Citing the threat of a possible third wave of the pandemic, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday requested the Centre to provide 2.6 crore Covid-19 vaccines to the Delhi government.
Stating that the Delhi government only has 40 lakh vaccines at the moment, Kejriwal said the city needs 80-85 lakh doses every month for the next three months to inoculate all adults in the national capital.
“One lakh people are being vaccinated in Delhi everyday. We will soon convert 250-300 schools into vaccination centres to inoculate three lakh people everyday,” Kejriwal said. Currently, vaccination is being conducted in 100 centres in Delhi.
The Delhi CM also urged the Centre to ensure children are provided with the Covid-19 vaccines.
He further said that due to good arrangements in Delhi, people from NCR towns like Noida, Ghaziabad are also coming to Delhi to get vaccinated. So, Delhi will require a little more than three crore doses, he said.
Kejriwal also said that Delhi currently has only enough vaccine doses to vaccinate people for next 5-6 days.
The chief minister said Delhi’s population is two crore of which fifty lakh are children.
“Roughly 1.5 crore people are above 18 years of age. We need three crore vaccine doses to vaccinate these 1.5 crore people, but we’ve received just 40 lakh doses. As a result, we need 2 crore 60 lakh additional vaccines,” he said.
Delhi has been vaccinating more than one lakh people everyday. This includes around 50,000 people in age group of 18-44 years and 50,000 aged 45 years and above, he said.
Delhi is not getting an adequate amount of vaccines, and if it were to get the required amount of doses then the Delhi government will be able to vaccinate all adults within three months, he reiterated.
(With input from Agencies)
