TN to vaccinate people travelling from other states as imported cases surge

CHENNAI: The State Health Department will vaccinate people travelling in groups from other States as a large number of imported cases of Covid are being reported in the past few days.

Health Minister Ma Subramanian said that the cases are seeing a surge in Delhi, Maharashtra, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and other parts of the country. A similar trend is being seen in Singapore, Malaysia, Germany, Israel and other countries. It has been noticed that people coming from other states have tested positive upon arrival in the State," he said.

"Construction workers usually come in groups and we are going to vaccinate people coming from other States in government hospitals. People coming from Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh who usually travel to Tamil Nadu for work have tested positive. Upon identification of these travellers, health department officials will conduct the RT-PCR tests for them and no matter how many people are there, we will vaccinate them for free at government hospitals," the Health Minister said.

He further said that as the cases of Covid are increasing, people should get vaccinated. About 91.41 per cent of people have been vaccinated with the first dose and 77.69 per cent have received the second dose in the State. As many as 1.46 crore people are due for the second dose, and 54 lakh people are yet to get first dose in Tamil Nadu.

Health Minister announced that the State Health Department will conduct a special mega vaccination drive at about 1 lakh locations across the State on May 8. "The vaccination will start at 7 am in the morning and will go on till 7 pm. The details of vaccination camps on district level and block level will be informed to the public through the respective district healthcare officials," he said.