Doctors’ association seeks opinion on vaccine safety

Doctors’ association seeks opinion on vaccine safety

TNGDA to issue an advisory for members by January 14

13/01/2021

Special CorrespondentCHENNAI

With some doctors expressing concerns over the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine and expressing their unwillingness to vaccinate themselves, the Tamil Nadu Government Doctors Association (TNGDA) has sought the opinion of independent specialists on the safety, efficacy and choice of the vaccines offered. They will issue an advisory for members based on the reports.

With the vaccination against COVID-19 for healthcare professionals and workers set to begin soon, the TNGDA sent a circular to all State executive committee (EC) members of the association. The TNGDA said the government had announced the starting of the vaccination drive against SARS-CoV-2. The government planned to launch the drive with two vaccines — Covishield and Covaxin. The Centre had announced the start of vaccination for healthcare professionals on January 16.

“In this situation, some of the doctors and other frontline workers have expressed concern on the safety of the vaccine supplied and if they have a choice. Some doctors have expressed unwillingness to vaccinate themselves for the fear of serious complications vis-a-vis the disease [infectivity and mortality],” the association said in the circular.

Due to the queries raised and the doubts prevailing among some doctors, the TNGDA had sought an opinion by January 13 from three independent specialists on the safety, efficacy and choice of vaccines offered. It will issue an advisory for its members and other stakeholders based on those reports after the scheduled TNGDA emergency executive committee meeting on January 14.

“We will finalise the advisory on January 14. It will mostly be on the type of vaccine to be preferred and who should take it. It is mostly surrounding the safety aspect,” an office-bearer said.

Vacancies in Secretariat a cause for concern

Vacancies in Secretariat a cause for concern

More than 150 Under Secretary posts are lying vacant

13/01/2021

Time to recruit: The government is racing against time to clear all files with the present strength. File photo

Dennis S. JesudasanCHENNAI

Several vacancies in various departments housed on the Secretariat campus in Chennai have become a cause for concern.

It is said that the vacancies were causing delays even as the government is racing against time to clear all the files ahead of the Assembly election. Most of the vacancies are of Under Secretary and Deputy Secretary posts in various departments.

Though the sanctioned strength of Under Secretaries is around 240 in 36 State government departments (in what is known as ‘one unit’, excluding the Finance and the Law Departments), more than 150 posts are vacant.

“The Under Secretaries are also posted as Public Information Officers [PIOs] for giving replies to RTI Act queries. Since about 70%-75% of posts are vacant, the response to RTI applications are also delayed,” said a section officer.

Section officers are not promoted as Under Secretaries. The promotion of typists, assistants and assistant section officers have also been affected as the Under Secretary posts have not been filled.

Another officer said certain litigation relating to the issue were pending in court, despite over 60 hearings.

“Only because the government extended the services of government employees by one more year with effect from last year, some Under-Secretaries are still in service. If not for the announcement, there would have been more vacancies,” he added. When contacted, a senior official told The Hindu that the government was not able to fill these vacancies due to the pending litigation.

However, instructions have been issued to the Personnel and Administrative Reforms Department to promote these (litigating) section officers to the Under Secretary posts, subject to the outcome of the case.

“However, we could not do the same for Deputy Secretary posts, since only a few positions are vacant and there are multiple claimants for each of these posts,” the official added.

AICTE urges college to pay salary dues to staff, return certificates

AICTE urges college to pay salary dues to staff, return certificates

9 teachers of Nagercoil-based engineering college have not been paid since March

13/01/2021

Special CorrespondentCHENNAI

The All India Council for Technical Education has asked the principal of Ponjesly College of Engineering in Nagercoil to pay salary to nine of its staff and also return the original certificates of its faculty.

The Council, in a letter to the principal, said it had received complaints from nine staff members, who had been working in the institution for the past four to seven years.

The faculty said the performance of the teachers was more than satisfactory as seven of 33 students had secured university ranks. Yet, the college had not paid them salary since March 2020.

Despite their performance, the college had been paying only a consolidated amount, the AICTE noted.

Not only did the college not pay salary as per AICTE norms but it also withheld all payments.

The staff appealed to the Council to ensure that the college paid them a minimum of ₹5,000 to enable them meet their domestic expenses, including recharging their mobile phones. Instead, the management had removed the faculty from the college’s official communication media group.

The AICTE communication said the management had insisted that the faculty resign when they asked for their original certificates to be returned.

Appeal to AICTE

The staff had appealed to the AICTE to help them receive their salary dues and arrears, be given access to their provident fund account, and return their certificates besides issuing experience certificates, covering their present service.

In a 10-page letter to the principal, the AICTE regional officer, M. Sundaresan, cited the various court verdicts that have been issued protecting the faculty’s rights.

A copy of the letter was also sent to the Commissioner of the Directorate of Technical Education and the Registrar of Anna University, besides the nine affected faculty members.

Lack of food and water in Tejas Express’

Lack of food and water in Tejas Express’

The train was re-introduced on January 10 after cancellation due to poor patronage

13/01/2021

S. SundarMadurai

A section of passengers travelling in Tejas Express complained of lack of drinking water, beverages and snacks.

The train was re-introduced on January 10 after cancellation due to poor patronage. The passengers said that they were put to lot of sufferings on the first train that left Chennai Egmore on Sunday.

“The train leaves Chennai Egmore early in the morning at 6 a.m. People have neither time to cook breakfast or buy food or water bottle as even hotels are not opened at that time,” complained J. Jerin (34) of Nagercoil.

Onboard railway employees claimed that distribution of food and water had been stopped after a passenger made a complaint.

Mr. Jerin said many passengers who failed to bring water had to suffer till the train reached Tiruchi. The worst part is that the train arrived Tiruchi station with a delay of an hour.

Some of the passengers had pleaded with the travelling ticket examiners to make the halt for additional five minutes so that everyone could buy water and food. He complained that even toilets were not maintained properly in the premium train.

“But, claiming that the train was already running behind the schedule, the TTE refused,” said another passenger, A. Ramachandran (62) of Theni.

Besides, elderly people found it difficult to buy food and water as the train stops for a brief while at the station.

Mr. Ramachandran said that the online ticket itself had made a mention that no food would be supplied with the ticket. However, water bottle, coffee/tea, snacks and food packets that were sold in the train earlier were missing on Sunday.

However, a railway official here said that Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation that operates the train could not make arrangement for the water and food immediately as operation of the train was announced all of a sudden.

Onboard sale of water bottles, coffee, snacks and noodles resumed on Tuesday, he added

Colleges not paying faculty despite fee reimbursement

Colleges not paying faculty despite fee reimbursement

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Hyderabad:13.01.2021

Despite receiving fee reimbursements dues from the government, technical colleges — engineering, MBA, pharmacy, among others — have allegedly not paid salaries to the faculty.

Faculty members said that many colleges are not paying salaries since April. Few managements are said to be paying only 50% of the salary.

“Except for a few top colleges, managements stopped paying salaries to their faculty members during the pandemic. Between November-December 2020, the state started releasing dues to college managements. But, even now the faculty members are yet to receive salaries,” said A Santosh Kumar, president, Telangana Schools’ Technical Colleges Employees Association.

They said that even top colleges, which are collecting over one lakh rupees as the fee from each student, are not paying proper salaries. “Despite receiving reimbursement amount and collecting annual fees from students, my management is paying only 50% salaries,” said a faculty member, working at a private engineering college in Ghatkesar.

They said that most of the colleges have divided faculty into different categories and are not paying them uniformly.

“In a college, few faculty members are paid full salaries, some are paid 50% salaries, and others are not being paid at all. This is the case with almost all the colleges. Overall, about 40% of the teaching faculty in technical institutions are forced to survive without salaries,” said V Balakrishna Reddy, president, Telangana Technical Employees Association.

The managements, meanwhile, said that they have only received a part of fee reimbursement dues from the state.

“Till now, only SC/ST fee reimbursement dues are released. In the majority of colleges, 70% of total scholarships belong to BC students. Unless they are cleared, managements will not be in a position to clear salary dues,” said K Ramadas, co-convenor, Telangana Private College Management Joint Action Committee.

Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University authorities, meanwhile, said that they have already given instructions to college managements to pay salaries to their staff and added that before sanctioning affiliation, they will be verifying the ground reality and will initiate action against erring colleges.

Don’t panic, bird flu is common in winter: Sr official

Don’t panic, bird flu is common in winter: Sr official

Neha.Madaan@timesgroup.com

Pune:13.01.2021

Avian flu occurs every year in the country because migratory birds bring the infection to India from across the world, Atul Chaturvedi, the secretary of the Union government’s department of animal husbandry, dairy and fisheries told TOI on Tuesday.

On the sudden outbreak of avian influenza in parts of the country, Chaturvedi said, “The outbreaks usually happen in winter months, starting from September-October till February-March. Unnecessary panic need not be created about avian influenza — a common phenomenon in India. Some years, the bird mortalities are more and in others less. Every year, India gets the disease because of bird migrations and is declared bird flu-free subsequently after the outbreak is over.”

He said, “In the history of bird flu in India over the last 15 years since 2006, not a single instance has been reported when the infection was passed on to humans. Human to human transmission is even more remote.”

Chaturvedi said there was also no requirement for banning import of poultry products from affected states, which some states were doing, because the infected poultry was being culled and not allowed to move out of the infected zone. “There should be no apprehension about the consumption of poultry products if they are cooked properly,” he said.

He said the states had been told to prioritise the testing of dead bird samples, which was of prime importance to contain the spread of avian influenza.

Chaturvedi said three states — Maharashtra, Haryana and Kerala — among the 10 affected with avian influenza so far in India had reported the outbreak in poultry and duck population, where culling might be required.

Full report on www.toi.in

Countdown to Delhi vaccination begins with 2.6L doses landing

Countdown to Delhi vaccination begins with 2.6L doses landing

Alok K N Mishra & Sidhartha Roy

New Delhi:13.01.2021

After over 10 months of counting Covid-19 cases daily, the capital on Tuesday began to keep track of a new tally with 2.64 lakh doses of Covishield vaccine arriving at Delhi airport. Stored at the city’s largest and central Covid vaccine cold storage facility at Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital in east Delhi, the vials will inject new hope into the fight against the pandemic from Saturday.

Starting with 8,900 healthcare workers, who are to be inoculated at 89 booths across the capital, the unprecedented campaign aims to vaccinate 2.25 lakh healthcare workers before moving on to other vulnerable groups and gradually widening the scope to cover people in the rest of the city.

The vials are protected by three security layers and have been stored at an optimal temperature (2 to 8o C). A cold van delivered 22 boxes of vaccines at the hospital with each box containing 12,000 doses.

Special flight brings vials to IGI

Delhi’s first vaccine consignment arrived on a SpiceXpress SG 8937 at IGI airport at 10.15am in specially packed airtight containers. The flights are capable of transporting extremely sensitive drugs, blood samples and vaccines in a controlled temperature range of -40o C to +25o C. P 3

Police set up ‘green corridor’

Delhi Police put in place a “green corridor” and deployed escort vehicles for the two containers from Delhi airport on Tuesday afternoon.“A distance of around 40km was covered in around 52 minutes,” joint commissioner of police (traffic) Manish Agrawal said. P 3

100 to be vaccinated a day at each booth

Each box has 1,200 vials and each vial contains 10 doses.

An official said the entire storage facility at the hospital is under 24x7 CCTV surveillance with Delhi Police personnel and the hospital’s own security staff standing guard.

The vaccine will be sent by the health & family welfare department in cold vans to over 89 cold chain points which are located near 89 vaccination booths where the drive will be launched. An official said the vaccine can be stored easily at the cold chain points for a long period. "For the booths located at the government facilities, the vials will be sent a day before Saturday while for the booths located at private hospitals, these will be sent on Saturday morning," said Dr Suneela Garg, director-professor and head of community medicine at Maulana Azad Medical College and a public health expert.

CM Arvind Kejriwal will kickstart the vaccination programme at a function at Lok Nayak Hospital. At each vaccination booth, only a 100 people will be vaccinated in a day.

Those who have enrolled for vaccination will receive text messages from the districts a day earlier mentioning date and time and address of the booth. The SMS and an identity card will be needed to be produced at the booth.

Each booth will have three rooms and will be guarded by Delhi Police and managed by civil defence volunteers. Verification of the credentials of the beneficiary will be done in the first room and entries will be made on the Co-WIN app. The person will then be inoculated in another room. The next stop will be the observation room where the beneficiary will have to stay for 30 minutes to guard against any adverse event.

Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital was selected after the Centre wrote a letter to the Delhi government a few months ago asking for identifying a space of around 5,000 square metres. A team of the Union health ministry surveyed and approved the utility block after which the building was retrofitted.

"The modifications carried out included changing of existing doors so that the deep freezers for bulk storage could be brought in easily. More electricity points were also added and adequate power back-up arranged," said a gover nment official.

Delhi government has identified two more storage facilities. "We also have our existing facility at Battery Lane in north Delhi’s Civil Lines area as a secondary storage point and a third one has been identified at the office of the Directorate General of Health Services in Karkardooma in east Delhi. However, two storage facilities would be more than enough for our requirements and we have identified the third one in case the need arises," he said.

•PM to interact with city health workers on Sat, P 4

•Corpn staff to skip vax duty over arrears, P 4 8 9

VACCINE BOOTHS IDENTIFIED FOR DRIVE