Punjab, Haryana to hold dry run for Covid-19 vaccination on Saturday

On the Centre's directive, Punjab and Haryana will conduct a dry run for COVID-19 vaccination on Saturday.

The Centre had said a dry run will be conducted by all state and union territories on January 2 to test the linkages between planning and implementation, and to identify the challenges.

The Punjab government will conduct the drive in Patiala on January 2 and 3, state Health Minister Balbir Singh Sidhu said in a statement here.

He said as per the Centre's guidelines, Punjab has selected Patiala district where the dry run will be conducted at Government Medical College; Sadhbhavna Hospital; and the Community Health Centre in Shatrana.

The UNDP and WHO will be supporting the drive, he said.

In Haryana, the dry run will be held in Panchkula, state's Director General (Health Services) Dr Suraj Bhan Kamboj told PTI.

The drive will be held at three sites, officials said. For each of the three sites, the medical officer in-charge will identify 25 beneficiaries (healthcare workers), the Centre had said.

The states and UTs have been asked to ensure that the data of beneficiaries is uploaded on Co-WIN, an online platform for monitoring the delivery of the vaccine.

Earlier, a two-day dry run for the distribution and administration of COVID-19 vaccine in two districts of Punjab concluded on Tuesday.

The districts of Ludhiana and Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar (Nawanshahr) had been selected for the dry run, aimed at testing the laid out mechanisms for the vaccination roll-out in the health system.

Before Saturday's nationwide exercise, the earlier dry run drill had been planned by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in Punjab, Andhra Pradesh, Assam and Gujarat.