Thiruvananthapuram: More than 4.5 lakh people were vaccinated in Kerala on Saturday, a first for the state, and with this more than 16 lakh have been given the jab till now this week alone, Kerala Health Minister Veena George said.
However, now the state has only about two lakh vaccines in stock and everyone will not be able to get vaccinated on Sunday, she said.
The minister also said that if more vaccines are not supplied to the state by the central government soon, vaccination in Kerala would come to a standstill for an indefinite period.
By vaccinating 4,53,339 people on Saturday, Kerala has shown that it can vaccinate more than four lakh people per day and that it was the best state where vaccination was concerned.
It also debunked the propaganda that the state was hoarding around 10 lakh vaccines, she said.
She further said that vaccination in the state was higher than the national average and all of its health workers and frontline workers have received the first dose of the COVID vaccine.
She also said that presently there are 1,522 vaccination centres of which 1,380 were run by the government and remaining were private.
Of the 14 districts, Kannur came first by vaccinating 59,374 people, Thrissur second with 53,841 and Kottayam third with 51,276.
So far, a total of 1,83,89,973 people in the state have been vaccinated with one or two doses.
Of these, 1,28,23,869 were given the first dose and 55,66,104 were given the second dose, she said.
She also said that 38.39 per cent of the total population was given the first dose and 16.66 per cent the second dose.
She further said that 53.43 per cent of the population which was over the age of 18 have been given the first dose and 23.19 per cent the second dose, which was well ahead of the central average.