Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Thursday directed the Health Department to explore possibilities of floating a global tender for the procurement of vaccines from all possible sources to ensure early inoculation in the state. The state government will also reach out directly to all vaccine manufacturers for direct purchase of various Covid vaccines, including Sputnik V, Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson, he announced.
The Chief Minister said all efforts would be made to procure vaccines and meet the acute shortage in the state, which has received fewer than 44 lakh vaccine doses from the Government of India, of which only 1 lakh is currently available for use and will be exhausted within a day. As per GoI allocation for the 18-44 age group, the state government has been able to buy only 3.6 lakh vaccine doses, including 63,000 received on Wednesday. 2.3 lakh doses have already been used, leaving only 1.3 lakh, said the Chief Minister.
Pointing out that almost 1 lakh unregistered construction workers and their family members have come forward for getting vaccinated in line with the state’s priority vaccination for the 18-44 category, the CM asked the Labour Department to ensure the registration of these workers on priority.
During the review meeting, Covid Expert Group head Dr KK Talwar also noted that the existing vaccines have been found to be effective against the new variants so far.