Covid vaccine: India gave more jabs than G7 nations combined in August

India administered more than 180 million doses in August as it continues to ramp up its vaccination drive to stave off a third wave of Covid.

This was more doses than all the Group of Seven (G7) countries – Canada, the UK, the US, Italy, Germany, France and Japan – put together, according to an official statement.

The government aims to vaccinate all eligible Indians by the end of 2021.

It has so far given more than 686 million doses of three approved jabs.

More than half of India’s eligible population – some 473 million people – have received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine, official data says.

But only about 17% of eligible adults have been fully vaccinated since the beginning of the drive in January.

Regional disparities also persist with larger and poorer states lagging behind smaller and richer ones.

India has reported more than 33 million Covid cases, second only to the US. The country is also only the third in the world to record more than 440,000 deaths – behind the US and Brazil.

How is India’s rollout going?
Since 16 January, India has administered nearly 687 million doses.

About 526 million people have received the first dose and another 160 million or so have received both doses so far.

India gave six million jabs on an average every day in August, compared to 4.3 million daily jabs in July, according to official data.

Experts say India needs to administer more than 10 million doses a day consistently to fully inoculate all eligible adults by the end of this year.

Much will depend on levels of vaccine hesitancy and the availability of doses in the coming months.

India’s daily case count has been dropping – it has been reporting less than 40,000 new daily cases in the past month and most of them from the southern state of Kerala.

But doctors say that a third wave is likely given that the country has fully reopened even as the threat of new variants looms large.

While the vaccination drive has gained momentum, experts worry about a gender gap – government data shows 6% fewer women are getting vaccinated. This is especially true in rural India where women have limited access to the internet and are hesitant or scared to take the vaccine.

Although a higher number of doses are being administered daily in rural areas, the share of population being vaccinated in urban areas is still greater.

Agencies