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India Covid: Long queues in Mumbai for vaccination amid virus surge

Mumbai - Thousands of residents including senior citizens start lining up outside vaccination centres from early morning hoping to get a jab.

While government leaders and police officials urge people to avoid venturing out during the Covid lockdown, thousands of Mumbai residents are forced to line up outside vaccination centres and wait indefinitely for hours, thanks to the shoddy handling of the entire vaccination system.

Thousands of Mumbai residents including senior citizens start lining up outside vaccination centres from early morning hoping to get a jab. While almost everyone wears masks, it is not uncommon to see people removing it for a few minutes to take in some fresh air.

Though the Indian government has been touting its CoWin application as being the best way to get appointments, many are unable to access it or get the right information about vaccination centres or even appointments. This results in citizens rushing to the nearest centres and waiting in long queues.

BMC, the Mumbai civic body, has made it compulsory for people wanting to get vaccinated to get appointments on the CoWin portal. Unfortunately, many of the senior citizens are not used to handling mobile apps and persist in queuing outside places where they hope to get vaccinated. A few days ago, the BMC resumed vaccinating those above 45, but has been unable to tackle problems related to lack of coordination with citizens and the ability to ensure a hassle-free process.

Hundreds of people start crowing outside centres from 6 in the morning, though the civic body has urged citizens not to stand in queues without appointments. The civic body is now planning to set up special booths to help senior citizens not accessing apps to get appointments. And those with provisional certificates providing details of their first vaccination will be exempted from having to get prior bookings from the government app.

Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray has asked the central government to allow states to have their own apps for registering people, instead of overburdening a single app for the process of vaccination.