NEW DELHI: Five states that are home to just over a quarter (27%) of India’s
adult population
account for threequarters of
private vaccine doses
, according to data presented by the government to the Supreme Court. Not surprisingly, these states are the ones that contain some of largest metros — Maharashtra,
Karnataka, Bengal, Delhi and
Telangana in that order.
Interestingly, in the most populous state of UP, just 4.8 lakh doses were administered in the private sector, a little over what was administered in Gujarat, with less than half of UP’s population.
Data for Bihar showed a blank, but it is not clear whether this meant private hospitals administered almost no doses there or whether data was not available.
CoWin showed just three private vaccination centres in Bihar on Sunday. There were zero private vaccination centres in most Union Territories and hardly any in the Northeast.
The data was presented in the Centre’s affidavit to the apex court but did not specify the period for which the data was. A table preceding this one as part of the same annexure on how many doses the Centre has provided to states specified that it was for January-May. It is not clear whether this data too is for the same period.
In many large states, the private sector provided few vaccines. In Jharkhand, it had administered just 18,700
doses
, in
Odisha 35,500, and just 40,000 in Madhya Pradesh. Recently, Odisha asked the Centre to cut down private sector’s allocation from 25% to just 5% in the state as the presence of private hospitals in the health sector was poor.
There were reports from
Tamil Nadu that half the vaccine allotted to private hospitals were lying unused. Private sector accounted for just 7.8% of the vaccine doses administered in the state in May-June.
Of the 1.56 crore doses administered by the private sector, according to the affidavit, Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin was just 17%. Of this, almost 40% or 10.26 lakh, were in Telangana. Though the affidavit was filed on June 26, the period not being specified means it is not possible to draw any conclusion regarding the share of the private sector in total doses administered till now. If it is indeed for January-May, that would mean the private sector has administered a mere 7.2% of the 21.6 crore shots provided till the end of May.
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