The dry run for the COVID-19 vaccine was conducted according to the protocol without any issues here in the district on Saturday.
Addressing the media after the successful completion of the dry run held between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m., District Collector V. Vinay Chand said that all protocols were followed and it concluded successfully.
The dry run was held in three hospitals in the city — Government ENT Hospital, Pradhama Hospital and the Regional Health Centre at Simhachalam.
According to the District Collector, 34,761 health workers, including doctors, nurses, paramedic staff, lab assistants, ministerial staff, ANM, Aasha workers and anganwadi workers, will be vaccinated in the first phase, which is scheduled to begin shortly.
Disposable syringes
According to the directions from the Union government, each person will be administered 0.5 ml of dosage and twice within 28 days or three weeks. Disposable syringes will be used and a system is in place to dispose them of scientifically, said Mr. Vinay Chand.
According to the process, an SMS will be sent to the mobile phone of each of the person to be vaccinated, indicated the date, time and place of vaccination. Each centre or session site will have three rooms. One is a waiting room where their identity will be checked, the second is the vaccination room and the third will be the observation room, where they will be kept under observation for 30 minutes. In case of any adverse effect, they will be shifted in the waiting ambulance to the nearest bigger hospital, which will be tagged to the session site for treatment.
The district has also constituted a AEFI (Adverse Event Following Immunisation) committee, comprising a cardiologist, neurologist, neuro surgeon, general physician and anaesthesiologist.
“Every hospital will have such a team and they will monitor the condition of the patient in case of any adverse event,” said Mr. Vinay Chand.
He also informed the media that a special software Co-Win has been developed to handle the vaccination programme, and everything will be fed into it, including the details of the people.
In the second phase, frontline workers will be vaccinated and in the third phase, people above 50 years with or without comorbidities will be administered.
Regional store point
Mr. Vinay Chand informed that the vaccines will be delivered from the manufacturers through special refrigerated vehicles and Visakhapatnam has been made the regional store point for the districts of Vizianagaram, Srikakulam and East Godavari.
“All the vaccines will arrive in Visakhapatnam and stored in freezers that have been built specifically for this purpose in 2° to 6° Celsius. We can store at a time close to 17 lakh vaccines,” he said. From the storage points the vaccines will be sent to the cold chain points in the districts, which will be the CHCs, area hospitals and district hospitals.
From the cold chain points, the vaccines will be shifted in freezer boxes to the session centres, where it will be administered to the people, as per the listing.
In Visakha agency, where villages are inaccessible, the 44 shandy points (weekly market points) are being targeted to host the session centres, said Mr. Vinay Chand.
Each session centre will work from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and each will be equipped to administer at least 100 vaccines, per day, he added. On which vaccine will be given, he said that at least three, including the Covishield, have been approved and it depends, which one will be sent.
He also said that there is no cost component involved and will be given free of cost. He also said that the staff and vaccinators have been trained and are in sufficient numbers.
