COVID-19: Maha govt to start door-to-door vaccination on trial basis

The Maharashtra government has indicated its readiness to do door-to-door vaccination of immobile or bedridden people on an experimental basis and would not wait for approval from the Centre, the state government told the Bombay high court on Wednesday. We will not send this proposal to the Central Government for approval. We (the state government) will decide for ourselves. On an experimental basis, door-to-door vaccination will be started from Pune district, said Advocate General Ashutosh Kumbakoni on behalf of the state governmenton to the division bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Girish Kulkarni.

The state government said in an affidavit filed in court on Tuesday that a person bedridden is required to be certified by his doctor before a dose of corona vaccine can be given at home. The guidelines also state that doctors should take responsibility for the treatment if the vaccine adversely affects the person concerned.
"We hope and pray that you do not press for the doctor to give his undertaking. In a critical operation, the hospital takes the patient or his relative's undertaking. Not the doctor's undertaking. Don't give this impractical condition that no one approaches for vaccination." said Chief Justice Datta.

Advocates Dhriti Kapadia and Kunal Tiwari have filed a PIL in the High Court seeking vaccination of senior citizens above 75 years of age, the disabled and the bedridden. The petition was heard on Wednesday.

The court asked the Maharashtra government to consider the successful vaccination drive conducted by the state of Tripura where nurses and doctors travelled to people's homes to administer the vaccine. 

The next hearing is scheduled for Thursday in the judges' chamber.