'At this rate, it'll take 15 years for all to get COVID-19 vaccines'

New Delhi: As Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday requested that the Centre allow his government to scale up vaccination for Covid-19, the Aam Aadmi Party took sharp aim at the Centre for choosing to send vaccines to countries across the globe rather than vaccinating Indians first.

Chief spokesperson of the party, MLA Raghav Chadha, said that if the country continued its inoculation programme at its current pace, it would take at least 15 years before all of the country is vaccinated.

"Vaccination doses have been exported to 84 countries. The amount exported is higher than the number of vaccine doses given to the people in India. Should we care about people from our own country or from other countries?" Chadha said.

"Where has the Centre's vaccine nationalism gone? The AAP demands an increase in the rate of vaccinations against COVID-19 so that each and every Indian can get vaccinated," he said.

He further claimed that it will take 15 years to vaccinate the entire population of India if the vaccination drive continued at the current pace.

"Some scientists say that to contain the virus at least 70 per cent of the population has to be vaccinated. It will take 10 years to inoculate 70 per cent of the population of the country if the vaccination continues at the current pace while at the current pace, vaccinating everyone in the country will take about 15 years," he said.

In India, cumulatively, 7,91,05,163 vaccine doses have been administered through 12,31,148 sessions, as per the provisional report till 7 am on Monday.

While vaccination numbers in Delhi have been unimpressive with hesitation still a major obstacle for many, the Delhi government has insisted that it can vaccinate everyone in the Capital in 3 months but the only reason it was unable to do so was that the Centre was restricting the distribution of vaccines.

The CM had earlier also suggested that schools and community centres be roped in as vaccination centres so that more doses can be administered in a day.

Meanwhile, over 81,000 beneficiaries received shots of COVID-19 vaccine on Monday. By 6 pm, at least 81,545 people had received jabs, a senior official of the Delhi health department said. Final figures at 9 pm were not immediately available.

Out of these, 70,935 people got their first jabs while second doses were administered to 10,610 people, while 46,676 beneficiaries in the age group of 45-59 received shots, the official said. Three cases of minor adverse events following immunisation were reported.