patna chief minister nitish kumar on monday launched the drive to vaccinate six crore more people in the state against covid19 in the next six months he applauded the efforts of the health department in tackling the covid19 crisis so far cautioning people against the predicted third wave nitish urged everyone to follow covid appropriate behaviour and get vaccinateddo get vaccinated it is the only tool to protect oneself from the virus also maintain distance put on a mask and wash hands regularly nitish said on the occasion he also talked about his governments efforts in the first and second wave of covid19 and assistance provided to the people be it tests vaccination medicines or other help he said the state government had been working vigorously following the centres guidelines and despite being the third most populous state bihar was on the 21st position in numbers of active covid19 cases nowwe dont indulge in publicity but work at several places we see people advertising much but we believe in direct work said nitish while lauding the decision to provide free vaccines to all the 1844 years age group beneficiaries he said over 116 crore people in bihar have got first doses and another 2254 lakh their second doses vaccinating another six crore people with two doses of vaccines require a lot of planning and would need huge amount of vaccines and manpower he saidnitish also mentioned his governments decision to give rs4 lakh to the next of kin of the covid19 victims he said there were 9500 such deaths still a poor state like bihar was ready to provide all possible help to its people recalling how the number of covid19 cases increased all of a sudden during the second wave the cm said many people fell victims to it and there was shortage of oxygen across the country which had never happened earlier but now all the arrangements have been made said nitish adding the state government was focused on tests treatment and vaccinationstate health minister mangal pandey called it a big day in terms of health as two mega initiatives were launched six crore vaccination campaign and free vaccines to the beneficiaries of 1844 years age group by pm modi pandey said this vaccination drive will play a crucial role in making bihar covidfreestate health department additional chief secretary pratyaya amrit thanked the cm for guiding the department in the crisis he said the six crore vaccination drive will be officially started from july 1 and will continue till december however the health department will try to achieve this target before the set time frame amrit also talked about the work being done in creating awareness among the people both the deputy cms tarkishore prasad and renu devi education minister vijay kumar choudhary and other cabinet ministers along with senior officials were present on the occasion