Chennai, July 15(BPNS)
Tamil Nadu Health minister Ma Subraminan will meet the Union health minister, Mansukh Mandaviya in New Delhi on Thursday for more vaccine supply to the state. The minister reached the national capital on Wednesday.
The minister will press the Union government for a good supply of vaccines to the state as after high pitched awareness campaigns even in rural areas of Tamil Nadu, there has been a high increase of people coming out to take the jab.
In several parts of the state, the general public entered into arguments with the state health department officials after they were not able to get the vaccination even after standing in overnight queues. The minister will apprise the Union government of this situation and the urgent necessity to get sufficient quantity of vaccines for the state.
It is to be noted that Ma Subramanian had earlier sought an appointment with the former Union health minister, Dr. Harsh Vardhan on July 9th for getting enough vaccines but as the Union minister was replaced, the meeting was postponed for Thursday.
The Tamil Nadu health minister while speaking to BPNS over the telephone said, “ The daily vaccination numbers have improved considerably ever since the DMK government under Thiru M.K. Stalin assumed office but still, we are short of the requisite numbers. I am pressing the Union health ministry for an immediate supply of 2 crore vaccines to meet the necessity of the state.”
The meeting to be held on Thursday afternoon will also discuss the pending request of Chief Minister, M.K.Stalin for a 1 crore dose of vaccines to Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his first visit to New Delhi after assuming office as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu.
Tamil Nadu had reported 3 lakh vaccines on Monday and Tuesday but the number of vaccines administered had dropped to 2,07,259 doses on Wednesday. According to the Union Health Ministry data, around 30 lakh people of Tamil Nadu received both doses of vaccines and this is only around 5% of the total population of the state.
It is to be noted that there was an acute shortage of the second dose of Covaxin in many districts of Tamil Nadu. In Madurai people almost entered into fisticuffs with the security personal including policemen when there was announcement of a shortage in Covaxin. People were standing in long queues overnight to get the jab and when they found that the vaccine doses were exhausted things turned unruly.
Ma Subramanian while speaking to BPNS said, “We are expecting the Centre to allocate us the requested dose of vaccines and a pending request of our Chief Minister Thiru Stalin to the Prime Minister Thiru Narendra Modi is already with the government.”
