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By October, the third wave of COVID will sweep India: Reuters survey of experts | Coronavirus pandemic news

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According to a Reuters poll of medical experts, the third wave of coronavirus infections is likely to hit India in October. Although it will be better controlled than the recent outbreak, the epidemic will remain at least for the next year. Public health threats.

A quick survey of 40 healthcare professionals, doctors, scientists, virologists, epidemiologists, and professors from all over the world from June 3 to 17 showed that a significant increase in vaccination could be a new outbreak Provide some cover.

Among the respondents who made bold predictions, at least 85% of the respondents (21 out of 24) said that the next wave will come in October, 3 of them predicted in August at the earliest, and 12 predicted in September . The remaining three are said to be between November and February.

But more than 70% of experts, 24 out of 34 experts, stated that any new outbreak will be better controlled than the current outbreak because of shortages of vaccines, drugs, oxygen and hospital beds, compared to a smaller scale The first outbreak was more devastating and the number of infections surged last year.

Dr. Randip Guleria, Director of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, said: “This will be more controlled because there will be far fewer cases, because more vaccines will be introduced, and there will be a certain amount of Degree of natural immunity.” (AIIMS).

So far, India has only vaccinated about 5% of its estimated 950 million eligible population, leaving millions of people vulnerable to infection and death.

Although most medical experts predict that vaccination activities will increase significantly this year, they caution against lifting restrictions as early as some states.

When asked whether children and people under 18 are at the greatest risk in the potential third wave, nearly two-thirds of the experts, 26 out of 40, answered yes.

Dr. Pradeep Banandur, head of the Department of Epidemiology at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuroscience (NIMHANS), said: “In terms of vaccination, they are a completely primitive population because there is currently no vaccine for them.”

Experts warned that the situation could become serious.

Dr. Devi Shetty, a cardiologist at Narayana Health and a consultant for the Karnataka government’s pandemic response plan, said: “If children are infected in large numbers and we are not prepared, there is nothing you can do at the last minute.”

“This will be a completely different problem because the country has very, very few pediatric intensive care beds. It will be a disaster.”

But 14 experts said that children are not in danger.

Earlier this week, a senior official of the Ministry of Health stated that children are vulnerable to infection, but analysis shows that the health effects are not so severe.

Although 25 of the 38 interviewees said that future variants of the coronavirus will not invalidate the existing vaccine, in answering a separate question, 30 of the 41 experts said that the coronavirus will This year poses a threat to India’s public health.

“COVID-19 is a solvable problem because it is clearly easy to obtain a solvable vaccine. Two years from now, India is likely to develop herd immunity through vaccines and disease exposure,” said the director of the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland. Said Robert Gallo, International Scientific Advisor of the Global Virus Network.




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