Registration for the third phase of the Covid-19 vaccine, targeting around 1.60 crore people, will begin in Bihar from March 1. This phase will include people over the age of 60 and older and those in the 45-59-year age group with very severe co-infections.
The earliest vaccine slots will be available from March 2, depending on when the CoWIN 2.0 portal goes live, health officials said Saturday.
It will take at least 24 hours for a person to be admitted after registration once the portal is live.
“We may have a dry run on Sunday before the CoWIN 2.0 portal goes live. The planned dry run on Saturday did not happen due to technical issues, ”said Manoj Kumar, executive director of the State Health Association, Bihar.
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The government is at a price of ₹250 per dose for those protecting at private health facilities, while the vaccine is provided free of charge at public health facilities.
“Those who want to be vaccinated at private institutions have to pay an administration charge ₹100 plus the cost of vaccines ₹150 per dose, ”he said.
Any complaint about a private health center that is charging too many people for vaccination can be registered on 104. The government will then start to remove the facility from the Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (also known as PM-JAY) the Ayushman Bharat, or the Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS) – the two criteria for private facilities being registered as a session site (vaccination center).
The government has made Aadhaar and a mobile number mandatory for vaccination as it would be based on the one-time password (OTP).
“We will not allow the identity of any government other than Aadhaar to prevent individual issues. One mobile number can be used to register a maximum of four family members, as long as some of the mandatory fields, except father, spouse and address, are different, ”said Kumar.
The state health department has identified 750 health facilities, including 50 private establishments for the first day of the upcoming vaccination phase. Bihar has a total of 258 private facilities that are eligible as vaccination centers.
“Initially, we will have at least one private center for each area (Bihar has 38 districts) and nine in Patna. We plan to increase the number of facilities to 1,000 by 15 March and have 1,200 centers between 16 March and 31. We plan to increase up to 1,500 between 1 April and 15 April and finally up to 1,600 between 16 April and 30, depending on the response of the people, ”said Kumar.
Anyone wishing to register for a vaccine, either through the CoWIN portal or the Ayushman Bharat app, will have the option of selecting the date and time for vaccination at a convenience center. However, they will not have the option to choose from the two vaccines – Covishield and Covaxin which are approved by the General Drug Administrator of India.
Those who do not come in for vaccination after re – registration will have the option to cancel the previous registration. This also means that it will not be possible for one person to register at the same time at different venues.
Beneficiaries will have the option of choosing a different session site for the second dose of the two-dose vaccination cycle after 28 days from first sight – taking the first dose at a private center and the second dose at a public facility.
Health care workers and key workers, who are in the priority group, must pay the required fee ₹250 per dose of vaccine if they wanted to get themselves vaccinated at a private health facility after March 1, said Manoj Kumar, executive director, State Health Association, Bihar.
“We have vaccinated 85 per cent of healthcare workers (HCWs) and the exercise to give the first dose of the vaccine to frontline workers (FLWs) will end on 6 March. They now have to pay for the vaccine if they want to get themselves admitted to a private facility after March 1, ”said Kumar.
Bihar has recorded 4.68 lakh HCW and 2.71 lakh FLWs. Of these, 3,99,831 HCW had received the first dose and 79,212 second doses of the vaccine. For FLWs, 1,60,496 had taken the first dose. To date Bihar has received 23,33,880 doses of the vaccine of which 6,64,650 have been consumed.