About 40K people jabbed in a mega Covid vaccine drive in Hyderabad IT hub

About 40,000 people were vaccinated for Covid-19 at a mega convention centre in Hyderabad's IT hub on Sunday.

The joint initiative of the Cyberabad police, The Society for Cyberabad Security Council and Medicover hospitals is claimed to be “the biggest vaccination drive organized on a single day in the country,” till date.

“We had 38 thousand prior online registrations and adding the walk-ins, the total number of people vaccinated today would be about 40,000,” Dr Anil Krishna, MD, Medicover Hospitals told DH.

The vaccine administered was Bharat Biotech's Covaxin, with a single dose costing Rs 1400 including the Rs 140 inoculation charges.

Dr Srinivasa Rao, Director of Public Health and Family Welfare, Telangana, who was the chief guest at the “Mega Vaccination Drive” presented it as “the biggest vaccine drive ever organized on a single day anywhere in the world.”

The drive was paperless, touchless, cashless and contactless. However, it has caused massive traffic jams in the Hi-tech city area.

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“The drive was to begin at 8 am, but people started coming in from 6 am and much before their time slots, under the wrong impression that the vaccine stocks might get over. This has created a traffic jam for some time but we could bring the situation under control soon,” said Cyberabad commissioner VC Sajjanar.

Organizers said they followed all the Covid-19 protocols strictly to ensure the event does not become an infection spreader.

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“People could get jabbed in just 5 to 10 minutes, without having to wait in long queues. It was possible because of pre-registration, pre-online payment. All they had to do was to scan the QR code at the entry point and proceed to the vaccine counters,” said Krishna Yedula, Secretary-General, SCSC.

The Sunday drive was held in three mega halls at the Hitex convention grounds in the city's IT hub, with one hall reserved for senior citizens. 300 vaccine stations were set up, with 700 nurses pressed into service. A five-bed emergency care facility and 10 ambulances were kept on stand-by for any emergency.

Organizers said that they plan to conduct similar drives again at the same venue and also in other cities of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.