Have enough infra to vaccinate city's entire population in few weeks: Jain

New Delhi: Health Minister Satyendar Jain on Friday said Delhi has sufficient infrastructure and equipment to vaccinate its entire population in a few weeks once a COVID-19 vaccine is available. "There is no need to worry about storage of vaccines. We have a large number of health care facilities, such as mohalla clinics, poly clinics, and hospitals etc, where a COVID-19 vaccine can be administered to people," Jain told reporters. "Once a vaccine is available, we can vaccinate the entire population of Delhi in a few weeks," the minister said.

Jain also said Delhi should be given priority during the distribution of the vaccine as it is the national capital. A three-storeyed building on the premises of Rajiv Gandhi Super Specialty Hospital has also been identified for storage of COVID-19 vaccines. On Thursday, Delhi's Immunization Officer Suresh Seth had said the national capital is geared up for the COVID-19 vaccination programme and the city's entire population can be covered in a month.

"We have 600 cold storage points and around 1,800 outreach sites for the universal immunization programme for children. We have sufficient equipment for vaccines that can be stored at a temperature of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius and those that need minus 15 to minus 25 degrees Celsius. The central government is further strengthening the infrastructure and providing more equipment," Seth had said.

He had said the equipment and infrastructure for vaccines that need ultra-cold conditions (minus 70 degrees Celsius) are not there, but "we don't think there will be any problem logistically because the immunization programme will be carried out in a phased manner".

"If we involve hospital staff and nurses etc., we can easily vaccinate the entire population in a month," he had said, adding that at present, the Delhi government is collecting data of health care workers who are at top of the priority list of the Delhi government.

"If a vaccine is available, we can administer it to all healthcare workers in just three days... We have sufficient equipment and cold storage space, we are geared up. We won't let Delhi falter," Seth stressed.

Meanwhile, Delhi recorded 5,482 fresh COVID-19 cases on Friday, while 98 more fatalities pushed the death toll in the city to 8,909, the authorities said. The positivity rate was 8.51 percent. It was 8.65 percent on Thursday and 8.49 percent on Wednesday.

As many as 64,455 tests, including 28,100 RT-PCR tests and 36,355 rapid antigen tests, were conducted the previous day for detection of the novel coronavirus disease, said a bulletin issued by the Delhi health department on Friday. As many as 28,897 RT-PCR tests — the highest till date in the city — were conducted on Wednesday.

According to the bulletin, the total number of coronavirus cases climbed to 5,56,744 on Friday, of which 5,09,654 patients have recovered. The tally of active cases in Delhi was 38,181 down from 38,734 on Thursday.