Special vaccination drive on for school teachers, staff in Kolkata

KOLKATA: Nearly all teachers and non-teaching staff members at government and government-aided schools in Kolkata have been fully vaccinated. The school education department is also conducting special camps at institutes to vaccinate more than 3,000 teachers and staffers of city private schools who are yet to get their second dose. The drive is likely to be over by the weekend.
Of the 3.5 lakh teachers in Bengal, around 50,000 are yet to get their second dose.
Amid talks of possible reopening of educational institutes after the festival season provided Covid numbers remain low, the school education department has set a target to completely vaccinate all its teachers. In June, the Bengal government had notified the vaccination drive for schoolteachers and staffers for government, government-aided as well as private schools in Kolkata and Bengal. “We had sought details from schools on the vaccination requirements. The details have been submitted,” an official said.
A senior official pointed out that inoculation programmes for administering the first dose on teaching and non-teaching staff in Kolkata as well as the districts were taken up in June. The school education department recently prepared a complete database of teachers who are yet to get their second shot. “Before bringing students back to campuses, we aim to vaccinate all teachers and non-teaching staff at schools,” he said.
Sougata Basu, general secretary, West Bengal Government Schoolteachers’ Association, said, “This could have been completed earlier had the gap between two Covishield not been revised to 84 days. Now, when the Centre is talking about vaccine for children, we hope that secondary and upper-secondary students can also be inoculated before reopening.”
At DPS Ruby Park, a vaccination drive has been conducted for the past three days. “We thank the state government for their initiative to vaccinate all private school teaching and non-teaching staff free of cost. In spite of the inclement weather, the beneficiaries came for their second dose. Our school was a centre for the past three days,” an official said. Jadavpur Vidyapith headmaster Parimal Bhattacharya said, “All teaching and non-teaching staff of our school have been vaccinated. Very few are waiting for their second dose but they were administered the vaccine by the department in the first week of September. We are waiting for the government notice for reopening.”