Jharkhand on Friday received a fresh allotment of 5,30,430 doses of Covishield vaccine in a big relief to the State, which was running out of stock of vaccines. The State Health department has written a letter to all Civil Surgeons for lifting of vaccines from the State Vaccines store. The Health Department has requested all district administration to lift the vaccines by July 24.

Out of total 5,30,430 vaccines allotment received by State, district wise Ranchi has received maximum 40,000 doses of Covishield vaccines followed by Dhanbad getting 39,000 doses of vaccines, East Sighbhum getting 35,000, Giridih district getting 36,000 doses of vaccines. Palamu has received 29,000 vaccines, followed by Hazaribagh getting 25500 doses of vaccines, West Singhbhum getting 24,000 doses of vaccines, Godda 22000 doses of vaccines, Garhwa 21000 doses of vaccines among others. Lohardaga and Khunti district having less population and corona cases have received 10,000 doses of vaccines.

The State health department distributes vaccines based on population and number of active cases in these districts. Ranchi and East Singhbhum district have highest corona cases while Dhanbad has high population density.

The allotment of fresh vaccine stock is a big relief for the State government as on July 22, only 84,450 doses were left of the stock available for carrying out vaccination for only one day. As per state health department bulletin, the state till date has received 8542606 doses of vaccines, out of which 84,82,450  doses of vaccines have been administered (including Sputnik V). The vaccine wastage of state is 144606 which is around 1.72 per cent of total vaccines received by Jharkhand.

The Ministry of health department in June had claimed that Jharkhand tops in vaccine wastage with State reporting maximum wastage of 33.95 per cent.

However, terming the vaccine wastage figure of Jharkhand by the Centre at 33.95 per cent as "old data", the State government said it has received permission from the Central ministry to rectify the related data and the vaccine wastage was 1.5 per cent in the State. Since then the State government has worked hard in minimizing the vaccine wastage bringing it down by less than 1 per cent.

Apart from strengthening vaccination, in a big relief the daily corona cases in the State too has come down. The state recovery rate is 98.44 per cent while the active cases have dropped to below 300 mark. In last 24 hour zero corona cases has been discovered from Chatra, Dumka, Garhwa, Giridih, Godda, Hazaribagh, Jamtara, Khunti, Latehar, Lohardaga, Pakur, Sahibganj and West Singhbhum districts.  Meanwhile, the health department has started preparations for a possible third wave of pandemic.

Covid 19 testing has been made mandatory at all entry points, passengers coming from outside—by rail road and airport. The health department has made pediatric bed management and preparedness of pediatric ICU, Neonatal ICU and Child Friendly ward in districts.