Covid-19 - Third wave likely to come late: ICMR study says

Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has come up with a study which says that a third wave is likely to come late.

Trial for Zydus Cadila vaccine is almost complete, Dr NK Arora, Chairman, COVID working group has said adding that by July end or in August, the government might be able to start administering this vaccine to children of 12-18 age group.

He further said that there is a window period of 6-8 months to immunise everybody in the country. “In coming days, our target is to administer 1 crore doses every day,” Arora said.

Meanwhile, Arora, has told IANS that vaccination along with Covid appropriate behaviour will play a crucial role in minimizing the effect of subsequent wave.

"The analysis indicates that vaccines almost all Covid vaccines, be it India made or overseas, are highly effective against Covid. Not 100 per cent but, now it has proved that vaccines will minimise the damage. Even if it reduces the number of deaths, it means that we have something to control deadly pandemic. So, the vaccination is going to play a very important role in the next wave," Arora Said and IANS reported.

Arora, however, added that it will also depend on new variants and their level of transmission and effectiveness, as every new variant, emerging one after another, is different, this report said.

The first wave of Covid-19 pandemic in India had begun in late January 2020 with a peak attained in mid-September. The first wave was relatively mild compared to the second wave that followed, from mid-February 2021 onwards, exhibiting a more explosive spread across the country, this report said.

Dr Arora further said that a major factor behind the deadly second wave was emergence of more-infectious variants such as B.1.1.7 (Alpha variant) and B.1.617.2 (Delta variant), of which the latter has played a dominant role in recent months.

Recently, ICMR along with Imperial College London (UK) has also conducted a study on rapid scale-up of vaccination efforts, which according to Dr Arora, could play an important role in mitigating the present and future waves of the disease, this IANS report said.