Mumbai: CoWIN errors major hurdle in vaccination of 60-plus

A nurse administers COVID-19 vaccine to a frontline worker, at Nair Hospital on Wednesday. Pic/Ashish Raje

Despite the availability of data on 1.6 lakh healthcare and 1.9 lakh frontline workers, the BMC is struggling to administer COVID-19 vaccines at full capacity due to technical glitches in the CoWIN app. These errors now pose a bigger challenge for the corporation as the Centre on Wednesday announced vaccination for everyone aged above 60 and citizens who are 45-plus and have comorbidities from March 1.

The city has more than 30 lakh senior citizens and the number of people with comorbidities is uncertain. The unavailability of data will create a hurdle in enrolling them for vaccination. Meanwhile, the BMC is waiting for specifications on comorbidities.

Until now, out of 1.6 lakh healthcare workers, 1.03 lakh have taken their first dose and 13,754 their second dose. Out of 1.9 lakh frontline workers, 83,241 have received their first dose. On Wednesday, 9,830 people received vaccines, i.e. 91 per cent of the BMC's total target. More than one-third of them are health workers who have taken their second dose. KEM, Sion, Bandra-Bhabha, Rajawadi hospitals saw more health workers coming for the second dose. A total of 6,461 received their first dose, including 5,265 frontline and 1,196 health workers.

Currently, there are 36 vaccination centres, including 12 private hospitals, with a combined capacity to administer 10,800 doses per day. Eight more private hospitals are likely to start vaccination centres next week.

But the major challenge the BMC faces now is the technical issues on CoWIN. As per the central government's guidelines, vaccine recipients have to register through the CoWIN app using Aadhaar number or Voter ID.

Many healthcare workers have not been able to take the vaccines as their registration has failed. In some cases, the app could not find the name of the person. With senior citizens, the problem is feared to be worse as most are not proficient in the use of technology.