Govt. to exchange with private hospitals COVID-19 vaccines with longer expiry period

Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine issues a circular to all deputy directors

The Directorate of Public Health (DPH) and Preventive Medicine has instructed all deputy directors of health services (DDHS) and the city medical officer of the Greater Chennai Corporation to review the COVID-19 vaccine availability in all vaccination centres and exchange vials with shorter expiry from private COVID-19 Vaccination Centres (PCVC) with vials having longer expiry available with the Government COVID-19 Vaccination Centres (GCVC).

In a circular issued in line with a letter from the Union Health Ministry, the DPH said that regular review on the status of vaccines available with PCVCs should be conducted either in person or entry in Co-WIN portal to know about vaccines with shorter expiry period.

The Union Health Ministry said that it had no objections to States and Union Territories exchanging near expiry vaccine vials of PCVCs with long expiry vaccine vials available with government centres after due diligence.

All DDHS and city medical officer were instructed to review the vaccine availability in all centres, including PCVCs, and ensure that no vial in GCVCs as well as PCVCs was wasted for reason of shorter expiry. If vaccines were received from the private centres as donation/exchange due to shorter expiry or other reasons, the respective district had to add stock at District Vaccine Store-level to avoid wastage.

Vaccines with shorter expiry from PCVCs can be exchanged with longer expiry vaccines available with GCVCs if the private centres make a request for exchange after ensuring that the vaccines at the PCVCs were maintained as per the temperature norms prescribed by the immunisation division of the Union Health Ministry, the vaccines are beyond one month date of expiry from the date of receipt by DIOs and by deputing the respective cold chain technicians to PCVCs to confirm the functioning of the cold chain equipment.

All DDHS were instructed that the exchanged vaccines should be exhausted before the expiry date.