M F AHMED
Daltonganj, Nov. 8: The lone Covid-19 Tika Express in Latehar district has done 1,450 vaccinations in one month. One of the health officials of Latehar district, Ved Prakash clarified that although this lone Tika Express that arrived Latehar on October 3 ran for only 23 days in the preceding month as 7 days between October 3 and November 2 fell for the holidays. He put the average percentage of the Tika Express a day to 63.04%.
According to sources, the Tika Express is yet to gain momentum in Latehar. Its acceptability among the public is yet to be enhanced.
Latehar district was one among the 40 other districts in the country which was lagging behind its target of vaccinating people following which Prime Minister Narendra Modi had to converse with such districts to speed up the vaccination by all means quite recently.
DC Latehar, Abu Imran, said that he has asked the civil surgeon to accelerate the vaccination drive.
Latehar still staggers at 57% of its first dose and 17% of its second dose. It is the second dose of vaccination that is going down.
The civil surgeon Latehar, Dr Haren Chandra Mahto has planned to start a vaccination drive at the Chhath ghats on November 10 between 2 pm to 7 pm. Three ghats have been identified namely Karamachuan, Dharampur and Chatnahi under the territory of the community health centre Latehar.
The medical officer-in-charge of the community health centre Latehar informed that a two-member team will be out for the vaccination drive at each of these ghats.
However, questions arise on whether the devotees and onlookers at the Chhath ghats will be eager to take the jab when there will be prayers going on in the water body.
Sources said that putting vaccination teams at the Chhath ghats may sound a sincere effort but one has reasons to be skeptical about its yield as it is a hard battle for Latehar to have a respectable figure of the vaccination.
