Covid-19: India begins vaccinating children
Thousands of teenagers, many accompanied by their relatives, lined up outside schools and health facilities across India today as the country began vaccinating children aged 15-18 years for the first time amid a surge of Covid cases.
The children, who have been registered in the government-operated CoWin portal, will be administered the first dose of India's indigenous Covid-19 vaccine Covaxin.
According to Indian Health Ministry's figures circulated to states on December 28, India has 7,40,57,000 youths in the 15-18 age group who are eligible for vaccination, reports our New Delhi correspondent.
To begin with, more than 8,00,000 children have so far registered themselves for the jab and the Health Ministry expects the registration to pick up once people realise that the vaccine has no adverse effects in the 15-18 age category.
A large number of schools and other educational institutions are doubling up as vaccination centres.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced on December 25 that India would expand its ongoing vaccination drive, that had begun on January 16 last year, to 15-18 age group from January 3, a move that came amid the spectre of what some experts predict a third wave of Covid powered by increasing cases of Omicron, the highly infectious variant.
A number of outbreaks of Covid-19 have been reported from residential schools and college hostels.
The government's National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI) N K Arora has said the decision to vaccinate 15-18 group people is based on scientific analysis of national and global data that 75 percent of Covid deaths among children worldwide in the last two years has been in this age bracket.
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