A health worker administers the Covishield vaccine for COVID-19 during a special vaccination drive in Hyderabad.
To make easy access for Covid vaccines for the citizens, the Ministry of Health has taken yet another significant initiative to enhance access with the help of Google search.
The Union Health Minister took to Twitter and said, "search 'covid vaccine near me' on Google, Check availability of slots and more, Use 'Book Appointment' feature to book a slot."
Google today said users will be able to get more information about vaccine availability and appointments for over 13,000 locations in the country across its three products - Search, Maps and Assistant - starting this week.
The information is powered by real-time data from the CoWIN APIs, and includes details like availability of appointment slots at each centre, vaccines and doses offered (Dose 1 or Dose 2), pricing (paid or free), and link to CoWIN website for booking, a statement said.
The information will automatically show up when users search for vaccine centres near them, or in any specific area – across Google Search, Maps and Google Assistant, it added.
In addition to English, users can also search in eight Indian languages including Hindi, Bengali, Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Gujarati, and Marathi.
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Google said it will continue to partner closely with the CoWIN team to extend this functionality to all vaccination centres across India.
In March this year, Google started showing information on COVID-19 vaccination centres, in partnership with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
"As people continue to seek information related to the pandemic to manage their lives around it, we remain committed to finding and sharing authoritative and timely information across our platforms,” said Hema Budaraju, Director of Google Search, said.
With 1.33 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses being administered on Tuesday, the highest ever in a single day, the cumulative doses given in the country under the vaccination drive has exceeded 65.41 crore, according to the Union Health Ministry data.
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