Mumbai: The first day of BMC’s no walk-in rule had a chaotic start at most vaccination centres. Many citizens unaware of such a direction came without appointment. As the crowd swelled and refused to leave without the shot, some centres relaxed the ‘no walk-in’ rule for a few hours.
Booking a vaccine appointment on CoWin is now a game of fastest finger first. For the past few days, with limited slots up for grabs, vaccine seekers are spending hours on the website or mobile app to secure a confirmation in the few seconds they remain available.
When slots open, applicants have usually less than a minute to select the vax centre, time or type a security code. “Most days end in disappointment in the race against more tech-savvy citizens,” said Somnath Shetty, a Thane resident who managed to book slots at KEM for himself and his mother on Friday.
While BMC announces availability on Twitter, other MMR districts upload data on stocks through the day. Both the 18-44 group and s those above 45 now mandatorily need an appointment, thus intensifying the virtual rush.
To boot, many are now criss-crossing districts to land a slot. In Mumbai, those lining up with appointments include Thane or Navi Mumbai residents. On Friday, 41,107 took the vaccine in Mumbai of which an estimated 50% made online bookings, said an official.
Bhuleshwar resident Rajesh Rathod said he spent half of Friday refreshing the Aarogya Setu app and the Co-Win page. “I hit a jackpot though, I got an appointment in 20 minutes,” he said, standing in the queue at Parel’s KEM Hospital.
Another successful vaccine seeker, a 22-year-old, who managed an appointment for his 82-year-old grandfather’s second dose, said three of his friends “launched an attack” on CoWin from three devices. “We got it for the BKC vaccination centre after multiple attempts,” said the Bandra resident. He said he his friends in Delhi stayed up the night to see if appointments would be easier to get around 3-4am. On Friday, a security code was added to the steps on CoWin, apparently to stop bots from booking the appointments. A sure hack, he said, was to try searching for centres using districts rather than pin codes.
Another revelation for authorities was that vaccine seekers were crisscrossing between districts to get the shots. As slots opened in Mumbai, many from the neighbouring areas such as Thane, Navi Mumbai, Mira Road grabbed the slots. Rajkumari Gupta, a resident of Ghodbunder Road, said five of her previous appointments at nearby centres had got cancelled due to vaccine shortage. So, when she got the sixth confirmed appointment at a Parel centre, she just booked a cab and got there.
Additional municipal commissioner Suresh Kakani said several instances of residents from outside Mumbai booking slots in city hospitals have come to their notice. “We are hoping that the 200-odd centres starting in the community from next week will solve this problem. Because of this, many Mumbaikars are forced to travel outside the city to get doses,” he said.
BMC has also decided to open appointment slots at a fixed hour so that people don’t have to keep scrolling all day. Dr Mangala Gomare, BMC’s executive health officer, said vaccination centres have an idea about their leftover doses by 7.30pm. “We will now open slots uniformly, say around 8pm. We are working on that,” she said.
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