Vaccination drive in Kerala: Hotel and restaurant employees to get priority

The Kerala government has announced that hotel and restaurant employees in the state, falling in the 18 to 45 age group, will get priority vaccination. The government has also sent notifications to various priority groups that need to be considered for priority vaccination, based on the suggestions they have received from several departments.

Under this, the state government has included 32 groups in the newly-created list of frontline workers, who need to get priority vaccination. People included in the list can register themselves for free vaccination on a priority basis. Kerala’s tourism industry has been asking for priority vaccination for its whole workforce so that they can begin tourism once again and revive the industry. The list includes people working in hotels and restaurants, airport staff, people working in the beverages corporation and home delivery agents, among others.
Just a few days back, the tourism sector in the state became the boon for the virus control activities. A number of tour operators converted their mini tourist buses, which have been going to dust from the past one year, into special COVID-19 ambulances.

Given the COVID situation in the state, several travel operators in Kozhikode, Thiruvananthapuram and Malappuram had their tourist buses converted into ambulances to help the patients.
Since the start of the pandemic, Kerala has recorded 22 lakh COVID positive cases and more than 6500 deaths.