Mumbai’s first drive-in vaccination centre starts functioning

Mumbai’s first drive-in vaccination centre started operations on Tuesday. The multi-storey Kohinoor parking lot on JK Sawant Marg, near Shivaji Park in Dadar West, which has been turned into a vaccination centre, offers a drive-in facility to senior citizens and specially-abled citizens.

Kiran Dighavkar, Assistant Commissioner of the G/North ward with jurisdiction over the area, said, “The facility has the capacity to inoculate 5,000 beneficiaries per day across seven booths. Two of these booths are reserved for drive-ins.”

The parking lot has enough space for 60 to 70 vehicles to queue up for the two booths, said Dighavkar. An estimated 200 people would be able to drive in for their shots at the facility. A registration stall will also be set up, but beneficiaries will be registered by staff at the centre as they wait in the queue.

As Mumbai received its first drive-in centre, other vaccination centres in Maharashtra saw chaos. Crowding outside a vaccination centre in Beed was reported. Several districts in Maharashtra are witnessing vaccine shortage which has also resulted in major inconvenience and protests by agitated public.

According to reports, a man with low oxygen levels was turned back by a clinic in Osmanabad and told to go to a bigger hospital as the clinic did not have oxygen supply. Gasping for breath, the man fell down outside the clinic and his body remained there for three hours until civic body workers picked up his mortal remains.

The Maharashtra government has requested the Centre to increase its current oxygen supply by 200 MT as demand rises. Chief Secretary Sitaram Kunte has written to Union Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba, urging him to pay personal attention to the immediate supply of oxygen to the state from nearby and other convenient locations.