Mumbai: Stock late, vaccine centres to operate from 2-5 pm today

A young girl gets jabbed at Nair hospital on Monday. Pic/Ashish Raje

Shortage of vaccines in the city has become a serious problem since the public centres started inoculating the 18-44 group. The drive had to be stopped or postponed at least three times within a fortnight due to non-availability of stock. Even on Tuesday, the public centres will be open only between 2 pm and 5 pm as stock is expected to arrive late on Monday and would take time to be delivered at the respective centres.

The central government stopped free vaccinations for the 18-44 years group days after giving a green signal on May 1 amid insufficient stock. The issue has still not been resolved completely. After starting vaccinations for the 18 to 44 years group on June 21, the public centres in Mumbai managed to function at 50 per cent of their capacity on June 24 due to short supply of vaccines.

The civic body received fresh stock on June 24, but as it arrived late in the night, transportation took a lot of time the following day. The centres were open between 2 pm and 5 pm on June 25. The same thing happened on July 1, when all the public centres remained shut due to unavailability of jabs.

"We are expecting vaccine stock to arrive tonight and it will be delivered to all the centres by tomorrow afternoon. So centres can operate in the second half," said a BMC official.