Shillong, May 30: Meghalaya’s stock of COVID-19 vaccines is nearly over, forcing the ongoing vaccination drive to come to a grinding halt, especially for the age group of 18 – 44 years. Many were waiting patiently throughout the day on Sunday in hopes of booking for a slot for the vaccine jab coming week, but the Cowin website did not allow for any bookings for the week.

Meghalaya had opened the online bookings for 18-44 years old on May 23, allowing for the age group to be vaccinated from May 24 to 30, 2021 in government health centres and private hospitals. But no further date was provided for the next slot of the jab.

People who are 45 years and above are not required to book for the vaccine online; they can walk into a health centre and get the vaccine. Only those in the age group of 18 to 44 years have to book their vaccine slot online via the Cowin portal or the Aarogya Setu or the UMANG app.

State Health Minister, A.L. Hek informed that the state has an insufficient stock of vaccines; hence, the vaccination drive had to be stopped. He added that the state had received only 43,000 vaccines from the centre for the inoculation of 18-44-year-old.

He said the state is expecting the next batch of vaccines from the Centre by the middle of the second week of June 2021. So the registration for the vaccination can only be expected after that. However, he did not know how many vaccines will be sent by the centre in this batch.

Joint Secretary & Mission Director, National Health Mission (NHM), Meghalaya, Ram Kumar, said the state has a very limited number of vaccines left, which will be used to inoculate the frontline workers and those aged 45 years and above.

He further stated that the state isn’t sure by which exact date the vaccines will arrive, so it is difficult to put a date on when bookings will open again for 18-44-year-old. The centre has only told them that the next batch will be dispatched on the second week of June, and the State is expecting the delivery somewhere between June 8 to 10 as of now.

Meghalaya is not alone in facing the vaccine shortage as states across the whole country are complaining of the same, leading to most of the states halting the inoculation drive for 18-44 years old.

So far, Meghalaya has vaccinated 4,63,951 people, of which 3,89,627 have received the first dose and 74,324 have received the second dose.

The state has so far recorded 35,190 COVID-19 positive cases, of which 27,130 have recovered while 7,496 are still recovering. In the meantime, the state has also recovered 564 fatalities to the pandemic.