[BREAKING] Universal COVID vaccination can't be achieved by a policy that relies exclusively on digital portal: Supreme Court on CoWin website

The Supreme Court of India has stated that the COVID vaccination policy in place, which relies exclusively on a digital portal (CoWin portal) for vaccinating a significant population of this country between the ages of 18-44 years, "would be unable to meet its target of universal immunization owing to digital divide.".A Bench of Justices DY Chandrachud, L Nageswara Rao and Ravindra Bhat, in its judgment in the suo motu case on COVID-19 issues, stated that "there exists a digital divide in India, particularly between the rural and urban areas.""The extent of the advances made in improving digital literacy and digital access falls short of penetrating the majority of the population in the country. Serious issues of the availability of bandwidth and connectivity pose further challenges to digital penetration," the Court said. .The top court noted that the digital divide could have serious implications on the fundamental right to equality and the right to health of persons within the above age group..The Court, therefore, directed the Central government to clarify whether it is feasible to require the majority of our population to rely on friends/NGOs for digital registrations over CoWIN, when even the digitally literate are finding it hard to procure vaccination slots.Further, the issue of over-crowding may also arise at CSCs in rural areas where people would have to visit constantly in hope of a vaccine slot opening up, the Court noted. "Certain vaccination centres may be earmarked for on-site registrations for the population aged between 18-44 years without the existing conditions prescribed in the circular dated 24 May 2021, potentially with a view to prioritize those with co-morbidities/disabilities/other socio-economic vulnerabilities," the judgment said. .Some of the other clarifications sought from the Central government are:1.Whether specific daily quotas may be introduced for on-site registration at each centre or specific centres. This policy may not allay the issue of hesitancy which may arise from approaching a State authority (such as the District Immunization Task Force) to obtain registration for the vaccination.2. Whether on-site registration with selfattestation of age to ensure widespread vaccination can be provided. The CoWIN platform and other IT applications like Aarogya Setu should be made available in regional languages. The timeline for ensuring the availability of the platform in multiple regional languages.3. Conducting a disability audit for the CoWIN website and other IT application like Aarogya Setu to ensure that they are accessible to persons with disabilities. 40 It has been brought to our notice that the CoWIN platform is not accessible to persons with visual disabilities..The Supreme Court further noted that the CoWIN website suffers from certain impediments. They are: (i) Audio or text captcha is not available;(ii) The seven filters, which inter alia, include age group, name of vaccine and whether the vaccine is paid or free, are not designed accessibly. "This issue can be addressed by creation of a drop-down list," the Court said. (iii) While visually challenged persons can determine the number of available vaccine slots, one cannot find out the day those slots correspond to. "This can be resolved by ensuring that table headers correspond to associated cells," the top court suggested. (iv) Keyboard support for navigating the website is absent(v) The Court also said that adequate time should be given to disabled users to schedule their appointment without the possibility of being automatically logged ofvi) Further, accessibility protocols, such as use of appropriate colour contrasts, should be adhered to.[BREAKING] Supreme Court seeks complete data on Central Govt’s purchase history of all COVID-19 vaccines; asks when vaccination can be completed.The Supreme Court, therefore, asked the Central government to furnish complete data on the government’s purchase history of all the COVID-19 vaccines till date including Covaxin, Covishield and Sputnik V.The Court ordered that the data should clarify: (a) the dates of all procurement orders placed by the Central government for all 3 vaccines; (b) the quantity of vaccines ordered as on each date; and (c) the projected date of supply..The Court also ordered the government to provide data on the percentage of population that has been vaccinated with one dose and both doses, as against eligible persons in the first three phases of the vaccination drive.This shall include data pertaining to the percentage of rural population as well as the percentage of urban population so vaccinated, the Court said..[Read judgment]