191,181 people inoculated on 1st day of India's Covid-19 vaccination drive

India today successfully began the world's biggest Covid-19 vaccination drive, inoculating 191,181 people with no case of post-vaccination hospitalisation reported so far.

The first day of the massive countrywide vaccination programme saw beneficiaries being administered Covishield manufactured by Serum Institute of India and Covaxin produced by Bharat Biotech, the Health Ministry said in a late-evening update.

An additional 3,429 beneficiaries were vaccinated in defence institutions. As many as 16,755 personnel were actively involved in organising the immunisation session sites, our New Delhi correspondent reports.

While Covishield vaccine has been supplied to all the states, Covaxin was sent to 12 states.

Adequate quantities of vaccines and logistics were ensured for today's vaccination session sites across the country. Minor issues such as some delay in uploading of beneficiary list at some session sites were successfully resolved, the Health Ministry said.

Earlier, virtually launching the start of the vaccination campaign this morning, Prime Minister Narendra Modi put the unprecedented scale of the vaccination drive in perspective by pointing out that, in the first round itself, three crore people, which is more than population of at least 100 countries of the world, would be vaccinated.

Modi asked people not to pay heed to rumours and conspiracy theories as Indian vaccine scientists, medical system, and institutional mechanism in this regard are trusted globally and this trust is earned with a consistent track record.