Just shy of a landmark 200 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses, the shots administered in India against coronavirus are now about to surpass the total doses given in all of Europe and North America combined.
According to Our World in Data, India has now administered 1.95 billion shots against COVID-19 while this number is 1.29 billion in the case of Europe, 592.27 million in the case of the United States and 85.91 million in case of Canada.
This feat, interestingly, has been achieved despite the fact that the government’s push for booster doses for a large chunk of the population is yet to pick up the momentum.
The CoWIN dashboard, maintained by the Union government shows that as on June 20, 5.30 pm 1,96,17,60,546 vaccine doses against COVID-19 have been administered in India. Of these, 1,57, 07, 56, 208 doses are that of Covishield, followed by 32, 85, 70, 413 doses of Covaxin.
The rest of the doses are of other vaccines against coronavirus including Sputnik V, Corbevax and Covovax.
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More than 90 percent of Indian adults are now fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and this figure is also picking for other age groups such as 15-17 years and 12-14 years for which the vaccination is now permitted, as per the figures shared by the government.
Government authorities said that the tremendous feat was a result of concerted efforts taken by the Centre and states to tackle the pandemic.
“The way our COVID-19 vaccination is reaching one milestone after another is a big achievement for the country and the credit also goes to the people who have supported the government in its mammoth effort,” said Dr NK Arora, chairman of the COVID-19 working group under the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation that works under the Union health ministry.
Dr Samiran Panda, chief epidemiologist at the Indian Council of Medical Research said that vaccination is a crucial tool to control the pandemic and the country has done well to accept it wholeheartedly.
“The immunisation division of the health ministry deserves a big kudos for this achievement,” he said.
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