Bhubaneswar: raised concerns about the third wave of Covid-19 who was anticipated and the impact on children, the minister of Chairman of Naveen Patnaik on Friday asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to launch a vaccine for the age group 12-18 as soon as possible.
In the video interaction between Modi and Minister of Minister of Selort, six countries watched the High Daily Caseload, Naveen said, “I want to request a vaccine for the age group 12-18 years to be prioritized and the earliest launched.” Besides Naveen, the meeting was attended by Tamil Nadu’s main ministers, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Maharashtra.
Naveen’s concern about children is based on the assumption that they might be more affected in the third wave which is possible because they are still not vaccinated since ongoing inoculation targeting them over 18 years.
Repeating the demand of the country to change the formula sharing vaccines between the government and private hospitals from 75:25 to 95: 5, Naveen told PM, “in Odisha, because the low presence of a private hospital, lifting the vaccine from a 25% quota less.” Referring to Previous communication with the central government about this issue, Naveen said, “We have written to the Government of India to increase the allocation of the state government to 95% and reduce the allocation of private hospitals to 5%.
This will help us in increasing the rate of vaccination in the state.
“While the Minister of Health Naba Kishore Das had written to the Health Minister Union Harsh Vardhan, Secretary of the Additional Chief Pradipta Kumar Mohapatra had sent a similar letter to the Union Health Secretary of Rajesh Bhushan to divert the vaccine quota to the government.
While Odisha has been locked up with countries that witness the number of high daily cases, said Naveen, “the Covid-19 situation in Odisha has increased in recent weeks and now the cases are in several coastal districts.” The positive cases of active Odisha on Friday more than 21,000 are the sixth highest among countries after Kerala (1.09 lakh), Maharashtra (1.07 lakh), Karnataka (32,000), Tamil Nadu (25,000) and Andhra Pradesh (25,000).
Data on the Ministry of Health shows that most new infections in Odisha are mainly reported from Khurda and Cuttack.
Of the 2070 new infections reported on Friday, the two districts contributed 765 (37%).
The highest 446 came from Khurda followed by 319 from Cuttack.
More than a third of active cases (7877 of 21,745) are concentrated in these two districts.
The whole TPR country has dropped below 4% over the past week and 2.95% on Friday.