Pandemic Facts (September,5 )

Markets will open. Live meetings will start. That will increase the spread of the virus. When there is already a  local surge, opening up will further increase the surge. 

Rule no 1:

Gatherings should be decided by the local Test Positivity Rate.

What is optimal for Odisha now should not be applied to the present Kerala. Each region should have its own guideline. And we should institute a long term mechanism to take such decisions.

Does vaccination prevent Long Covid ?

Sometimes few symptoms persists even after 28 days of  Covid infections.

Vaccination has been proved to have reduced hospitalisation and  Death in every country, the world over. Now one UK study has come up with a finding that vaccination cuts the Long Covid by Half.

That is another good reason for getting vaccinated.

Rule no.2:

Masks and Distancing will be the new normal.

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• Number of new cases detected in last 24 hours in Odisha- 805
• Number of Paediatric cases in them- 131 (16%)

This is 4 point higher than expected. but we should not be worried.

Children usually have a mild Covid-19 as compared to adults. Yes, the inherent immunity system in children is usually more competent to handle unknown viral attacks than that in adults. This is called the Innate immunity. As we grow up and build up more of targeted immunity, our overall immunity tapers off. This has an exotic name: Immuno Senescence . We also gather many chronic medical conditions.

Rule No 3;

Opening of school should again be decided by the local Test Positivity Rate.

What if it takes 3 shots to reach adequate immunity ?

Non of the vaccine trials have initially considered a 3 dose schedule. They simply ran out of . With a pandemic killing people right and left, you cannot wait for 6 months to consider the effect of a booster. Now we have crossed more than 6 months from the start of vaccination. We have a pretty large sample size to consider the validity of a booster now.

It is the universal observation that our antibody level falls rapidly after 6-8 months after all types of vaccination. Antibody titre may not be indicative of our protection as we can not measure the cell mediated immunity component. But it is our only guide to strategise a vaccine schedule.

All studies published so far point out strongly towards a 3rd dose of any combination : Astra Zeneca + mRNA, or AZ+AZ or Pfizer+Pfizer.

We have very few literature about the outcome of Indian, Chinese and Russian vaccines. ( Covaxin, Sinovac or Sputnik)

Rule No 4:

There will be 3rd Dose in near Future.

We can have a fixed 3 dose schedule to be given at 0, 1 month and 6 month ( as we are getting for Cervical cancer, Hepatitis, DPT vaccination). Alternately, we can have a regular annual shot that is different form the original one. It naturally will target the new variants in circulation.

In immunisation parlance, a dose targeting the new variant is not considered as a booster dose but as a new vaccine. We are getting these annual shot against Influenza regularly. It is not considered as a booster.

(Detected In the last 24 hours)	New cases	New death
India	42,667	342
Kerala	29,682	142
Maharashtra	4,130	64
Odisha	805	7

Who Lost in the Tokyo Olympics ?

Yoshihide Suga, the Japanese PM failed to rein in the Covid-19 outbreak following the Olympics and will step down from his post. The daily new cases in Japan (Tokyo) has climbed 10 fold after the Tokyo Olympics 2020.

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