Covid-19: Uttar Pradesh CM tells officials to ramp up vaccination drive for children aged 12-14 years

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday instructed officials to ramp up the ongoing Covid vaccination drive for children aged 12-14 years, saying many kids in this group are yet to take their jabs.

Reviewing the Covid situation in the state, the chief minister said vaccinating all eligible children is the priority of the government and asked officials to ensure the availability of vaccines.

“Many children in the age group of 12 to 14 years are yet to take the vaccine.

There is a need to ramp up the vaccination drive for them. The state has proper availability of vaccines and it should also be ensured for future requirements,” he said.

He also directed authorities to undertake awareness campaigns about the importance of booster doses and encourage every individual above 18 years to take the precaution jab, the release said.

Uttar Pradesh has so far administered over 32,10,86,485 vaccine doses.

Of these, 17,30,37,190 are first doses, while 14,50,83,297 individuals are fully vaccinated, according to data.

So far, over 2,36,01,148 children in the age group of 15-17 years and over 77,68,203 children in the aged 12-14 have been administered vaccine doses in the state.

Committed to providing additional protection cover to the priority groups, Uttar Pradesh started administering booster shots (precaution dose) to frontline and healthcare workers as well as senior citizens from January 10.

Nearly 30 lakh ‘precaution doses’ have been administered in the state so far, it said.

In terms of percentage, over 90.53 percent of the adult population is fully vaccinated and 100 percent have received one vaccine dose, it said.

In the age category of 15-17, over 96 percent of the children have received at least one dose of the vaccine, while over 70 percent in this age category are fully vaccinated.

At present, the total number of active cases in the state is 1024, which has been witnessing a consistent decline since the past few days.

The chief minister has made usage of face masks mandatory in public places in districts with higher positivity rate.