BANDIPORA December 04(KNS): District Development Commissioner Bandipora Dr Owais Ahmad on Friday chaired a meeting to review the arrangements for the roll out of COVID19 Vaccination in the district.

The meeting was attended by Assistant Commissioner Revenue (ACR) Reyaz Ahmad Beigh, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Block Medical Officer and other senior officers of the district.

The meeting discussed threadbare requirements including availability and requirement of vaccinators, vaccine carriers, hub cutters, wastebags, power supply, Water Supply and other requirements at vaccine centres.

The meeting was informed that various COVID-19 vaccines are currently in the third phase of clinical trials and will be shortly available for usage. As such, the Department of Health was asked to do the preparatory planning beforehand, and compile the database of potential vaccinators, prioritized groups of beneficiaries to be administered the vaccine in its initial stages starting from healthcare workers both in government and private establishments, frontline workers including armed forces, home guards, police, volunteers, municipal workers, etc, the prioritized age group of persons above the age of 50 years, and persons with co-morbidities.

It was given out that district has 120 vaccination centres and 13 cold chain plants available. On the occasion Dr Owais stressed upon the concerned to be ready for successful implementation of Government vaccination plan and said all the logistic support to health department including additional staff from different departments will be provided to health department in order to successfully implement the vaccination plan

DC Bandipora asked the concerned officers to work out the human resource requirements for organizing dedicated COVID-vaccination drives and to further ensure that they do not compromise the existing arrangements for COVID-19 testing and routine immunization drives. The Department was advised to engage additional vaccinators among MBBS/BDS doctors/interns, staff nurses, auxiliary nursing midwives, pharmacists, and retired persons, besides training potential vaccinators.

He also impressed upon greater coordination between the frontline workers of various departments including health, social welfare, school education, rural development, and Panchayat Raj Institutions(KNS) .