New Delhi: As India completes five months into its massive vaccination drive against the deadly Covid-19, the country so far has been able to inoculate over 21 crore people with at least one dose of the vaccine, making it the country with the second highest vaccinated population overall.
In total, India has administered over 26 crore doses of Covid-19 vaccine as on 18 June, out of which, only 4 crore 85 lakh people in the country have been fully vaccinated, making India stand with just a little over 6% of its total population being fully vaccinated, while over 21 crore 60 lakh people have been administered with a single dose of the Covid-19 vaccine jab so far.
The Covid-19 inoculation drive in India was started on January 16, with the first phase of vaccinating frontline workers, which included healthcare workers, sanitation workers and some other sections of people who were directly being exposed to the Covid-19 virus.
Currently, India is majorly using two vaccines against Covid-19 in its inoculation drive–one being the Indian Serum Institute manufactured Covishield, and the indigenously made Covaxin which is manufactured by Bharat Biotech. Both these vaccines are inactivated vaccines. The Russian made Sputnik V vaccine which has received approval in India, is yet to be administered to the public in India.
Amongst the two vaccines currently available, Covishield is the vaccine which is widely being administered in the country. Over 23 crore doses of Covishield have been administered in India, while just a little over 3 crore doses of Covaxin have been administered to the Indian population.
An age group-wise comparison on vaccination on the government’s CoWin portal shows that about 8 crore 50 lakh people belonging to the age group of between 45 to 60 years have received at least one dose of the Covid-19 jab, while over 6 crore 45 lakh people from the age group of 60 plus have received at least one dose of the Covid-19 jab.
The younger population of India, belonging to the 18-45 age group, which constitutes the largest percentage of the population in India, is being vaccinated at a much slower pace. According to government data on CoWin platform, just a little over 6 crore 75 lakh individuals from this age group have received at least one jab of the Covid-19 vaccine. India’s vaccination drive was opened in a phased manner, with the first phase being open on 16 January only for healthcare and frontline workers; the second phase was started on 1 March to inoculate all those above the age of 60. In the first phase of vaccination, the country was doing about 3,13,000 doses per day, this increased to about 1.7 million doses in the second phase owing to the fact that vaccination was then opened to the general public above the age of 60.
The third phase of vaccination began exactly a month after it was opened for the 60 years and above age group. From 1 April, the government allowed all those who are above the age of 45 to be inoculated with the Covid-19 vaccine and at this phase, the country was administering about 3 million doses per day. However, after growing demand for vaccination for all adults, the drive was thrown open to all adults in India in its phase 4 stage in mid-May where anyone above the age of 18 years was eligible to get the jab. In this phase, the vaccination number also started to fall, from 3 million doses per day, it was reduced to 2.3 million doses per day, even when a large chunk of the population was now eligible to get vaccinated.
States blamed the unavailability of doses for the falling number of vaccinations in the country, with both the manufacturers claiming that their production capacity was stretched to supply such high number to doses. A state-wise comparison on the number of doses administered shows that Gujarat, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan are some of the states that have done over one crore vaccination of at least one dose till now.
In the country-wise comparison, India stands at number two in terms the total number of doses of vaccine administered to the population, but when compared to the percentage of population vaccinated, India stands at the bottom of the table, with just 6% of its total population being fully vaccinated and 12% of the population being administered at least one dose of the vaccine. Countries like Israel have fully vaccinated over 60% of its population. The UK and the US have fully vaccinated over 40% of its population. Germany and France have fully vaccinated about 30% of its population so far.