Shillong: Administration of the third booster or precautionary dose of the vaccine against COVID-19 for health care and front-line workers and those above 60 years of age with comorbid conditions commenced in Meghalaya on Monday along with rest of the country.
Meanwhile, the surge in COVID-19 cases continued with the state registering 70 new COVID-19 positive cases on Monday, which increased the number of active cases to 448 and two deaths due
to the viral disease, taking the fatality figure up to 1487, even as 14 more cases of recovery from the virus surged the number of recovered cases to 83,369.
So far, Meghalaya has registered 85304 confirmed COVID-19 cases.
Director Health Service (MI), Dr. Aman War said one COVID-19 related death each was recorded in the East Khasi Hills district and West Khasi Hills district.
He said the new COVID-19 cases detected included 62 in the most pandemic-hit East Khasi Hills, including state capital Shillong with the number of active cases in the district having soared up to 371.
While two new COVID-19 cases were detected in the West Garo Hills district, which now has 45 active cases, four new cases were detected in the Ri-Bhoi district, which has 15 active cases and one case each was detected in the South West Khasi Hills district, which has four active cases and West Khasi Hills district, which has one active case, as per the latest case count.
The West Jaintia Hills district has seven active COVID-19 cases, followed by three active cases in East Jaintia Hills district, one active case each in East Garo Hills district and North Garo Hills district, while the South Garo Hills district and South West Garo Hills district have no active case.
Of the 12,71,367 persons tested for Covid-19 in the state till Monday, 11,86,063 persons were tested negative for the virus, the state Covid dashboard reflected.
Meanwhile, 32,100 health care workers have received the first dose of the vaccine against COVID-19 and 29,165 have been administered with the second dose, 96976 front-line workers have got the first jab and 84,420 have taken the second shot, while 11,23,339 persons from among the general public have been inoculated with the first dose and 7,83,089 citizens have been vaccinated with the second dose across the state till date, as per the National Health Mission record.
Data for the administration of the third booster dose of the Covid-19 vaccine was yet to be furnished by the health department.
