Mumbaikars prefer private centres for Covid-19 jabs

People get vaccinated after a two-day gap at Bharat Ratna Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Municipal General Hospital in Kandivli. Pic/Satej Shinde

Even as public centres continue to face a shortage of vaccines, around 1.6 lakh people received paid vaccines at private centres in the last four days from Tuesday to Friday.

The public vaccination centres, on the other hand, only resumed their drive on Saturday, after being shut for two days this week.

This is not the first time that public centres shut doors to common people. In the last one-and-a-half months, the public centres were closed at least for 10 days.

In June, when the state had adequate supply, more people received jabs at public centres. According to statistics, private centres gave an average of 26,000 doses daily, as against 45,000 doses at public centres in June.

In July, the private centres outnumbered public centres. In the last week, the supply to the city dropped drastically as the state decided to send more vaccines to rural areas with more cases. Between August 1 and August 14, private facilities vaccinated 4.04 lakh people, while public centres could administer only 2.87 lakh doses.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, public centres administered only 13,000 doses against 70,000 doses given by private centres. On Thursday and Friday, when the vaccine centres were shut, 90,000 more people paid Rs 780 per dose at private centres. "The state government announced that only those who have received both doses of the vaccine can travel on the local train, so people are eager to take the vaccines even if they can't afford it," said Shailesh Goyal, member of Western Railway Zonal Users' Consultative Committee. He added that the government should have made vaccines available before such an announcement.