- The lightning pace with which the Omicron variant of the novel coronavirus is spreading amply demonstrates how infectious the variant has become replacing the more lethal Delta. The Omicron variant is creating an unprecedented spike in confirmed infection cases all over the world. Several countries like the US, the UK, France, Italy, and Spain, just to name a few, have already recorded a huge number of cases per day. Now, India too is apparently in the grip of the third wave as the number of infection cases per day is witnessing exponential growth over the past ten days.
PC: Freepik
- Thankfully, there is still no sign of the second wave’s accompanying devastation much to the relief of the health authorities. This situation may change soon if we fail to exhibit enough responsibility before the matter reaches stratospheric levels. As the report announced suggest, the national test positivity rate has jumped to 12.1%, and it has breached 25% in some large cities. Of course, the daily testing has gone up too from an average of 11 lakh to over 20 lakhs now. However, the number is still inadequate given the likely spread, and most testing seems concentrated in big metro areas presently.
- Mind you, reported figures are likely to be underestimated, perhaps by an order of magnitude. Further, unreported infections are getting caught by home testing. As such, the authorities need to recalibrate their approach in the following manner. Firstly, the national numbers of hospitalization and hospital caseload should be made available with absolute accuracy. The case in point is hospitalization figures from large metros like Delhi and Mumbai show there is no shortage of oxygen, ICU, and ventilator beds yet. The same reporting of statistics should emanate from Tier II and III areas too.
PC: Wirestock
- Secondly, the data about national and region-wise break up of hospitalization of patients by vaccination status must be diligently originated. This provides the authorities with relevant data indicating whether the partially vaccinated or unvaccinated are the ones most needing hospital care. Note that unvaccinated accounted for 96% of admissions for oxygen beds in Mumbai as of date. Remember, nearly after two years of living with Covid, we still have not managed to put systems in place about requisite data collated and published regularly nationwide. Most worryingly, there are more than 7 crore adults who have not yet got jabbed who may get an incentive to change their vaccination status out of fear of getting hospitalized, if not anything else.
- Thirdly, the time gap between two Covishield doses should be reduced forthwith which will allow a large pool of partially vaccinated to become eligible to complete two doses on time. Fourthly, aggressive campaigns exhorting children in the age group of 15-18 years to get vaccinated should be pursued. The initial brisk pace has given way to slowing down now probably owing to the surge-related fear at jab centers. The same tactic should apply to the booster program as well. Finally, serious consideration to aggressively pursue door-to-door vaccination should ensue. Time is of the essence, and as such, these mentioned measures should be embraced to beat the latest surge.
