The Delhi government on Thursday announced that it will provide free COVID-19 precaution doses to all eligible beneficiaries in the 18-59 age group at its vaccination centres. The precaution dose was available free of cost only to those above 60 years of age, healthcare workers and frontline workers until now.
An order issued by the Directorate of Family Welfare, said the vaccine used for previous doses will also be used as precaution dose. Those with a gap of nine months or more from the date of administration of the second dose will be eligible for the precaution dose.
“Necessary changes in Co-WIN app have been made for Delhi wherin both online appointment and walk-in appointment will be available. It is not necessary to register any citizen afresh for administration of precautionary dose,” the order said.
Earlier on April 10, the Centre had said that the precaution dose for those above 18 years will be available at private vaccination centres only.
Delhi government’s decision to provide free precaution doses comes at a time when COVID-19 cases have been steadily rising in the Capital. According to the health bulletin released on Thursday, 965 new COVID-19 cases were registered in Delhi on Thursday taking the number of active cases in the city to 2,970. The positivity rate was 4.71% with 20,480 tests having been conducted.
The Delhi government on Wednesday made wearing masks mandatory in public places and announced a fine of Rs 500 on violators, just eight days after it had relaxed this norm due to a decline in cases.
Delhi has also started genome sequencing of samples of all COVID-infected people to ascertain if a new variant, such as the XE, has spread in the city.
