IT Desk
On June 4, 2021, Advisor RCH, of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, Dr. Pradeep Haldar , had written a letter to all the Mission Directors of the National Health Mission of all states and Union Territories of the Country. It was an instruction to not let leak out the vaccine stock available with the state. What actually is the hidden agenda of the government of India on this instruction to not let the people know about the vaccine stock of a state. Moreover, the letter also gave strict instructions on how the vaccines are being stored under what temperature. Does that mean that people don’t have the right to know the vaccine stock in the country as well as in the state? How will this help in containing the pandemic?
With the instruction, it is obvious that people will not know how much Covid vaccine doses are in stock with the State Vaccine Store of the State Health Department?
With the spike of Covid-19 cases across the nation, the only means left to stay protected from the virus is either to follow the State administrators’ prepared SOPs or to vaccinate at least 40% to 60% of the total population. As of now, there is no medicine to cure the Covid patient, however, leaving no other option moderate and severe Covid infected people thronged on to hospital with hopes for survival, even though they had no idea of how they are being treated by the doctors and other health workers in the hospital. With the influx of Covid patients hospitals which provide health care service to any kind of diseases have also stopped giving service by closing the OPD or by stopping conducting of surgery due to lack of oxygen. The only thing that has been providing to Covid patients at hospitals are giving immune booster medicine and oxygen which is common for all. There are reports of giving life-saving Covid vaccines like Ramdesevir or some other steroid at some hospitals but not all the people of this country, which is the 2nd largest population in the world are fortunate enough to get cured from the second wave.
So the only means left at the moment to protect people from the attack of the virus is to vaccinate as many people as possible and by enforcing the strict standard operative procedures (SOP) – like social distancing, frequent washing of hands, using sanitizers and most importantly using face masks.
When the world agreed that vaccination is of extreme importance for any nation to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, one wonder why the government of India is not accelerating the vaccination by organising mass vaccination programmme.
The common people who have been severely affected by the invasion of the dreaded virus have every right to know how safe they are , what safety measures are being taken up by the government, and besides, when will they get the vaccine, which the government had appealed to get vaccinated by advertising at the various medium of mass media.
As of today, except for the number of deaths caused by the Covid and the number of people who tested positive with the Covid-19 and the number of people so far vaccinated are the only information made to the public.
The government has so far not announced the number of vaccine doses in stock with the government, perhaps, that is one reason for the state to slow down the vaccination process. There should be complete transparency in the issue of vaccine as it is the only option left for the human being to protect from the killer virus.
