Congress asks Karnataka govt to listen to its own vaccine advisor

Congress on Wednesday asked the Karnataka government to pay heed to its vaccine advisor Gagandeep Kang and alleged that the BJP government is only doing headline management.

"The Karnataka must listen to their own vaccine advisor to defeat Covid, rather than deal with Covid as merely a means to let Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders blackmarket vaccines and hospital beds," said DK Shivakumar, Karnataka Congress chief.

On Kang's appointment, Shivakumar said, "We thought the BJP government was finally taking scientific advice. However, it is clear it was only headline management because the government's actions do not reflect their own advisor's advice."

On social media, Shivakumar quoted Kang on 10 aspects of Covid management and asked if the Karnataka government agreed with her. Congress asked if Karnataka government if it agrees with their vaccine advisor's comment that vaccine procurement should be done by the Centre and not by the states and whether they agreed with her that India was "late on the table" in acquiring vaccines from global companies.

According to an official statement of the party, Dr Kang has been quoted in the media as saying, "The rest of the world has been buying vaccines at risk for a year, so what's the supply that is available in the market for us to go now and say we want to buy vaccines?"

Gagandeep Kang has said the central government's claim of 2 billion vaccine doses by December should be taken "with a pinch of salt," the statement said.

Karnataka Congress asked the BJP government in the state whether it agrees with their vaccine advisor's assessment and if they plan to explain by when they hope to vaccinate all adults in Karnataka.

Congress also asked if the state government agree with its advisor's criticism of the approval that Covaxin got in January without publishing final efficacy data, her criticism that the government ignored early warnings of COVID second wave.

Kang has been urging the Indian government to collect better and more data on Covid and vaccines so that we can fight this war better, the party said.

According to the Union Health Ministry, Karnataka has 2,98,320 active COVID-19 cases. The total number of recoveries has reached 22,90,861 and fatalities have mounted to 29,554.

( With inputs from ANI )