(TibetanReview.net, Oct22’21) – There have been 36 new Covid-19 cases among Tibetans in India and Nepal over the past one week as New Delhi celebrated the achievement of one billion vaccinations against the virus. However, millions in India are still to receive their first dose, underlying the challenges that still lie ahead, given the country’s still rather low full-dose vaccination rate.
At its 82nd weekly briefing Oct 22, the Covid Taskforce of the Central Tibetan Administration has said the 36 positive results had come from 623 tests. This has taken the cumulative total of reported Tibetan Covid-19 cases to 6,704, of which 6,494 had recovered while 153 had died. There were 57 active cases, concentrated mainly at Mundgod, Bylakuppee and Dharamshala.
India’s Covid-19 taskforce chief Dr V K Paul has said Oct 21 that the country’s achievement of vaccinating 100 crore people in just nine months was a remarkable feat.
However, he has cautioned that consistency was important to benefit from this achievement. And he has flagged the fact that 25% of eligible adults had still not received the first dose of the vaccine while only 30% had taken the second dose.
He has said the second dose was overdue in case of 10 crore people. The country’s mission will be complete once all adults are completely vaccinated, he has added.
“Two doses have been given to about 30% of Indians, which is fine. But what is concerning is that about 10 crore individuals are now overdue. They should have received a second dose but they have not. So it is now unfinished work that we must accomplish to ensure that those eligible receive the second dose. People should be reminded… We must continue to push the frontier that the first dose reaches universal coverage and we must continue to push the frontier that the second dose coverage also reaches 100%,” the timesofindia.com Oct 22 quoted Paul as saying.
China, in contrast, has administered about 2.2 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines on Oct 21, bringing the total number of doses administered to 2.24 billion, said the timesofindia.com in another report Oct 22, citing data from the country’s National Health Commission Oct 22.
Meanwhile, India has reported 15,786 new cases over the past 24 hours as of this morning, which was 14% lower than the day before.
The country’s Covid-19 cases now total 34,143,236, of which 33,514,449 (98.16%) had recovered. Active cases numbered 175,745 (0.51%). With 231 new deaths in the last 24 hours, total is 453,042 (1.33%).
The daily positivity rate is 1.19% and the weekly 1.31%.
Himachal Pradesh reported 202 new cases and 4 deaths, including two in Kangra, in the last 24 hours.
Capital Delhi reported 22 new cases with no death during the same period.
