Uncertainty

Uncertainty

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution against COVID. The jab still remains the best bet.

To each its own. There is no longer any universal approach to tackling the COVID-19 pandemic globally. Countries are beginning to realise that they have to tailor vaccination strategies to suit situations peculiar to them. The United States is the best example. The country propagated the view that herd immunity is the answer to controlling the pandemic. Seventy per cent vaccination of the adult population became the target of not just the US but the entire world. As of date, 65 per cent of the American population has received at least one dose. However, a sizeable section has refused to get vaccinated because of its Republican leanings. These people do not wear masks either and are a threat to fellow citizens wherever they move. Communities which felt they had achieved herd immunity now realise that just one unvaccinated and maskless person among them can make them revisit the perils of the pandemic. The Food and Drug Administration has now authorised a third vaccine dose for those with weak immune systems. The presence of those who refuse to get vaccinated weighs heavily on this decision even though the Delta variant’s penetrative power is the immediate reason for the authorisation. This applies to millions of Americans deemed vulnerable because of certain cancers, rare disorders and organ transplants. There is a lesson in this for India. Scientists are beginning to bust myths that seemed unimpeachable truths some months ago.

Some scientists are now insisting that herd immunity is a misconception in India for want of clarity among public health administrators. According to them, word began to spread that the infection would not spread once herd immunity was acquired. K Srinath Reddy, president, Public Health Foundation of India, says with the advent of new Coronavirus variants, the threshold of herd immunity could be revised to as high as 90 per cent. Even then, if people from a high immunity State travel to a low immunity one, the balance could get disturbed. Secondly, he is of the opinion that seropositivity is another misunderstood concept. It is now known that it does not mean long-lasting immunity at all because antibodies keep reducing within three to six weeks and the state of cellular immunity is not known. Reddy says the sero survey does not check the capacity of neutralising antibodies and that could have given a more realistic assessment. Scientists at a session held by the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology on lessons “learnt and unlearnt” during the pandemic noted how the country moved from “lockdown to laxity” after the first wave and it resulted in the virus moving freely into the rural areas even as it began to mutate into dangerous variants. While there is talk of a booster dose in India, the WHO has cautioned that introducing such a dose should be based on firm evidence and targeted at segments of the population that need it the most. Until then, vaccination is the only answer.