Due to the unavailability of enough vaccine doses, the COVID-19 vaccination drive in Mumbai will be suspended on Thursday at the centres run by the city civic body and the Maharashtra government, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said on Wednesday. Of the total 342 active COVID-19 vaccination centres in Mumbai, 243 are managed by the BMC and 20 by the state government. The decision to suspend the vaccination drive on Thursday was taken due to the unavailability of a sufficient number of vaccines, the civic body said in a release.
According to the BMC's update, so far 33.74 lakh people have been administered COVID-19 vaccine doses in Mumbai, including 49,833 doses given on Wednesday. The civic body said it was expecting to receive vaccines anytime throughout the day on June 3. Thereafter, the inoculation drive will resume the next day (June 4). The BMC had floated a global tender for the supply of one crore vaccine doses.
In a release issued on Tuesday, the civic body had claimed that it has received response from nine bidders, who are ready to supply mainly Sputnik Light and Sputnik V vaccines. BJP's group leader in BMC, Prabhakar Shinde, said there is still uncertainty over the vaccine supply.
"None of the bidders has submitted the copy of the agreement with the vaccine manufacturers. Hence, there is no clarity about the supply of vaccines yet," Shinde, who had raised points of information in BMC's standing committee meeting, said.
As of Wednesday, Mumbai's COVID-19 case count stands at 7,08,007 while the overall death toll is 14,938. The financial capital is now left with 16,580 active cases, as per the BMC. On Monday and Tuesday, Mumbai had logged 676 and 831 cases, respectively. Mumbai now has 30 active containment zones in slums and chawls, and 133 active sealed buildings. At 11,163, Mumbai had reported the peak of COVID-19 cases on April 4. The city had seen the highest number of COVID-19 fatalities in a day on May 1.