Editorial: Welcome move, though belated

Though delayed, the Centre’s approval for booster doses for healthcare and frontline workers and senior citizens with co-morbidities and vaccinating the young population in the age group of 15-18 is a welcome move. There is no reason, whatsoever, for the delay in administering the booster doses to the general population since there is no shortage […]

Though delayed, the Centre’s approval for booster doses for healthcare and frontline workers and senior citizens with co-morbidities and vaccinating the young population in the age group of 15-18 is a welcome move. There is no reason, whatsoever, for the delay in administering the booster doses to the general population since there is no shortage of the vaccines. In fact, India is a major manufacturing hub for the Covid-19 vaccines. There is overwhelming scientific evidence pointing towards the efficacy of a booster shot in curbing the spread of coronavirus strains. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement finally acknowledges the seriousness of the surge in infections due to the rapidly spreading new variant, Omicron, and the need to introduce booster shots while simultaneously expanding the inoculation coverage. Studies have indicated waning immunity after eight to nine months of receiving the second vaccine shot. Those who received their second doses before April this year, mostly healthcare workers and the elderly, could, therefore, benefit from booster doses. Now, Omicron appears to have infused a sense of urgency and made the case for boosters even stronger with preliminary data showing that the variant has evaded vaccine-induced immunity in 50% of those it has infected in India. The highly contagious nature of the new strain also increases the risk of infection in the unvaccinated younger population. Against this backdrop, the decision to broaden the ambit of the inoculation drive is welcome. After a consistent decline for five months, Covid cases have been on the rise in some States, apparently fuelled by the Omicron variant.

In addition to this, the latest data shows that reproduction number R, a measure of how fast the disease is spreading, has crossed the value of 1 in several States, the threshold after which cases begin to rise rapidly. In the United States and Europe, booster doses started much before the emergence of Omicron, when a majority of the eligible adult population had been fully vaccinated. India too is at a similar stage now, with over 60% of the eligible population fully vaccinated and over 90% having got at least one dose. The latest data by a team of researchers at Chennai’s Institute of Mathematical Sciences shows that the R-value was now over 1 in Maharashtra, Delhi, Bengaluru and Kolkata. Though the R-value for India as a whole is still less than 1, a massive surge is not ruled out, given the rate of the spread. At present, only a fraction of the positive cases is being confirmed as Omicron infections because of the need for genome sequencing results. The actual spread of the Omicron variant in the population could be several times higher. Though the Omicron strain is relatively milder compared with the Delta variant, a big jump in the number of fresh cases has the potential to overwhelm hospitals and medical facilities.

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