AIIMS Delhi Director Dr Randeep Guleria said that COVID-19 vaccines can be tweaked to provide protection against new forms of the virus, amid growing concerns over the new Omicron COVID-19 variant.
Dr Guleria said on Sunday, “Although this is a new form of COVID-19, the glimmer of hope is that it seems to be a mild disease and as far as the vaccine is concerned, we should get protection. And I think That’s important. To remember that vaccines can be modified.”
He said, “We will have second generation vaccines. This is something that we need to keep in mind. The existing vaccines are effective, but with the new variants, they will decrease immunity, although the vaccines can be modified.” Is.”
Dr Guleria further said, every year a new vaccine (for diseases in general) is made based on surveillance data provided by the World Health Organization (WHO), so it is easy to do.
While the Omicron COVID-19 variant was first reported in South Africa on 24 November, the first two cases of this heavily mutated variant from India were detected in Karnataka on 2 December.
Till Sunday, 153 cases of Omicron were reported in India. According to central and state officials, cases of omicrons have been detected in 11 states and union territories – Maharashtra (54), Delhi (22), Rajasthan (17) and Karnataka (14), Telangana (20), Gujarat (11). It’s gone. , Kerala (11), Andhra Pradesh (1), Chandigarh (1), Tamil Nadu (1) and West Bengal (1).
(with inputs from agencies)
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