Mumbai: Just one third of youth have taken their first Covid-19 vaccine dose

The second dose of the vaccination for children starts today. The BMC has so far been able to vaccinate less than one-third of the estimated population of the age group 15 to 17 against its target of 9 lakh. It had aimed to do it before the start of the second dose.

Now the BMC has the huge task of reaching out to at least 6 lakh more children before the vaccination of younger children starts.

A student gets her first shot of the COVID-19 vaccine at Nair hospital. File pic

The vaccination for adolescents in the age group of 15 to 17 years started on January 3. Though the state government has given it the target of vaccinating 6,12,461 children in the age group, the BMC had set itself the target of vaccinating 9.22 lakh teenagers. The target was supposed to be achieved before the start of the second dose of Covaxin which is 28 days after the first dose.

"On January 3, 6,115 children received the first dose. They are eligible to take the second shot on January 31," said an official from the BMC.

Till Saturday, 2,80,812 adolescents received the first dose, out of which 15,755 doses were given by private vaccination centres and the rest were given by the government.

The BMC started the drive to vaccinate teenagers only at nine jumbo centres to curb risk of side effects of the vaccine. But as the drive started, city schools were shut due to the third wave. "The drive was affected due to both the issues and so it is a little difficult to raise the number of recipients. Now the vaccine is available at most of the centres and we plan to hold drives even at high schools and colleges so more children get the vaccine at the earliest," said a health official.