At 3pc, private hospitals fall far behind in vaccination drive in TN

While the vaccination against Covid-19 is picking up after several measures taken by the state health department, especially mega vaccination drive and special vaccination drive, private hospitals are witnessing less number of people getting vaccinated at their sites.

Last year, the centre has ruled that 75 percent vaccine doses are allocated to state government healthcare facilities and 25 percent for private hospitals. The state health minister had urged the Union Health Ministry to allocate 90 percent of the total State allocation to the government and 10 percent to the private sector. However, private healthcare centres continue to witness less than even 10 percent vaccinations.

The private sector has vaccination about 29.33 lakh people in the State, against 9.40 crore government sector vaccination in the State, which is about 3 percent of the total vaccinations in Tamil Nadu. Earlier, health minister Ma Subramanian said that reports of vaccines getting expired in private hospitals have come but state health department cannot intervene as it is a Union Health Ministry decision.

Responding to the same, Dr Vinay Kumar, State Immunisation Officer at the Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine said that the government vaccination is free and it is natural for public to get vaccinated at government hospitals. However, the state health department is encouraging vaccination by private hospitals as part of CSR activities by corporate organisations and in such manner, the vaccines can be utilised better.