India administered more than 62.42 lakh vaccine doses till 9 pm on Wednesday with Madhya Pradesh (a little over 11 lakh), Uttar Pradesh (over 7 lakh) and Maharashtra (over 6 lakh) leading from the front.
This is nearly 10 lakh more doses than Tuesday, when the jabs administered by M.P. had fallen precipitously.
On Monday, India entered a new phase of its inoculation strategy in which the Centre will procure 75 per cent of the vaccines produced in the country and distribute them free of cost to the States.
That day, India saw a record inoculation of about 88 lakh, of which 63.68 per cent was in rural parts. Cumulatively, the country has administered close to 29.63 crore doses so far, according to the CoWIN dashboard.
In his media conference on Tuesday, VK Paul, NITI Aayog Member (Health), had said that 71 per cent of the vaccination centres are in rural areas and, consistently, more than half the total vaccination carried out in the last few weeks had been in Bharat.
Coverage in Bharat
“With the increase in the use of the IT system, educating people about the use of vaccination and with people accepting it, with more vaccines being taken to the rural areas, we are getting more confidence and hope that covering rural areas entirely will be possible,” added Paul. He also noted that there had been no glitches in the CoWIN platform despite the jump in vaccine administration the last few days.
On Wednesday, the government said that around 29.68 crore vaccine doses have been provided to States and UTs so far through the government’s free channel and through the direct state procurement category. Of this, the total consumption, including wastage, was around 27.76 crore doses. More than 1.92 crore vaccine doses are still available with the States and UTs, it said.