Union Secretary advises States, UTs to ramp up Covid-19 vaccination drive

New Delhi, May 20: Even though India's cumulative Covid-19 vaccination coverage exceeded 191.96 crore, a large number of the population is still unvaccinated or partially vaccinated. During a meeting with senior health officials of States and Union Territories, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan advised them to ramp up Covid-19 vaccination. For this objective, the Union Health Ministry is also planning to start the "Har Ghar Dastak-2.2" campaign for two months June and July, said sources. According to the data given by Union Health Ministry on the Covid-19 vaccine, over 193.53 crore vaccine doses are provided to States and UTs and over 16.72 crore unutilised vaccine doses are still available with them. "The Union Health Secretary has advised States and UTs who already have extra doses to utilise timely before the expiry of vaccines," sources added. The Indian government has been continuously assisting the States and UTs by supplying them with free Covid vaccinations as part of the nationwide vaccination drive. Also Read | CBI registers corruption case against Lalu Yadav, his daughter; raids 17 locations Over 3.24 crore vaccine doses have been administered to children aged 12 to 14. In the last 24 hours, India has reported 2,259 new cases of Covid-19. According to the Union Health Ministry, the active cases dipped to 15,044 in the last 24 hours. India also reported 20 new Covid-related fatalities, bringing the total number of deaths to 5,24,323. A decrease of 228 cases has been recorded in the active COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours. The active cases comprised 0.03 percent of the total infections, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.75 percent, the ministry said. Also Read | Unit of Ropar thermal plant resumes operations; power situation eases in Punjab -PTC News