The Centre is set to conduct a dry run of COVID-19 vaccination on December 28 and 29 in Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Assam and Punjab. This will be the largest and most ambitious mass immunization programme in its history.
The dry run exercise will enable the government to understand if there is any gap in the entire process. It will enable end-to-end mobilization and testing of COVID-19 vaccination process and check the usage of Co-WIN, a mobile application through which the entire process will be monitored online.
According to a statement from the Ministry of Family Welfare and Health, each state will plan the dry run in two districts, and preferably in different five session type settings, such as district hospital, CHC/PHC, urban site, private health facility and rural outreach etc. “This will also provide a hands-on experience to programme managers at various levels. This two-day activity is planned on 28th and 29th December 2020, and will include activities from the necessary data entries in Co-WIN to vaccine receipt and allocation to deployment of team members, mock drill of session sites with test beneficiaries to reporting and evening meeting,” it said. “This will include testing for cold storage and transportation arrangements for COVID-19 vaccine, management of crowd at the session sites with proper physical distancing.”
The ministry highlighted that the important focus of the dry run will be on management of any possible adverse events following immunization (AEFI). In addition, adherence and management of infection control practices at the session site, to prevent disease transmission. About 2,360 training of trainers session have been held and more than 7,000 district trainees have been trained during national level Training of Trainers which comprised state immunization officers, cold chain officers, IEC officials, and development partners etc.
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Sources told The Indian Express that a team will be displaced to the vaccination centre. The cold chain will be operational simultaneously. The district will inform whether it will get its vaccine from the nearest state depot or the Government Medical Store Depot (GMSD). There are four GMSDs run by the Union governmentm and 27 state consignee points. The district will inform from which location the vaccine has to be received, where it is being taken, and details of the cold chain temperature up to the vaccination site. The sources pointed out that not all states have a state consignee point.
“The vaccinators will do the dummy run with 100 persons. Each person will wait for 30 minutes after getting vaccinated. The vaccinators will see where glitches are, if any,” they said. “They will also record adverse events, if any, after the vaccination. Since Adverse Event Following Immunization (AEFI) is a critical aspect,the management of the adverse event will be tracked.”
