Odisha plans more session sites for COVID-19 vaccination

Encouraged by over 85 percent immunisation on the first day of the COVID-19 vaccinationprogramme, Odisha government has formulated a strategy toincrease the number of people getting COVID-19 jabs, a seniorofficial said.As per the strategy all medical colleges, bothgovernment and private from Monday, will conduct at least fivesessions per day in different locations and in each sessionsite, 200 beneficiaries to be targeted, said Additional ChiefSecretary, Health and Family Welfare, P K Mohapatra.For each session site, two vaccinators and fourvaccination officers shall be deployed.

Encouraged by over 85 percent immunisation on the first day of the COVID-19 vaccinationprogramme, Odisha government has formulated a strategy toincrease the number of people getting COVID-19 jabs, a seniorofficial said.

As per the strategy all medical colleges, bothgovernment and private from Monday, will conduct at least fivesessions per day in different locations and in each sessionsite, 200 beneficiaries to be targeted, said Additional ChiefSecretary, Health and Family Welfare, P K Mohapatra.

''For each session site, two vaccinators and fourvaccination officers shall be deployed. Sessions shall beconducted on working days,'' Mohapatra said.

Similarly, district headquarters hospitals and sub-divisional hospitals will conduct onetwo sessions per daybased on the beneficiary load of the institution. The targetwill be 100 per day for each session.

Community Health Centres and Urban CHCs will conductone session per day and the target for a session is 100. Thesessions will be planned on Monday, Thursday and Saturday insuch institutions.

The session micro-plan will be prepared based on thevaccine availability and consolidated plan to be submitted tothe state by Monday noon, he said, adding that sessionplanning should be done in such a way so that the first phaseof vaccination can be completed by January 25. As many as 3.28lakh front line workers from health and sanitation departmentwill be covered in the first phase.

On the first day of the vaccination programme onSaturday, as many as 13,980 beneficiaries were administeredCOVID-19 vaccines across the state in 161 session sites. Sixdistricts achieved 100 vaccination on the first day.

Though some side effects were noticed in Dhenkanal,Salipur and Rayagada after some people got the shot of COVIDvaccine, it was ''due to nervousness'', said Director of HealthDepartment Bijay Panigrahi adding, that no major side effectshave been reported later.