COVID Vaccination for the age group 18-44 has started in the state and Days
fixed for the vaccination are 17, 20, 24, 27, 31 May 2021. On these days, vaccination will be provided only to those eligible persons who have scheduled their appointment on
the COWIN portal. The Government Spokesperson informed that till now directions had been given to the districts they were requested to publish sessions 2 day prior to vaccination day before 5 pm.
A lot of media reports were also received regarding different timings of all districts and misinformation. Hence to bring uniformity in the State
for scheduling the sessions, Districts will be updating the sessions on the COWIN portal two days before the session between 2.30 to 3.00 P.M. All the eligible persons are informed that they may schedule their appointments on the COWIN portal as per the available sessions.
Mental health issues during COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought multiple challenges in addition to the
disease itself. During this period renewed emphasis is required on the Mental Health issues of Positive patients during their illness, persons during Post COVID period, Pre-existing patients with psychiatric disorders and general mental health concerns faced by the general public.
The Government spokesperson said that adequate steps have been taken since the onset of the pandemic to address the concerns of such patients.
Comprehensive Call Centre “104 Health Helpline” is providing counselling
services related to Mental health/de-addiction. This helpline has been notified as “Mental health Helpline” in the month of September 2020.
Till now 194 number of calls have been received since January 2021 to till date for counselling.
The new facility for psychiatric consultation, e-Sanjeevani was established on 01 st April 2020 in the State. To cater to the health care need of the population keeping in view the decreased mobility due to lockdown and the pandemic conditions and
anticipating a rise in mental health issues, Psychiatrist were deployed as Specialists in hubs of IGMC, Shimla and SLBSGMC, Nerchowk, Mandi. Till now 4854 consultations have been done through this facility, out of which 2337 patients have been given counselling since Jan 2021.
The spokesperson said that the majority of the patients had psychiatric symptoms that included anxiety, worries, non-specific psychological distress,
depression, stress symptoms including PTSD, insomnia, hallucinations, paranoid and suicidal ideations. These calls were received from elderly, youth, adolescents and children. He added that adequate active and promotive measures have been taken to deliver mental health care at the community level.
He said the pandemic has been used as an opportunity to establish community
mental health services. In order to strengthen Mental Health Curative Services at District level, District Mental Health Teams have been constituted which have been mandated with ensuring specialized services at the Districts for early detection and treatment of mental health disease along with generating public awareness on mental health, monitoring and record keeping and short term training of general physicians in the district. For capacity Building of various health care providers, the State has organized module based online training for Counsellors posted at various locations in the State including “104 Helpline”.
Further psychiatrists posted in various districts have been trained as TOTs who have further trained the DMHTs. Training of medical officers
of 99 “Nayi Disha Kendra” on mental health issues including de-addiction has also been accomplished. Medical officers have been trained in community mental health programmes through NIMHANS.
