Telangana asks Centre to supply 50 lakh doses of Covishield to ramp up booster jabs

Hyderabad, Aug 9 (PTI) The Telangana government on Tuesday urged Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya to supply at least 50 lakh doses of Covishield vaccine "urgently" to enable the state to ramp up the pace of precautionary doses.

In a letter to Mandaviya, state Health Minister T Harish Rao said the Telangana government has decided to take up a massive drive for administration of precautionary dose to the eligible population.

At present, the state is administering about 1.5 lakh doses per day.

However, based on the demand, there is potential to administer over three lakh precautionary doses per day which the state is not able to meet as "there is shortage of vaccine supplies, particularly for Covishield", Harish Rao said.

The state government has urged the Centre, from time to time, to increase the supply of vaccines. The state is, however, receiving vaccines only in small quantities making it difficult for the state to ramp up vaccination from present levels, he said.

As of now, the state has only 2.7 lakh doses of Covishield which was not sufficient even for two days, he said.

"I, therefore, request the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare to kindly arrange to supply at least 50 lakh doses of Covishield vaccine to Telangana urgently to enable the state to ramp up the pace of precautionary doses," the state Health Minister said.

Telangana has achieved 106 per cent coverage of first dose of COVID vaccination and 104 per cent for the second dose, for 18 years-plus population which is one of the highest in the country, he said.