66% of adult population in India have received at least 1 dose of COVID-19 vaccine: Govt

While ramping up the rate of daily vaccinations, the Union government on Thursday said 66% of the country's adult population have been administered at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine, while 23% have received both doses.

As per Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan who was addressing a daily press conference, 63.7% vaccine doses have been administered in rural areas and 35.4% in urban areas.

A total of 68.2 lakh doses (approximately 0.95%) has been administered at COVID-19 vaccination centres not tagged as rural or urban, he said.

The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country has crossed 84 crore, according to the data from Co-WIN portal. Bhushan said from May 1 to September 22, roughly 6% doses have been administered in private hospitals and the remaining have been given in public health facilities.

"Two-third of India's adult population (66%) has been vaccinated against SARS-CoV 2 and almost a quarter of the adult population have received two doses, and you can see in both these parameters there are states and UTs which have done so much better than these averages. It is a very important milestone in its own way in the line of other milestones that you are aware of," NITI Aayog member (Health) VK Paul said.

The vaccines, he said, are providing protection against serious diseases and against mortality in a big way and therefore, it is a matter of satisfaction that the coverage is now phenomenally significant. "We are urging those who are eligible but have not taken their vaccine - men and women, pregnant women and everybody more so those who are of higher age in particular above 50 years should get their first and second dose so that they can get complete protection and we could overcome this pandemic," Paul underlined.

Bhushan said 99% of the healthcare workers have received the first dose, while 84% of the eligible healthcare workers have taken the second dose. He said 100% of the frontline workers have been administered the first dose, while 80% of them have been given the second dose.

According to the data shared, the average daily doses administered in a month has increased from 19.69 lakh in May to 39.89 lakh in June, then further to 43.41 lakh in July and to 59.19 lakh in August. The average daily vaccination in September so far has been 81.60 lakh per day, the health secretary said, adding that nearly 18 crore doses have been administered in 22 days of September.

He said of the total vaccinations, 43.39 crore men (52.2%) have received vaccines and 39.72 crore women were administered jabs (47.8%) and approximately 0.02% 'Other' gender have also received vaccines during this period.