'What Is Rahul Gandhi’s Problem?' Health Minister Slams Congress Leader For Tweet On COVID Vaccine Supply

Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan's response to Rahul Gandhi's tweet comes a day after he wrote about "seeing irresponsible statements from various leaders regarding Largest Vaccine Drive".

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New Delhi: Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan has criticised former Congress President Rahul Gandhi for his latest tweet pertaining to COVID vaccines in India.

Earlier today, Rahul Gandhi took to Twitter and wrote: "July is here, the vaccines have not arrived", using the hashtag 'WhereAreVaccines'.

Reacting to this, Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan replied: "Just yesterday, I put out facts on vaccine availability for the month of July. What is Rahul Gandhi Ji’s problem? Does he not read? Does he not understand? There is no vaccine for the virus of arrogance and ignorance!! INC must think of a leadership overhaul!".

 

The salvo comes a day after the Union Minister wrote about "seeing irresponsible statements from various leaders regarding Largest Vaccine Drive".

He stated that "After GoI provided 75 percent of vaccines available for free, vaccination speed picked up and 11.50 crore doses were given in June. States have already been informed in advance about COVID-19 Vaccine supplies for July. This info was shared with States 15 days prior, along with details about day-wise supply".

A total of 12 crore doses shall be made available in July. private hospital supply will be over and above this. If there are issues in states, it shows that they need to better plan their vaccination drives. Intra-state planning and logistics are the responsibility of the states, he added.

Dr. Harsh Vardhan then went on to urge opposition leaders to desist from "their shameless urge to play politics even in the midst of a pandemic".

He added that he would again request state leaders to spend more energy in planning and "not in creating panic".

Earlier, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had criticised the union government. She had alleged that when other states are getting more vials, Bengal is being overlooked though the state has performed exceptionally in implementing the vaccine scheme.

Speaking to the media, Mamata Banerjee said, "We have administered 2.17 crore vaccine doses so far of which 18 lakh vials worth Rs 59 crore have been procured by the state government directly from the manufacturers. We have received 1.99 crore doses from the Centre of which 1.90 core have been administered. We are the best state as far as implementation, utilisation and execution of the vaccine drive are concerned."

Hitting at Modi government for "not providing" enough vaccine doses to the state, the Chief Minister said, "We have no vaccines for which we are only administering the second dose now. Uttar Pradesh has received 3.15 crore doses, Maharashtra has got 3.17 crore doses, but we have been left out. Even the smaller states like Gujarat and Rajasthan are getting more doses, but a large state like West Bengal is being deprived".

Meanwhile, according to the Health Ministry, a total of 34,00,76,232 people have been vaccinated so far in the country, including 42,64,123 who were administered vaccines in the last 24 hours.

(With Agency Inputs)