Covid-19 vaccination continues in Bengal, CoWIN glitches reported

The COVID-19 vaccination drive

resumed on Monday at 207 sites across West Bengal with beneficiaries, mostly frontline workers, reaching there as scheduled to receive the doses, a senior official of the Health Department said.

Glitches in the CoWIN portal were reported from several sites, following which health officials chose to manually complete the process of documentation and allocation, he added.

"The vaccination drive began around 9 am. We hope that those who did not come on the first day will turn up today. Most of the people who have received SMSes have already reached the centres. Around 100 beneficiaries will be receiving the Covishield vaccine from each centre today," the official said.

"The CoWIN portal is not functioning. We are facing trouble for session allocation, listing of beneficiaries and sending of SMSes," he said, adding that on Sunday health officials worked round the clock to overcome the limitations.

On Saturday, West Bengal witnessed 75.9 per cent turnout for the vaccination programme with four districts registering 100 per cent success, he said.

These districts are Purba Bardhaman (700/700), Jhargram (400/400), Darjeeling (498/500) and Kalimpong (100/100), he said.

There were five other districts that registered above 90 per cent turnout.

Purba Medinipur registered 96 per cent (995/1,037) turnout, followed by Kolkata (93 per cent) and Murshidabad (92 per cent), the official said.

Fourteen cases of Adverse Event Following Immunisation (AEFI) were reported on Saturday from different districts, including one from Kolkata.

While a nurse is undergoing treatment at the critical care unit of the Nil Ratan Sircar Medical College and Hospital in the metropolis, 13 others are "doing fine", he said.

A team of doctors is monitoring the health condition of the woman at the NRS Hospital, the official said.

The others are in touch with the respective district health officials for a daily update on whether they are facing any problem, he added.

AEFI is any untoward medical occurrence following immunisation and might not have a relation with the vaccination process, officials said.