2nd lot of COVID vaccine for Assam arrives at Guwahati airport

Assam received the secondconsignment of COVID-19 vaccine on Wednesday as a cargo flightof a private airline carrying 12,000 doses of indigenouslydeveloped 'Covaxin' landed at the Lokopriya Gopinath BordoloiInternational (LGBI) Airport here, an official said.

The freighter ferried three boxes, weighing around78.5 kg, of the COVID vaccine from Hyderabad, he said.

''The consignment was shipped by Bharat Biotech andhanded over to state government officials within six minutesof its arrival,'' a spokesperson of the Airport Authority ofIndia said.

All the formalities were completed before the arrivalof the flight for quick transportation of the vaccinesdirectly from the aircraft, he said.

A consignment of COVID vaccine for Manipur is expectedto arrive at the airport during the day, the official said.

The LGBI Airport has been marked as the nodal point ofdistribution of vaccines for the North East and it is equippedto transport such consignments to the regional states, hesaid.

The first batch of 2.40 lakh vials of COVID-19 vaccinefor Assam and Meghalaya had landed at the airport here onTuesday.

The Assam health department has kept the vaccines at astate-run store and will start distribution of it soon, astate government official said.

Assam will launch the vaccination programme on January16 with priority to be given to healthcare and frontlineworkers, he said.

''We will roll out the drive from 74 sites acrossAssam, and 1,85,235 state health workers and 5,524 personnelfrom central medical agencies have registered their names forthe programme,'' the official added.