Chandigarh, February 26: With the prioritization as guidedby the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for COVID-19 (NEGVAC),the next phase of vaccination is due for citizens of age appropriatecategories, including initially the people above 60 years of age and those agedfrom 45 years to 60 years and have the co-morbidities.
Disclosing this here today, Health Minister Mr. Balbir SinghSidhu said that all such citizens that are aged, or will attain the age of 45years to 59 years as on 1st January 2022, and have any of the specifiedco-morbidities, which have been recommended by NEGVAC and approved byGovernment of India from time to time, subject to certification to that effectby a Registered Medical Practitioner.
Mr. Sidhu added that to augment and simplify the process ofregistration vaccination, the MoHFW is coming with COWIN 2.0, based on thefeedback received during the implementation of Phase-1 of COVID-19 vaccinationdrive. He said that citizens will be able to register and book an appointmentfor vaccination using the COWIN 2.0 portal or through other IT applications suchas ArogyaSetu etc.
He said that this new portal would prove helpful to expeditethe vaccination drive especially to be conducted for aged people.
The Minister said that as per World Health Organisation,COVID-19 vaccination is the single way out to deal with pandemic so thateligible beneficiaries have to take maximum benefit of this goldenopportunity.
Divulging about the free & paid services, he said thatvaccination will be provided free of charge at the Government Health Facilitiesand will be on payment basis in the Private Health Facilities, at a rate as maybe decided by the Government of India from time to time.