MUMBAI (Reuters) – The Indian government asked the union’s states and territories on Saturday to speed up COVID-19 vaccinations after a review found “substantial” space to accelerate the program.
India started what it says is the largest vaccination program in the world on January 16, with the goal of reaching 300 million people between July and August.
Twelve states and territories in the union have vaccinated 60% of their health professionals so far, but many need to improve their performance, the government said after an analysis by the federal health secretary.
He said in a statement that there remains “substantial scope for improvement in the average number of vaccinations per vaccination session.”
India vaccinated around 3 million health workers in the first two weeks of the campaign – an average of just over 200,000 a day – but will have to step up to meet its summer coverage target.
The government asked states to schedule all health workers for vaccination at least once by February 20 and all frontline workers by March 6.
India, the most populous country in the world after China, is relying on the CoWIN app to link beneficiaries to vaccines, despite initial software failures that have delayed the vaccination program.
India has officially reported more than 10.8 million infections, the largest in the world after the United States, although its daily cases have dropped dramatically since a peak in mid-September of nearly 100,000. The death toll is almost 155,000.
(Reporting by Abhirup Roy, edited by Timothy Heritage)