Over 157 crore vaccine doses in 365 days: India's Covid-19 vax drive in numbers

PM Modi congratulated the nation, remarking that India’s vaccination program 'added great strength to the fight against Covid-19'

India’s Covid-19 vaccination programme completed a year on January 16, during which the country administered over 157 crore doses of vaccines to fully inoculate over 70 per cent of the adult population.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated the nation, remarking that India’s vaccination program “added great strength to the fight against Covid-19”. The government also launched a commemorative postal stamp to mark the day.

The first two vaccines approved by India’s drug regulator on January 2, Serum Institute of India’s Covishield and Bharat Bitoech’s Covaxin, shouldered most of the drive's weight, even as now when India has eight approved jabs. In the year, over 134 crore doses of Covishield were administered, while Covaxin lagged behind with over 21 crore as it was hit by supply woes months into the drive.

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When the drive was launched only for healthcare and frontline workers in January last year, it got off to a slow start owing to vaccine hesitancy and misinformation, two major hurdles for the government. Soon vaccinated healthcare workers took on geographical challenges to inoculate eligible populations in remote areas.

India achieved the milestone of administering 1 crore vaccine doses on February 19.

The drive unfolded in phases till May 1, when all adults above 18 became eligible for the vaccine at the peak of the deadly second wave of the virus. The government administered over 2.5 crore vaccine doses in a day on PM Modi’s birthday, on September 17. On October 21, vaccine doses administered crossed the 100-crore mark. To accelerate the second dose coverage, the government launched the Har Ghar Dastak Campaign in November. Earlier this month, the government started inoculating teens aged 15-17 and administering precautionary dose to healthcare, frontline workers and senior citizens.

Credit: Co-Win

India's vaccination drive in numbers

*As of January 17, 1,57,20,41,825 vaccine doses have been administered.

*Over 1.03 crore health care workers have received the first dose of the vaccine and 97.80 lakh are fully vaccinated.

*Over 1.70 crore frontline workers have been inoculated with both doses of the Covid-19 vaccine.

*Over 52.54 crore in the age group 18-24 have received one dose of the vaccine, while 36.93 crore are fully vaccinated.

*Over 19.76 crore in the age group 45-59 years have been vaccinated with one dose and 16.10 crore have received both doses.

* At least 10.08 crore senior citizens are fully vaccinated.

*The third dose or the precautionary dose that India started administering on January 10 has been given to 18.33 lakh healthcare workers, 14.81 lakh frontline workers and 11.33 lakh senior citizens.

*Over 76 crore vaccine doses have been given to women and over 3.69 lakh doses have been administered to transgenders.

*Over 6 lakh doses have been given to prison inmates.

*Over 11 crore have been vaccinated in tribal districts while 99 crore doses have been administered from rural Covid vaccination centres.

*Uttar Pradesh has inoculated the most number of adults, at 23,32,16,649, followed by Maharashtra (14,36,49,517), West Bengal (11,46,98,291) and Madhya Pradesh (10,76,61,391).

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