Maharashtra had 21 Delta-plus cases: Health Minister Rajesh Tope

State Health Minister Rajesh Tope said on Monday that Maharashtra has seen 21 Deltaplus cases two of which have been recorded in Mumbai itself The latest mutation of the highly infectious Delta variant spreads even faster Tope said that 7500 samples from across the state were tested to determine their variant In another development Tope also extended the vaccination drive to everyone aged above 18 years from Tuesday to speed up immunisationOf the 21 patients found with the Deltaplus variant nine are from Ratnagiri seven from Jalgaon two from Mumbai and one each from Palghar Sindhudurg and ThaneRatnagiri which has a population of 162 lakh registered 761 Covid19 cases on Sunday and 446 cases on MondayPeople talking to a doctor before taking their Covid19 vaccination at a civic centre in Abhyudaya Nagar in Kalachowkie on Monday PicAshish RajeTope said that the state government had decided regarding genomic sequencing and started the process of taking 100 samples from each district Since May 15 7500 samples have been taken out of which 21 cases of Deltaplus have been foundldquoFurther action is being taken regarding these cases and highrisk contacts are being investigated by taking information about their travels vaccination status and Covid19 infection whether they have been reinfected and if they got infected despite vaccinationrdquo Tope saidEach week around 50 samples are sent from the city to check for the presence of the Delta variant BMCrsquos additional commissioner Suresh Kakani said earlier in the day that studies are yet to be done on whether the Deltaplus variant is vaccineresistantlsquoJune has more vax supplyrsquoAfter the civic body started vaccinating those aged 3044 years on Monday the city for the first time witnessed more than one lakh vaccinations in a dayOf the 108 lakh vaccines administered in civic government and private centres on Monday 75316 given to people between 18 and 44 years of ageWith more than three lakh doses in hand civicrun centres started the vaccination drive for those aged 30 to 44 years on Monday The civic body had planned to observe the drive this week and take a call on splitting the group of 1844yearolds by next week Mumbai has five million people aged 18 to 44 yearsHowever late on Monday Tope extended the vaccination drive to everyone above 18 years ldquoTill Monday only those in the age group of 30 to 44 years apart from the 4559 and 60 above group were vaccinated in Maharashtra We want to speed up the immunisation programme and hence we are approving immunisation for all aged above 18 years starting Tuesdayrdquo Tope saidThe city received 870 lakh vaccine doses in April but only 457 lakh in May ldquoIn June the corporation has received more than six lakh doses so far Current supply is better than in the recent past We are expecting more doses from the state and accordingly we will increase the number of centresrdquo said Kakani Till June 19 25 lakh doses have been administered in civic and governmentrun centresThe average vaccination at civic centres in June has been 1600018000 On Monday civicrun centres administered 44384 vaccines out of which 22120 were given to people aged between 30 and 44 yearsSimilarly at governmentrun centres out of 4824 vaccinations 2712 were given to people aged 30 to 44 yearsAt privaterun centres out of the total 58940 doses 49439 were given to people between 18 and 44 years Of the total 108148 vaccines 13688 were given to senior citizens 16788 were given to those aged 45 to 59 years while 253 students and 11 lactating mothers also received the dosesVax numbers in June at civic govt centresPeople vaccinatedJune 1 to 10 126565June 11 to 19 127620Vaccine supply to MumbaiApril 870 lakh dosesMay 457 lakh dosesJune Around 6 lakh doses50Cases from city tested weekly for variant