Kerala is still reeling under a shortage of Covaxin. Over the last 42 days, hundreds of people have missed their second dose of Covaxin even as the state received 9.85 lakh additional vaccine doses on June 19. Of this, only 97,500 vaccines were Covaxin and by June 21, the state had only around 24,000 doses of Covaxin left. Though the state has not published separate data on how many people received Covaxin and Covishield, a medical officer associated with the vaccination drive in Kerala said that there has been a shortage of Covaxin across the state and that hundreds of people missed the second dose within the stipulated time.
According to a press statement from Health Minister Veena George, on June 19, Kerala received 9.85 lakh doses of vaccines. Of this, the state bought 1,32,340 doses of Covishield, while the Union government provided six lakh doses of the vaccine. It also included 97,500 doses of Covaxin. "Kerala has received 1,21,75,020 (1.21 crore) doses of vaccine so far. A total of 12,04,960 Covishield doses and 1,37,580 doses of Covaxin were bought by the state, while the rest 1,08,32,480 doses were provided by the Union government," the statement said.
While there is also no consolidated, state-wise data on how much is the requirement for the second dose, the shortage has affected different districts differently. Dr MG Sivadas, the nodal officer for immunisation in Ernakulam, said that the shortage hasn't affected the drive in the district as they have stock for administering the first dose accordingly. "As per this, we required 2,000 vaccines to administer the second dose for which we received 12,000 doses now. We never had shortages as we kept the doses for the second jab," he told TNM adding that the shortage can be avoided with planning.
A source, however, told TNM that there has been no such instruction in the state of keeping the stock for the second dose. "Rather we were told to administer the doses we received and to keep the drive moving as and when we received more doses. For Covaxin, it's ideal to take the second dose 42 days after the first dose. However, since there is a shortage of vaccines, the option is to give the second jab when the vaccine is available," he said. According to the Indian Council of Medical Research, the second dose of Covaxin can be taken from four to six weeks after the first dose.
As of June 19, a total of 12,086,457 (1.20 crore) beneficiaries above 18 years have received the vaccine doses, either fully or partially. In the age group above 45 years, 71.39 lakh people received the first dose, and only 15.97 lakh among them have received their second dose. Only 14% of the people in the age group population have been fully vaccinated. In the 18-44 years age group, 14.53 lakh have received their first dose, while 3,361 have received their second dose. In Kerala, in May, also the Covaxin shortage had affected the coverage of the second dose. The Covaxin shortage has affected other states too. In Tamil Nadu, at least 1,41,319 people could not get their second within six weeks.
"There is no need to panic if you can get the second shot in two months," said Dr KP Aravindan, who is part of the state government's medical advisory panel on COVID-19 management. Dr KK Purushothaman, former head of the pediatric department of Thrissur Government Medical College, said that such a scenario should have been foreseen and planned by the state government accordingly. "The production capacity of Bharat Biotech is 65 lakh per month. If they enhance their capacity, they can produce from 1 to 1.5 crore. The state received 95,000 doses of Covaxin on June 19, but that won't be enough to give the vaccination drive at a fair pace," Dr Purushothaman said.
While there has been a general shortage of Covaxin in certain districts, there is a shortage of Covishield too. In Alappuzha, there has been a shortage of both. "No vaccination was scheduled for the past couple of days as there was a shortage of both Covaxin and Covishield. We will resume the vaccination scheduling from June 21," Alappuzha District Medical Officer L Anithakumari said.