M F AHMAD
Daltonganj, Dec 21: Panchayats in Jharkhand are too slow and tardy with vaccination drives.
There are 4,423 panchayats in the state and Palamu has 263 panchayats after more than 20 panchayats were merged into the municipal corporation areas.
Only three panchayats in Palamu claim to be hundred percent vaccinated. The three panchayats namely Pathak Pagar, Sonepoora and Nawagarh fall under the Tarhassi block, according to the district epidemiologist Dr Anup Kumar Singh.
Remote panchayats on the NH have the same tale of apathy towards the vaccination.
Satbarwa, an eight panchayat block, has 36, 672 eligibles to be vaccinated but around 10, 000 eligibles here are still unvaccinated.
A panchayat Ponchi under the Satbarwa block on NH75 in Palamu lags behind in the Covid vaccination. 4,608 eligible people are yet to be vaccinated.
Just 2,768 people from this panchayat were vaccinated with the first dose, accounting for only 60.07 percent of eligible people. The second dosage of immunization is far worse. The percentage is 37.57 percent. Only 1,731 people who took the first dose have taken the second.
Bohita is another panchayat of Satbarwa block which is also in disorder so far. Here 4,860 eligibles are to be vaccinated but so far only 2,806 have been given the first dose and 2,018 have taken the second dose which account for 57.74 and 41.52 percent of the vaccination respectively.
Rewaratu is another panchayat of Satbarwa where the first dose vaccination is spectacularly 93.94 percent and second dose vaccination is 49.69 percent.
Sadar SDO Rajesh Kumar Sah commenting upon the status of the vaccination said that Satbarwa block is a typical block where there are pockets of Latehar Manika block, pockets of Nilamber Pitamberpur block and then Palamu Satbarwa block and as such coordination goes for a toss here very often.
Civil surgeon Palamu Dr Anil Kumar said that grass root support is needed to have the panchayats’ eligibles fully vaccinated.
