India to vaccinate children in 12-14 age group against Covid from Wednesday

India will start vaccinating children in the 12-14 age group against Covid from Wednesday, health minister Mansukh Mandaviya has tweeted. "If children are safe, the country is safe. It makes me really happy to announce that from 16 March, children in (the) 12-14 age group can get vaccinated against Covid," the minister wrote. All adults above 60 years of age will be able to get booster doses.

So far, only those with illnesses above 60 could get the third dose of vaccine apart from frontline and health workers.

In his tweet, the minister also appealed: "I request all the adults above 60, and family members of children to get the shots." For the 12-14 age group, the vaccine that will be given "would be Corbevax manufactured by Biological Evans, Hyderabad", the government said in a statement.

"The government has also decided that the condition of co-morbidity for Covid-19 precaution dose for population over 60 years of age will be removed forthwith. Hence, from 16th March 2022 onwards, the entire population above 60 years of age will be eligible for precaution dose of Covid-19 vaccine," the statement further underlined.

India began the world's largest vaccination programme in January last year. The first phase was for health workers and frontline workers, and the programme was then expanded to adults above 60 in March 2021, and then to all adults two months later. Amid concerns over new variants, the country began giving booster doses in January. For children, the vaccination for 15-18 age group began in January.

The country has given more than 180 crore doses of vaccines so far. After a huge surge in cases in January, driven by Omicron, the country is now witnessing a drop in cases. On Monday, only 2,503 cases were logged, the lowest daily rise in 680 days.