NEW DELHI: India, till Thursday, has vaccinated 45 per cent of its 97 lakh-plus health-care workers with the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, with the second dose due on February 13.
Of the vaccinated persons, 37 lakh were reached by the government to seek feedback on the vaccine experience, of which 97.38 per cent said they were satisfied and 2.62 pc answered otherwise.
The government said 19 deaths had happened after vaccinations so far but no vaccine linked death had been detected yet.
Post mortems have been conducted in all deaths, and the state and national adverse events following the immunisation committees are reviewing data.
So far, the total AEFIs reported are 1,150 with only 0.0007 per cent being hospitalised.
The government also shared the findings of the third sero-surveillance conducted by the ICMR to detect the percentage of people exposed to the COVID-19 pandemic.
So far, 21.5 per cent of the general population group of 28,000 people covered, showed antibodies to the disease.
The percentage of people exposed to antibodies was 31.7 per cent higher in urban slums and 25.6 per cent in health-care workers, with doctors and nurses reporting over 26 per cent sero-prevalence rate.
The government said it had used 1,239 private and 5,912 public facilities for vaccination in the past 18 days.
States that have done well and have covered over 50 per cent health workers are Madhya Pradesh at 73.6 per cent; Rajasthan, Tripura, Mizoram, Lakshadweep, Odisha, Kerala, Haryana at 55.9 per cent; Bihar, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Himachal Pradesh at 54.3 per cent; Uttarakhand at 53 per cent and Uttar Pradesh at 50 per cent.
Poorly performing states with lower than 30 per cent vaccine coverage are Sikkim, Ladakh, Tamil Nady, Jammu and Kashmir, Chandigarh (a fairly aware metro city with 22.60 pc coverage), Daman Diu, Assam, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Manipur and Puducherry.
“We had projected one crore health-care workers but when the data came, it was 96,31,637 health-care workers. So far, as many as 43,91,826 — which is 45 per cent of the targeted number — have been vaccinated,” Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said, adding that with sero-survey showing that majority people were vulnerable, there was no cause for complacency.
The sero-survey was done between December 17 and January 8 in a general population of 28,589 and 7,171 health-care workers.
“Same 700 villages, 70 districts and 21 states selected for the earlier two rounds of sero survey were chosen. As many as 100 healthcare workers per district were covered and we found sero prevalence in adults of 21.4 per cent, urban slums 31.7 per cent, non-urban slums 26.2 per cent and 19.1 per cent rural,” ICMR chief Balram Bhargava said.
Health workers showed greater exposure of 25.7 per cent with 26.6 per cent in doctors and nurses.
The ICMR said a good proportion was still vulnerable and people must practise COVID-appropriate behaviour.