Bihar: Vaccination up, positivity rate down in Purnia

PURNIA: There has been sharp decline in the Covid positivity rate in the district, which boasts of smooth vaccination drive.
“We are leading, in comparison to neighbouring districts, in vaccinating people above 45 years of age. Till Sunday, over 3,99,000 people have been administered the vaccines, including 64,000 who received their second dose. In the 18-44 years age group, around 2,146 have been inoculated,” civil surgeon (CS) Dr S K Verma said on Monday.
District magistrate (DM) Rahul Kumar along with the civil surgeon has been mobilising people to take vaccines.The DM recently asked the DEOs, BEOs, COs, CDPOs and Jeevika workers to reach out to people to inoculate at PHC level.
“The immunisation process for the 45+ people has been going on at 14 primary health centres (PHCs). Our officials persuaded the panchayat and faith leaders to come forward to take vaccines. This helped others follow suit,” Dr Verma said.
On positivity rate, Dr Verma said only 14 people tested positive out of the 2,142 samples tested in the district on Sunday. On June 5, 23 people had fbeen found infected out of the 2,675 samples tested. The positivity rate in June has come down to 1.24%, compared to 6.78% in May and 7.24% in April, Dr Verma said.
On hospital admissions, he said 42-55 Covid patients used to be admitted at the dedicated Covid health centres. Their number has come down to 16. “We are miking, distributing pamphlets, posters and banners with phone numbers of the control room so that our team members can visit the villages for vaccination, if they are contacted for the purpose,” he said.
Dr Verma claimed no shortage of vaccines in the district. “Even people from adjoining districts visit Purnia for Covid treatment. We have sufficient ventilators and work is on to set up oxygen generation plants at Sadar hospital, Dhamdaha sub-divisional health centre (SDHC) and Banmankhi SDHC,” he said.