India Can't Vaccinate The Mahi Way

A one-day record means little. Supplies are still constrained. And bigger states have the most catching up to do

- Shankar Raghuraman

India’s record of having vaccinated nearly 86 lakh people on Monday would have raised hopes in many that the government’s target of fully vaccinating all adults by year-end could well be realised. The math seems to suggest this. With about 28.5 crore shots already provided as of Tuesday morning, what remains to be provided is just under 160 crore over the next 193 days to cover all 93.9 crore adults in India. That’s an average of 82.6 lakh doses a day and after all it has now been proved that we can do that many in a day

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For those of such optimists who are cricket buffs, it may well have conjured up visions of Mahendra Singh Dhoni in his prime – taking the match ‘deep’, remaining unfazed by the asking rate climbing, knowing that he has it in him to do what it takes at the fag end of the innings. Seductive as this vision is, there is a problem with it. There is of course the issue of whether one great over where you score, say, 20 runs heralds a string of similar overs to come. In this case, that’s the question of whether a one-day record of 86 lakh signals similar levels in the days to come. But we’ll come to that in a bit.