India needs 8.7m jabs a day to stop third wave of virus
It has been estimated that to prevent a third wave India must inoculate at least 60 per cent of its over 1.3 billion population with both doses of a vaccine by December
India is praying hard that a third wave of COVID-19 doesn’t run rampage through the country.
Administrators, health professionals, and vaccine makers are working hard to prevent such an eventuality. However, the rate at which the country is vaccinating itself may fall considerably short of the requirement to avoid another upsurge of infections.
India reported 34,703 fresh cases in the last 24 hours, the lowest in 111 days, according to the Union Health Ministry on Tuesday.
It has been estimated that to prevent a third wave India must inoculate at least 60 per cent of its over 1.3 billion population with both doses of a vaccine by December this year.
For this, it must administer the injections to 8.6 million people every single day.
Yet, for a litle more than a week now, the country has been vaccinating at a rate of about 4 million people a day, a shorfall of 4.6 million.
On Sunday, just 1.5 million people received their shots, which is less than the target by 7.1 million.
It must be noted that with every day’s shorfall, the required number of vaccinations per day, currently at 8.6 million, rises.
But that cannot be a mater of relief yet, given the nature of the disease and its ability to spread.
Over 35 crore doses have been administered so far even as the government tries to hasten the process. It aims to vaccinate all adults by the end of this year. So far, four vaccines - Covishield, Covaxin, Russia’s Sputnik V, and Moderna - have been cleared for use in the country.
Ater three cases of Avascular Necrosis (AVN) were reportedly detected in Mumbai among patients who have recovered from the coronavirus disease, three separate cases have been found in Delhi’s BLK Super Specialty Hospital as well.
The patients detected with Avascular Necrosis in Delhi are in the age group of 32 to 40 years and of them two are under medication, while one had to undergo surgery.
“AVN is a post-covid sequelae. Like other postCovid ailments, recently we are seeing Avascular Necrosis of the femoral head in the bone and joint segment. This is because of steroids used in the treatment of Covid-19.
This is not an immediate effect and it might take between three months to one year to show effects of steroids in joints,” Dr Ishwar Bohra of BLK Institute for Bone said.
In the backdrop of these cases, experts have warned against neglecting joint pains, especially those in the shoulder and the hip.
“Steroids soten the bone, but cartilage starts collapsing and reduces blood supply too. It is steroid-induced necrosis of bone,” Dr Bohra further said, adding that the cost of operating on patients to treat AVN may range between Rs3-4 lakh.
AVN, also known as osteonecrosis, is among various fungal infections seen among patients who recovered from Covid-19, the other being mucormycosis (black fungus), candida, along with common pain, breathing difficulties, hyperlipidemia, malaise, fatigue and hypertension.
In it, a lack of blood supply leads to the death of bone tissue; a broken bone or a dislocated joint can interrupt the blood flow to a section of bone.
The infection can lead to tiny breaks in the bone, eventually causing the bone to collapse.
India’s COVID-19 deaths relative to infections hit a record high in June ater cases peaked in early May, an analysis of government data shows, amid pressure on authorities to accurately report deaths from a second wave of the virus.
A big rise in infections in April and May, driven largely by the more infectious and dangerous Delta variant, brought India’s health system to its knees.
India has officially reported 403,281 deaths out of 29.75 million people who have contracted the virus.
“We knew in the early part of the second wave that the pandemic was mostly in northern India and the reporting there was not as good as other states,” said Chandrakant Lahariya, an epidemiologist and public health expert in New Delhi.
By contrast, the more developed southern states beter reported data when they got hit later, he said, adding that more deaths are being recorded now following a public outcry over undercounting.