India achieves the major milestone of ‘one billion’ COVID-19 vaccinations

In a historic achievement, the cumulative COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country has surpassed the 100-crore milestone. In a tweet, Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated the countrymen and expressed gratitude to the country’s scientific community and health professionals for working towards achieving this stupendous feat. The Union Health Minister Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya also congratulated the country on achieving this landmark.

India scripts history. We are witnessing the triumph of Indian science, enterprise and collective spirit of 130 crore Indians. Congrats India on crossing 100 crore vaccinations. Gratitude to our doctors, nurses and all those who worked to achieve this feat,” the Prime Minister tweeted.

India launched its countrywide vaccination drive on 16 January 2021 with healthcare and frontline workers getting inoculated in the first phase. The second phase covered people over 60 years of age and those aged 45 and above with specified co-morbid conditions and the third phase covered all people aged over 45 years, which was initiated from 1 April. The government then expanded its vaccination drive by allowing all above 18 to be vaccinated from 1 May.

Uday Shankar, President, FICCI said, “Administering 1 billion doses of COVID-19 Vaccine in 10 months is a phenomenal achievement by India, especially in these trying times. FICCI lauds the Hon’ble PM Shri Narendra Modi for his strong leadership and grand visions. We are also grateful to the government for seamless execution of all initiatives, and assure industry’s complete support, the way we have collaborated for tackling the pandemic.”

“As we vaccinate more than 75% of our adult population and move towards vaccinating the children between 2 and 18 years, we need to continue to maintain our guard through COVID Appropriate Behaviour, only then will we be able to protect ourselves adequately,” added Shankar.

The country has achieved many notable milestones since the pandemic started early last year. Starting from our pro-active readiness for test-track-treat, boost to technology enabled care through the roll out of Telemedicine Guidelines and the recent launch of Ayushman Bharat Digital Health Mission, along with constant efforts for augmenting our human resources and physical healthcare infrastructure.

T V Narendran, President, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) said, “Congratulations to the Government of India, Corona warriors and the citizens of the country for scripting history by reaching the milestone of administering 100 crore COVID vaccine doses. This is a truly inspiring achievement under the committed leadership of Hon’ble Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The unyielding efforts and sacrifices made by India’s researchers, doctors, healthcare workforce, administrative teams and police personnel are extraordinary and laudable. This historic mission will help place the economy on a high-growth path and reinforce India’s global leadership role.”

Sustained and collaborative efforts by the Centre and the States/UTs continue the trend of less than 50,000 Daily New Cases that is being reported for 116 consecutive days now.In the last 24 hours, 18,454 new cases were reported. The Active Caseload remains below 2 lakh mark and is presently at 1,78,831. Active cases presently constitute 0.52% of the country's total Positive Cases, which is lowest since March 2020.