Health

India administers record 25 million anti-Covid jabs in a day

New Delhi, Sep 18 (EFE).- India administered over 25 million vaccines against Covid-19 on Friday, a new record achieved through a special campaign to mark Prime Minister Narendra Modis 71st birthday.

“I would like to appreciate all the doctors, medical staff, people in administration in the country. With your efforts, India made a record of vaccinating more than 2.5 crore (25 million) people in a single day yesterday,” Modi said in a video message on Saturday.

The health ministry said that while establishing the record, the authorities had clocked “over 42,000 vaccinations (per) minute or 700 (per) second.”

Due to the magnitude of Friday’s campaign, officials have said that the exact number of vaccine doses given on the day would only be available by Saturday night.

According to official data, around 794 million vaccine doses have now been administered among a population of around 1.35 billion since the campaign kicked off in January.

In the last few weeks, India has registered one of its highest vaccination data, on several occasions, with 10 million vaccines in a single day.

However, the Friday figures far exceed the vaccination average in the last two weeks.

Still, with an adult population of more than 950 million people, the country is far from fully immunizing its eligible population.

So far, only 198.8 million people have fully inoculated themselves.

The Modi government has set a goal to fully vaccinate 60 percent of the entire population by the end of the year, which would mean inoculating an average of 10 million people per day.

The limited availability of vaccines has rocked the vaccination plan of India, known as “the pharmacy of the world.”

The country is home to the largest vaccine factory.

The India vaccine drive relies heavily on two locally manufactured antigens – AstraZeneca’s Covishield and the indigenous Covaxin of the Bharat Biotech.

It also has other licensed vaccines like the Russian Sputnik.

According to the Indian Ministry of Health, the country has over 60 million unused vaccine doses still available.

According to government policy, 75 percent of vaccine production destined for India goes to the state and is administered free.

Only 25 percent goes to private clinics. EFE.

mt/ia

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