Telangana asks Centre to include elected reps in first round of vaccination

Hyderabad: Political leaders, particularly the elected kind, appear to be hoping that they can make their way into the Covid-19 vaccination priority list. Influential to say the least, elected representatives in Telangana appear to have made their decision. They do not want to be among those left behind for the second, third or later phases of Covid-19 vaccination.

They, it appears, want to be included as priority candidates, as “frontline warriors”, on par with medical professionals who the Government of India has said should be the first ones to be inoculated against the Novel Coronavirus vaccine. The state government has already informed the Centre that 2,90,000 doctors and other health care workers, including staff, and working in both government and private hospitals, have been identified and registered their names to be vaccinated in the first phase set to begin from January 16.

The “request” for including elected representatives from Telangana state in the priority list of vaccine recipients, was made on Saturday, by Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar, during a video conference on vaccination drive preparedness, with Central Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba.

According to a news release issued by the state government on the meeting, Somesh Kumar requested Gauba to “consider including elected representatives for priority vaccination as per the request made earlier during a previous video conference by health minister Etala Rajendar”.
The Telangana Chief Secretary, according to the press release, also urged Gauba to include panchayat raj workers and officials and consider them as frontline warriors as they are part of the first line of defence when it comes to Covid-19 control.

The accepted plan as of now and one that was prescribed by the Central Government for the Covid-19 vaccination drive is that the first section of the society to get the vaccines will be healthcare workers. Once this section gets their two doses of vaccines, it will the turn of those over 50 years of age to be followed by those who are younger than 50 but with co-morbidities that might make them vulnerable to undesirable outcomes if infected by the Coronavirus. It is only after that other sections of the population would be vaccinated, but under the current plans, only if they register themselves on CoWIN app.