Over 60 lakh beneficiaries received the first dose of Covid-19 vaccine in India with 2,23,298 people receiving it on Monday till 6 pm, the Health Ministry said here.

India is third among the countries which have administered a maximum number of Covid vaccinations till date, after the US and the UK.

Within the country, over 54.12 lakh health care workers and 6.23 lakh frontline workers have been administered the first dose of the vaccine so far. According to Manohar Agnani, Additional Secretary in the Health Ministry, 11 States have already inoculated over 65 per cent of the health care workers.

Among the States which topped the list with the maximum coverage is Bihar, which vaccinated 77.6 per cent of its health care personnel. Following it, Tripura with 76.4 per cent and Madhya Pradesh which covered 76 per cent of health care workers. Among the States that are lagging with less than 40 per cent coverage are Delhi, Punjab and Tamil Nadu.

On Monday, Maharashtra with 23,615 vaccinations, Karnataka with 23,092 and Madhya Pradesh with 20,633, were top among the 10 States which reported over 10,000 vaccinations.

According to the official, 23 deaths were reported among the vaccinated people so far, including one in Andhra Pradesh where a 29-year-old female passed away. The postmortem results of the deceased are still awaited. All other deaths were not found to have any causal link with the vaccination.

Similarly, there were a total of 29 vaccination-related hospitalisations of which 19 have been discharged. One new case of hospitalisation was reported from Kerala who suffered facial palsy following vaccination.