After boost to mark Modi’s birthday, vaccination drive back at old levels
The daily moving average (MA), which crossed 95 lakh doses on September 17, has again come down to 70-75 lakh, data show
India administered a record two crore-plus vaccine shots on September 17 to mark the birthday of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and celebrate his 20 years in public office. Now, two weeks later, the daily vaccination rate has slid back to what it was a week before the push.
The daily moving average (MA), which crossed 95 lakh doses on September 17, has again come down to 70-75 lakh, data show.
MA is calculated as average inoculations over the previous seven days from a given day in the timeline.
Sudden Spike Changes Moving Average
As of October 1, India has administered 89.74 crore doses of COVID-19 vaccines since the beginning of the drive on January 16, data from the Ministry of Health show. The sudden spike in the daily number of doses changed the overall pattern.
So far the country has administered more than one crore doses over the course of a day seven times. The feat was first achieved on August 24, when the country gave 1.4 crore doses. Three days later, 1.07 crore doses were administered. August 31 and September 6 also saw the one-crore mark being breached. On September 17, more than 2 crore doses were given. September 18 and 27 also saw one crore-plus shots delivered. All these days substantially changed the MA for the subsequent weeks.
However, the overall rate of inoculation remains between 70 and 75 lakh a day, as of October 2. Considering the current daily average inoculations, India will easily manage to cross 100 crore doses by October 15.
States Pick Up Pace Too
Eleven states have managed to completely vaccinate more than one crore people. About a week ago, only ten states had crossed one crore-mark. A person is said to be completely vaccinated when he or she has received both doses of the vaccine.
These states are: Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Bihar is the latest entrant in the one-crore club. Odisha will soon cross the mark, data show.
Maharashtra tops the list of completely vaccinated individuals (2.46 crore) followed by Uttar Pradesh (2.10 crore) and Gujarat (1.91 crore).
UP tops the list of states to have administered at least one dose (8.74 crore). Maharashtra is in second place (5.81 crore), followed by Madhya Pradesh (4.83 crore).
According to official figures, the central government has supplied 88.14 crore vaccines to the states and Union territories as of October 2. The states have 5.28 crore vaccines in stock.