Govt to vaccinate truck drivers, commuters frequenting Shillong-Guwahati

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaApril 22, 2021

Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Thursday said the state government had decided to go for an aggressive vaccination drive to ensure 80 percent of the population gets vaccinated at the earliest.

Sangma also announced the government’s decision to vaccinate taxi drivers, truck drivers and people who are frequent commuters between Guwahati and Shillong and other parts of the state.

After chairing a review meeting, the Chief Minister told reporters that the second wave is much more aggressive as the transmission is much more higher compared to last year.

“The good news in this is that there is a light at the end of the tunnel in the sense that last year we did not know when this would end but in this second wave, at least there is a plan where we can see that if the vaccination drive goes well and if you can achieve 70-80 percent of vaccination of the population in the next two weeks to four weeks time, we are able to protect our people better. That is the difference between this time and last time,” he said.

Sangma however said that the situation of vaccination is not going as per the plan as there is a slight fear among the people.

“To that, I would like to clarify to everybody that more than 1.80 lakh doses have been given to our state and nobody has faced any kind of serious repercussion, there may be some two people who have got fever or allergy – so all these steps we have seen it has not affected anybody in a very severe manner,” he said.

Stating that the safety aspect is very strong, Sangma said, “There is also a study which has shown that& almost 75 million people who were vaccinated out of which less than 100 people came out positive after taking the second dose.  There is clear evidence that shows that this vaccination will protect the people having said that, again, it is not that you will not get positive. The vaccination gives protection to you and whoever takes the vaccination has clearly shown that even people above the age of 60—70 or 80 even though they may get positive they are able to fight the virus better, they are not needing medical attention the way others who have not taken vaccination.

Therefore, if you take the vaccination you are protected better and the chance of you fighting the virus in terms of comorbidities you might have or the age factor you might have is much stronger, therefore we are better off taking the vaccination than not taking it. That is my message.”

The Chief Minister also informed that the government has also decided to extend the vaccination drive to journalists who are also frontline workers.

“We have also decided that taxi drivers, truck drivers, people who commute a lot between Guwahati and Shillong and other parts of the state must also be vaccinated. We are going for a target based approach, a very focus approach,” he said.

Stating that the government is aggressively pushing the vaccination drive, Sangma said, “I hope that with the involvement of the MLAs, we should be able to touch about 25,000 to 30,000 within next two days– That is the kind of speed we want to go with.”

According to him, the state has six and a half lakh people who are above the age of 45 and who need to be vaccinated immediately besides approximately two lakh frontline workers

“We are hopeful this group will be able to complete in the next two-three weeks and then we try to work out so that at least 80 percent of our population is vaccinated at the earliest,” the chief minister stated.