Cent percent of eligible group for vaccination is within reach for India now as over 97% have been vaccinated. This has brought economic, educational and even social activities back to normal. This has not been easy ride for sure. India has braved 3rd wave very effectively and is almost back to normalcy. Beginning of the vaccination process was not a nice sight when only 450-550 million doses seemed doable, as late as Nov 2020. There were huge concerns of difficulties in geographical mobility and lack of cold storage facilities. With multiple other factors acting towards vaccine wastage, India had a mountain to move.
Hence, since the beginning of world’s largest vaccination drive, India has battled both vaccine hesitancy and vaccine shortage to reach current vaccine demand across the nation and abroad. A lot has happened since the first vaccine dose was administered on January 16, 2021. On February 19 2021, within just a month of its start, India had already achieved the 1 crore vaccination milestone.One of the key challenges in the success of the vaccination drive also involved the need for a robust registration and tracking mechanism for the beneficiaries. In March 2021, India began vaccination registration through CoWin portal, Arogya Setu and Umang App.
The Co-WIN platform was at the heart of the vaccination drive. In a country like India, where access to technology and digital literacy is limited, introducing a digital platform like CoWIN was a challenge. The software performed the crucial functions of registration of beneficiaries, the listing of facilities/planning unit and session sites, planning and scheduling of vaccine sessions with real-time status on booked and available booking slots on different dates and at different sites, end-to-end implementation of vaccine process, traceability of beneficiaries and monitoring of vaccine doses and wastages, etc. at national, state, district and block levels. Fast forward to October 21, 2021, the country had already hit its Vaccine Century with the administration of 100 crore vaccine doses. The same month, India also launched ICMR’s “i-Drone” (Drone Response and Outreach in North East) policy. For the first time, a “Make in India’ drone was used in South Asia to transport COVID vaccine over an aerial distance of 15 kms in 12-15 mins from the Bishnupur district hospital to Loktak lake. With this India had mounted over the challenge of vaccine delivery to far-flung areas, ensuring that none was left behind. To ensure that the vaccine reached every household, the Government had launched “Har Ghar Dastak” (door-to-door) vaccination campaign on November 3, 2021, to achieve 100 per cent first dose coverage.
India’s fight against COVID19 opened gates for an ecosystem that supported indigenous manufacturing and innovation. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation co-chair Bill Gates lauded India’s work on design, manufacturing and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines that helped save a massive number of lives. He also called it “a testament to innovation.” And why not, from CoWin platform, affordable COVID testing kits to innovative PPE kits for doctors, the country has developed devices that ensure innovations meet necessities.
Indeed, India has leapt into the front-row seat in the post-Covid world order due to its large scale implementation capabilities demonstrated in handling the pandemic while considering the welfare of all at home with Sabka Saath and abroad with Vaccine Maitri.
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