Inoculation drive to start for people over 45 years of age across all private hospitals in Kolkata

Kolkata: All private hospitals in Kolkata are gearing up for the vaccination drive that is to commence from April 1. They have set up a separate counter for providing vaccination for people over the age of 45 years. For the management of the rush that is expected to be during the first few weeks, the hospitals have also deployed additional manpower. Maximum of the hospitals are of the opinion that they need to divert the resources that are put into use for the second dose of health workers that will end up in March 31, to the people above 45 years of age.

In order to manage the extra load of people, AMRI Hospitals has planned to make use of additional staff. It has planned to provide vaccination to almost 500 people at every three units. 80% of the people should be over the age of 45 years.

The CEO of AMRI, Rupak Barua stated, “This is indeed a great move and will go a long way in checking the transmission of Covid. The 45- plus age group comprises the working population. They travel in public transport, which makes them susceptible to the virus. If we can protect this group, Covid will be restricted. We are ready to further step up the number of recipients since the government has said that there will be no dearth in the supply of vaccines”.

One of the vaccination centres from RN Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences (RTIICS)that is now being used for the second dose of vaccination to the health workers shall be used for the inoculation of the people aged above 45 years. The zonal head of RTIICS, R Venkatesh said, “While there will be a dedicated counter for the new group, we expect a huge rush initially, like what had happened when the 60-plus group was inducted. So, in case one counter is not enough, we will divert some of the recipients to the 60-plus window that is now less crowded”.

In order to control the imminent rush, Medica Superspeciality Hospital has decided to ‘streamline’ the vaccination procedure. The chairperson, Alok Roy stated, “There will be a scamper and it will be a challenge. We might have to involve more people to get things moving smoothly. But since the new group is a younger one, it should be faster and easier to handle them than the 60-plus group. Depending on the rush, we might have to allocate extra space”.

During the first few weeks of the upcoming month, Peerless Hospital too expects a massive rush of people. An additional space for the recipients are also in their plan. The CEO of Peerless Hospital, Sudipta Mitra exclaimed, “With the new entrants, vaccination counters will again be clogged. The 45-plus group is younger and mobile, unlike the senior citizens and they will try and get the jab as early as possible. Since this is a working group, they will be keen to get the vaccine sooner rather than later”.

According to the doctors, such a step is a great move in wiping out the virus and the sole attention should be on providing vaccination to the maximum number of people within the shortest span of time. The director of pulmonology from CMRI Hospital, Raja Dhar concluded, “So far, we have covered a miniscule part of the population. But now, the younger population will be covered. The aim should be to vaccinate them quickly. The government should also think about making the vaccine freely available at a price so that it can be taken everywhere rather than just a handful of hospitals”.