Over 62 lakh Covid vaccine doses went to waste in India, half from 3 states

More than 62 lakh doses of the Covid-19 vaccine have gone to waste in India, half of which are from just three states – Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

Madhya Pradesh tops the list with 16.48 lakh wasted doses followed by Uttar Pradesh (12.60 lakh) and Rajasthan (6.86 lakh). Taken together the three states squandered nearly 36 lakh doses, which is over 50 per cent of the total loss.

Also read: Scientists looking into Covid-19 booster dose; primary vaccination foremost goal, says Centre

Responding to a question in the Lok Sabha, Union Minister of State for Health Bharati Pravin Pawar presented a list of 25 states and union territories that reported Covid-19 vaccine wastage in the last 11 months. There are eleven states that wasted more than one lakh doses.

Other states wasting more than one lakh doses are Assam (4.58 lakh), Jammu and Kashmir (4.57 lakh), Andhra Pradesh (3.80 lakh), Gujarat (2.28 lakh), Tamil Nadu (2.38 lakh) Tripura (2.10 lakh), West Bengal (1.4 lakh) and Karnataka (1.27 lakh).

"An expenditure of Rs 19,675.46 crore (till Dec 19) has been incurred for procurement of Covid-19 vaccines by the Centre for free of cost supplies of vaccine doses to State and UTs," the minister informed the Lok Sabha.

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