JOIN US'Appalling!': Senior citizens' anger over Co-WIN glitches grows
A senior citizen unable to find a vaccination slot, another whose name does not appear in the beneficiary list despite registration and yet another elderly person who has to resort to procuring the vaccine outside the system. They all have one thing in common: A frustrating experience on the Co-WIN portal.
Over the last 48 hours, 64-year-old Sreenivas (name changed) had been frantically searching for a vaccination slot at the hospitals in the vicinity of his postal zip code in Shantala Nagar. To his dismay, he found that many of the designated hospitals did not have available slots for vaccination.
Finally, on Wednesday morning, he found an open slot at Bowring Hospital. “However, the slot was dated March 30,” he said.
“It is just appalling. As a senior citizen, I wanted to get vaccinated as soon as possible not only for the sense of safety it brings. If the first dose itself is only available on March 30, when would the second dose happen?”
Dr Rajani Nageshrao, deputy director, Immunisation, Department of Health and Family Welfare described the March 30 date as incorrect and as being prompted by still deficient training of hospital staff on the software.
“Currently hospitals are not scheduling dates at all. They only schedule slots for the next day,” she said, suggesting that hospital staff are making errors in slot scheduling.
She added that from Monday onwards, hospitals have to plan and offer slots for the 10-day periods.
Another senior citizen, 68-year-old Veena, had also successfully registered but could not find an open slot at the centre of her choice, Mallige Hospital in Gandhi Nagar, near her home. Instead, she was referred to Vikram Hospital. “However, when I went to Vikram, I was stunned to find that the hospital did not even have my name in the beneficiary list,” she said.
Such experiences are adding to growing anger within the public about the rollout of Phase 3 of vaccinations. “It is just chaos,” Veena said.
On-spot registrations take off
Many senior citizens and the government are turning to on-the-spot registrations as the fix. Dr Thrilok Chandra, Health Commissioner, noted that on-spot registrations have started from Tuesday, and added that all private hospitals would be asked to join in vaccination efforts from last week. However, experts cautioned that unless problems with the Co-WIN portal are ironed out that chaos will still reign.
“Even if the scale-up happens and on-site registrations start, the data will still have to be entered in the Co-WIN portal. The system is not at all smooth at present,” said Dr H M Prasanna, President of Private Hospitals and Nursing Homes' Association (PHANA).
Another concern is that people would swamp vaccination centres. Dr Chandra said that the current target of 200 vaccinations per day would be increased in some hospitals and that a token system would be introduced.
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