NEW DELHI, July 27 (Xinhua) -- India's federal health minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Tuesday said the government is likely to start vaccinating children against COVID-19 by next month, local media reports said.

"The government is likely to start vaccinating children against COVID-19 by next month," Mandaviya was quoted by a local news agency as having said during a meeting.

Experts said it would be a giant step in breaking the chain of transmission of COVID-19 infection and would help a lot in the reopening of schools across the country amid warnings of a possible third wave of the pandemic.

Last week, Director of India's premier health institute, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi, Randeep Guleria said the country is likely to start vaccinating children by September.

Prior to Guleria, NK Arora, who heads the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration said vaccination for children will start by September for the age group of 12-18 with the Zydus vaccine.

At present India is vaccinating population above 18 years of age.

According to India's federal health ministry, until Tuesday morning over 441 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines had been administered across the country.

The Indian government aims to vaccinate the entire population by the end of this year.

Experts said India needs to administer 10 million doses a day to achieve its aim of inoculating the adult population by December. Enditem

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