No fresh registration for healthcare workers to get Covid vaccine: Centre

Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said the registration of people above 45 will continue on the CoWIN website.

He asked states and union territories to ensure quick vaccination of healthcare and frontline medical workers who have already registered.

Some ineligible beneficiaries in these two categories have been found adding their names and getting vaccinated, which is a violation of guidelines, the Health Ministry said in the order.

When the vaccination process started in the country in January, there were reports about some healthcare and frontline medical staff being hesitant to take the jab.

They were thereafter asked to get inoculated and warned of not losing that chance, said reports.

Doctors and other health professionals were the first categories to be vaccinated in the country.

More than 7.44 crore people were administered vaccine doses in the country till Saturday.

These include 89,53,552 Healthcare Workers (HCWs) who have taken the 1st dose and 53,06,671 HCWs who have taken the 2nd dose, 96,19,289 Frontline Workers (FLWs) (1st dose), 40,18,526 FLWs (2nd dose), 4,57,78,875 for more than 45 years old(1st Dose) and 7,65,354 for more than 45 years old (2nd dose).

"Total 13,00,146 vaccine doses were given till 8 pm today, the Seventy Eighth day of nationwide COVID19 vaccination. Out of which 11,86,621 beneficiaries were vaccinated for 1st dose and 1,13,525 beneficiaries received 2nd dose of the vaccine as per the provisional report. Final reports would be completed for the day by late tonight," a Union health Ministry statement said.