Chandigarh, Jan 3 (IANS): Punjab is fully prepared with a capacity to vaccinate 4 lakh people a day, state Health Minister Balbir Sidhu said on Sunday.

He said the state has established a robust storage capacity of one crore vaccines. It has also achieved more than 95 per cent of routine vaccination of children, the highest in the country.

Highlighting major recruitments made in the Health Department, the minister said that in past three years, 10,049 recruitments have been made under the Ghar-Ghar Rozgar Yojana.

He said 649 specialists, 875 medical officers, 960 staff nurses and 2,250 other paramedical staff were on a regular basis.

Under the National Health Mission, 833 specialists and medical officers and 4,212 paramedical, 205 ministerial staff and 14 Class IV have been recruited.

In addition, 51 staff members have been recruited under the state health agency.

Sidhu said around 1.60 lakh health workers would receive a Covid-19 vaccine in the first phase and their names have already been uploaded on the CoWin portal, an online platform for monitoring the delivery of the vaccine.

As per the protocol, after health workers, vaccine will be administered to around 3 lakh frontline workers, including policemen, paramilitary forces, sanitation workers and disaster management volunteers.