At last, North MCD hospitals start Covid vaccination drive
New Delhi: After being forced to skip the first few weeks of vaccination owing to large-scale strikes by healthcare workers over months of unpaid salaries, North MCD hospitals on Tuesday finally jumped on the inoculation bandwagon with four hospitals under the civic body administering Bharat Biotech's Covaxin to those registered for their shots.
According to officials, nurses, paramedics and other technicians and staff of North MCD hospital finally called off their strike on Monday.
The COVID-19 vaccination drive started at Hindu Rao, Kasturba Gandhi, Mrs Girdhari Lal (Maternity) and Balak Ram hospitals. These hospitals are now fully-staffed as hospital workers have received salaries till December.
Earlier, several departments had been locked, and they had been taken off the list of official sites for the first phase of vaccination in the country.
North MCD Mayor Jai Prakash inspected the COVID-19 vaccination drive at Hindu Rao Hospital, where 67 people were vaccinated with Covaxin and none suffered from any lasting adverse effects, officials said.
Interestingly, a senior doctor at Hindu Rao said that none of the senior officials accompanying the Mayor, including Health Committee Chairman Vineet Vohra, Director Hospital Administration Sangeeta Nangia, and Medical Superintendent of Hindu Rao Hospital Dr Anu Kapoor, volunteered to get vaccinated.
Speaking about the delay in receiving the vaccine, the senior doctor said: "Many Delhi government hospitals nearby, such as Aruna Asif Ali hospital, had a dearth of volunteers for the Covishield vaccine. They were allowed healthcare workers to get vaccinated on a walk-in basis (against document verification), so 50-60 of us doctors have already received the vaccine."
Additionally, doctors at Hindu Rao have not received their salaries post-October but refuse to go on strike because they fear the hospital will once again become non-functional.
North MCD has received 2,000 doses of vaccines by now. According to data compiled by the civic body, 34 people got vaccinated at Kasturba Gandhi, 13 people received Covaxin at Girdhari Lal, and 71 people received the vaccine at Balak Ram hospital. No adverse events following immunisation were reported at these hospitals.
The North MCD had become infamous during the pandemic year for seeing large-scale strikes by healthcare workers over unpaid salaries. Not just healthcare workers, but other employees of the municipality have also
gone out in protest against unpaid dues. Recently, however, many of the unions leading the strikes, have recently suspended their agitation after parts of their pending payments were cleared.
