Stampede-Like Situation at Vaccination Centre in Madhya Pradesh

Half of the 600 people who had turned up to get vaccinated, had to be turned away as the centre only had 280 doses.

(Photo: The Quint)

Video Producer: Naman Shah
Video Editor: Mohd. Irshad Alam

A stampede-like situation was seen at a vaccination centre in Madhya Pradesh’s Chhindwara district on Thursday, 1 July, when a crowd of people, ignoring social distancing, tried to raise the shutters and enter the centre in order to get the jab.

Around half of the 600 people who had turned up to get vaccinated, had to be turned away as the centre only had 280 doses, The Indian Express reported.

As per District Immunisation Officer LN Sahu, a community hall in Lodikheda area of Sausar block was turned into a vaccination centre. Before the centre was opened at 8 am, a crowd had assembled there. The police were later deployed to bring the situation under control.

Sahu was quoted as saying, “The crowd tried to open the shutters themselves and get inside to ensure they were vaccinated. The situation was brought under control within 15 minutes. It sometimes happens that a large crowd assembles at a certain time, and since this was in the morning, people who work in the fields had turned up for vaccination,” The Indian Express reported.

This comes amid reports of vaccine dose shortage in different states, following India’s vaccination spike on 21 June, when Centre’s new vaccination policy was launched. From vaccinating over 90 lakh people, that number has come down to around 42 lakh doses on 1 July.

On Thursday, the vaccination drive in Indore that was intended to run for 10 days, from 21 June to 30 June, was cut short to only five days, owing to shortage, news agency ANI reported. The city also failed to achieve the targeted number of vaccinations.

According to the chief medical and health Officer Indore DA Satya about eight lakh vaccinations would be completed in 10 days, but due to shortage of vaccines, the health department had only vaccinated around 62,00,00 people by running the drive for five days

Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said on Thursday that the vaccination speed had picked up and 1,15,00,00,000 doses were given in the month of June.

Tehsildar of Sausar block Mahesh Aggarwal clarified there was no truth to the rumours that the crowd had assembled as the administration announced that people would be deprived of free ration if they weren’t vaccinated.

Aggarwal added, “People are scared of the third wave of infection as Sausar is closer to Maharashtra and therefore, they are showing up in large numbers for vaccination,” reported The Indian Express.

Chhindwara Collector Saurabh Suman was quoted as saying, “For future course of action, we have asked all administrative officers to set up sites in the open. We have told local authorities that the situation should not be repeated and rules should be followed for setting up vaccination centers."

He added, "The general guidelines say that vaccination centres should be in places that have a large ground and bigger rooms. There were certain violations at the Lodhikedga vaccination centre, and local authorities have been warned to not repeat it.”

(With inputs from Indian Express and ANI)