Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the launch of COVID-19 vaccination drive. (Photo source: ANI)Coronavirus vaccination in India LIVE UPDATES: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday launched the world’s biggest COVID-19 vaccination programme via video conferencing. While launching the drive the prime minister said that a vaccination drive at such a massive scale was never conducted in history. “There are more than 100 countries having a population of less than 3 crores and India is administering vaccination to 3 crore people in the first phase only. In the second phase, we will increase this number to 30 crores,” he said.
Among prominent people who administered a COVID-19 vaccine during the launch is All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) director Randeep Guleria. Serum Institute of India (SII) CEO Adar Poonawalla received a shot of Covishield vaccine manufactured by his company.
Trained personnel are administering either Covishield, which is a variant of Oxford-AstraZeneca’s vaccine and has been manufactured and tested by Pune’s Serum Institute in the country or the indigenous Covaxin, developed by Bharat Biotech along with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), India’s nodal health agency spearheading the fight against COVID-19.
In the days leading up to the vaccination drive, batches of Covaxin and Covishield were transported to several cities across the country with the help of several airlines to ensure that things run smoothly when the drive begins.
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