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New Delhi: World Health Organization Chief Scientist Dr Soumya Swaminathan said that COVID-19 in India is entering some kind of endemic phase where there is low or moderate level of transmission.
The endemic stage is when a population learns to live with the virus. This is very different from the epidemic phase when the virus dominates a population.
Regarding the approval of Covaxin, she said she was confident that the WHO’s technical group would be satisfied to approve Covaxin to be one of its authorized vaccines and that could happen by mid-September.
In an interview to journalist Karan Thapar for news website The Wire, Swaminathan said that given the size of India and the diversity of the population in different parts of the country and the state of immunity, it is “very possible” that the situation continues like this. can stay. and fluctuations in different parts of the country.
Swaminathan said, “We are entering some kind of endemicity phase where there is low level transmission or moderate level transmission, but we are not seeing the kind of exponential growth and peak that we saw a few months back. saw.”
“As far as India is concerned, what is happening, and given the size of India and the diversity of population in different regions and the state of immunity in different parts of the country, it is quite possible that the situation may continue like this. . And fluctuations in different parts of the country, especially where there are more vulnerable populations, so those groups that were probably less affected by the first and second waves or areas with low levels of vaccine coverage, we can expect peaks for the next several months. And could see the pools. ,” He said.
She said she hoped that by the end of 2022 “we will be in a position that we have achieved vaccine coverage, such as 70 percent, and then countries can go back to normal”.
On the spread of Kovid among children, Swaminathan said that parents need not panic. “We can take from sero surveys and what we have learned from other countries is that children can be infected and can be transmitted, children fortunately have very mild illness most of the time and a small percentage One who gets sick and gets inflammatory complications and some will die but much less than the adult population… panic from the crowd of thousands of children in the ICU,” she said.
Read also: WhatsApp to allow users to locate nearest COVID Vaccine Center, book appointments
On the use of drugs such as remdesivir, HCQ or ivermectin for treatment, he said that there is currently no evidence that HCQ or ivermectin can reduce mortality or morbidity in people infected with the virus or actually prevent people from getting the infection. has any role in , therefore there is no basis on which recommendations can be made in the use of either of these drugs for treatment or prevention.
“Solidarity trials have shown that remdesivir does not reduce mortality, it may be of marginal benefit in a subgroup of patients who are sick enough to require oxygen but not sick enough to be on ventilation, so There may be slight benefit but of course remdesivir doesn’t do much. Stage of moderately or severely ill patients. It is also very expensive. Medicines like dexamethasone and oxygen are two essentials that save lives,” she said.
Regarding the approval of Covaxin, he said that it is expected that a decision will be taken by mid-September.
“Bharat Biotech submitted its data in the third week of July which was the first data set, then an updated data set which came in mid-August. The committee has gone back to the company with some questions, which they have yet to answer. I think the technical advisory group that finally approves will meet in the first 10 days of September and so we are hoping that will happen soon after that.”
“So by the middle of September I’m thinking, and the reason it took longer was to go back and forth and require more data requested from the company and that’s the normal process. People seem to take longer than others for Covaxin. Looks, but it is not… Every company that applied for EUL (Emergency Use List) took this period of 4 to 6 to 8 weeks to get all the data required,” she said.
On the third wave, she said that no one has a “crystal ball” and that the third wave is impossible to predict.
“It will be impossible to predict when, where the third wave will hit us and if there will be a third wave. However, you can make educated guesses on some of the variables that have an impact on transmission,” she said.
On booster doses, she said there are both scientific and ethical and moral reasons not to rush into boosters.
“… so it would also be in the self-interest of countries that now have additional doses, to send those doses through Covax to countries that desperately need them,” she said.
On the Vaccine Passport concept, she said, “We don’t believe that vaccination should be a prerequisite, at least globally, to do things like travel because we haven’t given everyone the opportunity to vaccinate, that’s why there’s such a disparity in access.” For vaccines, so the first thing to do is to get rid of inequality, then you can allow people who are vaccinated to relax some of the measures.”
Vaccine passports are meant to allow international travel to people who have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.
Read also: US regulators give full approval to Pfizer-BioNtech COVID vaccine for people aged 16 and over
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