While every life-saving equipment is a survival kit, it’s the pace of vaccinations that will ultimately ensure India’s endurance against the virus.
Today, only 12 per cent Indians got their first dose, against 50 per cent in America. Currently, the vaccination rate is less than half million a day, sometimes falling further, given the shortage of vaccines. At this rate, it may take until summer 2022 to vaccinate 75 per cent of India.
A more dynamic and swifter pace of vaccinations is the antidote to arrest fatality numbers, build confidence and encourage a quicker economic revival. The polio experience is a test case.
REACH PEOPLE
At present, the approach of using hospitals for vaccinations has proved counter productive. A sudden desperation and opening up of vaccinations for the 18-44 age group has led to longer queues. This inevitably means a high probability of an infection while on a hospital visit. Using the CoWin platform to register and then showing up with identifiers like PAN or Aadhaar cards at selected jab centres like schools, community halls or sports venues often used as polling booths will decentralise the process. Mumbai and Gurgaon recently started “Drive-In” jabs. The country should undertake more such measures. The aim should be to reach people, rather than herding them at overcrowded hospitals.
MOHALLA METHOD
The “Mohalla Method” will increase vaccinated numbers in clusters. The knock-on effect is that as neighbourhoods vaccinate, infections will slow down in clusters, creating identifiable safe zones. Earmarked vaccinated zones enable city administrations to loosen lockdowns methodically in areas where jabs have crossed high numbers and infections have fallen.
Using age as the sole criteria for prioritisation, instead of a combination of age, economic status and population density, was always expected to pose challenges. The prioritisation of senior citizens meant most people unlikely to go to work were vaccinated first. Next in line were the 45-plus population, many of whom can afford private vehicles. The most vulnerable population was the 18-45 age group — where more people use public transport. Given India having over 70 per cent people under 45, and most frontline workers including delivery personnel fall in this category, the approach meant most of India was unvaccinated against the second wave.
States with worse Covid numbers could form the bigger focus in this vaccination plan. At a city level, densely populated areas require more vaccine booths — based on voter lists from elections. Citizens who aren’t on voters’ lists in their neighbourhoods can use Aadhaar cards. This also helps those facing a tech challenge in online registrations.
The “Mohalla Method” demands deployment of substantial numbers of health workers, logistics, and vaccines. Cynics may say this isn’t possible. But it actually works. India has over 12 lakh medical professionals, 7-8 lakh alternative medicine professionals, around two lakh medical students, diagnostic centre professionals, armed forces doctors, nursing assistants to provide jabs, the local police and paramilitary to handle the logistics and the armed forces to provide administrative support. Every neighbourhood can plan 5-6 centres of 25-30 volunteers each. Neighbourhood clusters could be simultaneously vaccinated in around 45-60 days (given availability of healthcare resources, vaccine supplies and errors in calculation).
We can reach a national jab rate of 10 million (one crore) a day, which means vaccinating the country in 4-5 months. In a worst-case scenario, if a third wave were to arrive in late 2021, most of India would have been vaccinated.
SHORTAGE
Choosing just two vaccines and then exporting them when just eight per cent of India was vaccinated was bound to lead to shortages. India needs over two billion jabs. Scaling up is a no-brainer. J&J’s Phase 3 trials are set to begin. Russia’s Sputnik V is here and will be distributed by Dr Reddy’s Labs. Bharat Biotech has ramped up its capacity from 200 million to 700 million doses a year. India has asked for a waiver on intellectual property and barriers on vaccines from Europe and America.
WAR NOT OVER
It’s taken a catastrophe for us to realise we must speed up vaccinations. To execute the blueprint, the bottom line is to shed lethargic bureaucracy and ensure an efficient supply chain and execution. A crisis taskforce needs to have a crack team of senior experts from amongst medical professionals, the armed forces and civil services. Like the polio campaign earlier, a targeted media campaign involving cricket and movie stars must be the focus. The campaign must be on a war footing and the national leadership has to make this period count. The war isn’t over till we have enough ammunition to fight for our citizens. And we must vaccinate to win.
(Dr Naresh Purohit is advisor to National Universal Immunisation Programme and National Communicable Disease Control Programme. He is also Advisor to six other National Health Programmes. He is visiting Professor in five Medical Universities of Southern India including Thrissur based Kerala University of Health Sciences. (The views and opinion expressed in this article are those of the author)
