A large number of private doctors in the Pune city have denied taking the COVID vaccine over their names that went “missing” in the centralized CoWIN app, in spite of registering for the mega immunization drive between 24th October to 12th January.

The doctors mentioned that their names could not be found and verified on the application when they had gone to the nearest vaccination centres according to their area pin-code for on-the-spot immunization allowed for registered but unscheduled recipients.

Sanjay Patil, who is the chairman of the Indian Medical Association’s Hospital Board of India said that a few private doctors have approached them with complaints of their missing names in the CoWIN app, in spite of accordingly submitting the details to the local health authorities in a specified given format. They also had sent the details by mail to the Pune Municipal Corporation’s ward office-linked email id. However, when they visited the nearest centres, their names could not be found in the app and they did not get the vaccine shot. He further said that the complaints were dispersed and the number are around more than 1,000.

City-based radiologist Vinay Chaudhari, who has a diagnostic centre in Yerawada, had submitted his and staff members details through the PMC’s specified email ID in the given format. Few names were either missing or they did not match with the mobile number of Aadhaar data uploaded in the CoWIN app. They could not pass the verification process and hence couldn’t get the vaccine.

There are approximately 500 practising radiologists in Pune and around 300 doctors practising in Chandannagar-Vadgaonsheri area were denied the vaccine for the same reason.

An umbrella organisation which is for general practitioners in Pune has received few complaints of missing names in the last few days too. Rupa Agarwal, who is a president of General Practitioners’ Association, Pune branch, said that most of the doctors who had their own clinics had approached the nearest vaccination centres and found their names were missing.

GP Aparna Gupte, practising on Sinhagad Road, said that she got the vaccine shot but the names of her 20 clinic staffers were found missing when approached the vaccination centre. Also, the names of the staff who were involved in the clinical work at the old age home run by her also were found missing in the app.

Chief of the PMC’s health department, Ashish Bharati, said that they will certainly try to re-register these doctors. Their names must have gone missing because of certain mistakes while uploading the data.

Source: The Times of India