Covid-19 Vaccine: Free At Govt Hospitals, Pay At Private Hosp

The Centre has cleared the way for the second phase COVID-19 vaccination drive and the Union Minister Prakash Javadekar informed that for those aged above 60 years and those above 45 years of age are eligible to get the vaccine from March 1st.

And in this second phase of vaccination drive, the Centre has allowed private hospitals too. The vaccine will be distributed to 10,000 government hospitals and 20,000 private hospitals. The Covid-19 vaccine will be free of cost for those going to government hospitals but it will be paid in private hospitals. However, the Centre is yet to decide on the price of the vaccine and minister Javadekar stated that the Centre will take a call on it very soon.

According to the union ministry stats, there are about 10 crore people in the country aged above 60 years and in the first phase of vaccination, 1.6 crore people received it. A total 1,61,840 vaccine doses were given as of February 23rd and high priority was given to healthcare and frontline workers.

64,71,047 healthcare workers and 41,14,710 frontline workers have received the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine shot while 13,21,635 healthcare workers have taken the second dose.