Tamil Nadu crosses 8 crore milestone as 19.07 lakh more inoculated

Tamil Nadu crossed a milestone of eight crore doses after Saturday’s vaccination drive. Of the 8.04 crore doses administered, 84.26 per cent vaccinated with the first doses and 54.73 per cent with both doses. Around 2.63 crore people were vaccinated against the pandemic virus during the 14 mega vaccination drives conducted earlier.

Chief Minister MK Stalin inspected the vaccination camps at Urban Primary Health Centre in Nandivaram. The State health department officials say more people turned up for the mega vaccination drive amidst the Omicron scare.

To encourage the vaccination drive, the State health department will conduct ‘village vaccination camps’ in addition to ‘mega vaccination camps’ to cover all those left out for the 1st dose and 2nd dose due to beneficiaries of the eligible population above 18 in the State.

The Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine has proposed to establish a sustainable model of providing services through a standalone vaccination centre in all 2,286 Primary Health Centers and Rs 10.69 crore is allocated for the same. One vaccinator each will be hired temporarily for the standalone vaccination centre and they will be trained for RT-PCR test, vaccination, and swab sample collection.

Talking about the medical admissions, the health minister said a total of 6,958 MBBS seats have been allocated in the State and 1,925 seats have been allocated for the BDS course this year.