The US government’s Covid-19 response coordinator on Tuesday hailed India’s “phenomenal” Covid-19 vaccination drive and called it a “stunning achievement”. Dr Ashish K Jha also praised the Narendra Modi-led government for doing an “excellent job” by inoculating people of the country against the coronavirus infection in a very phased and controlled manner.

Speaking at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit, he said, “…if you think about how India turned its situation around after the awful Delta wave, this massive ramp-up of vaccine production and a phenomenal vaccination campaign (helped). I will say it was one of the most impressive in the world.”

When asked about the efficacy of vaccines against the newer Covid-19 variants, he said the second generation of vaccines have already provided more efficacy, targeting the Covid’s Omicron variant.

Dr Jha was quoted as saying, “The question out there in vaccine world now is – ‘are we going to keep doing this… keep updating…’ If that is where we land, then that’s ok. That’s what we do with the flu vaccine every year… not a big deal. But my hope is we can start building vaccines resilient to evolving viruses… these can really prevent infections. Right now vaccines can prevent serious illnesses and are decent at preventing infections. But that doesn’t last as long as we want it to.”

The coronavirus pandemic erupted in December 2019 when China’s Wuhan city reported its first case. Soon it spread across the world and countries started imposing strict lockdowns to contain the further spread of the deadly virus.

After months-long trials, the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) on January 3, 2021 announced approval for the restricted emergency use of the Covid-19 vaccines manufactured by Bharat Biotech and Serum Institute of India (SII).

On January 16, 2021, India opened its vaccination drive in a phased manner where healthcare workers and older individuals were priortised first. As expected, there was a substantial amount of vaccine hesitancy in the beginning apart from vaccine shortage, misinformation and rumours followed by challenges with registration and appointments at Co-Win platform. However, it all subsided with time.

Reminders about appointments for vaccination via WhatsApp and social media chat groups, counselling, newspaper ads, and promotion of eminent doctors who have received the Covid-19 vaccine shots as influencers — multiple measures were taken by states to boost the confidence of public to come forward and take the jabs.

To fight the disbelief in vaccines, politicians and public figures took shots in public to boost confidence.

Being a country of 139 crore people, India surprised the world with its efficiency in delivering vaccines to the remotest parts of the country.

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