DIMAPUR: Nagaland recorded 65% COVID-19 vaccination coverage as of March 30, state immunization officer Dr Ritu Thurr said on Thursday.
He attributed the low vaccination coverage in the state to vaccine hesitancy coupled with the declining rate of COVID -19 cases in the state.
The weekly sample positivity rate of COVID-19 infections in the state has consistently remained below 2% for the past one month.
State nodal officer, Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme, Dr Nyanthung Kikon said Nagaland is not going by the 2011 census but by headcount as far the COVID-19 vaccination drive is concerned.
“So, there is a slight difference between national and state vaccination percentage,” he said.
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Kikon said there is not only vaccine hesitancy but also resistance to the vaccination drive in the state.
As per the data provided by Kikon, 84.7% of health workers received the second dose of Covid-19 vaccine while 99.7% of them were administered the first dose.
Among the frontline workers, 99.7% received the first dose and 79.9% second dose, 65.4% received the first dose in the age group of 18-44 years and 48.7% were vaccinated with the second dose while in the age group of 45 years and above, 48.7% received the first dose and 41.9% the dose.
A total of 25,012 people received the precautionary dose. Altogether 14,59,957 Covid-19 vaccine doses were administered in the state so far.