US booster shots’ move holds lessons for India
With the Delta variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus sweeping across the United States resulting in the daily case load going above one lakh and the daily death toll above 1,000, the government there has now decided to make a booster dose available from September 20. The joint statement of the department of health, the Centres for Disease Control and the National Institute of Health on Wednesday said the booster shots would be available for those fully vaccinated individuals who received their second shot earliest in the vaccination rollout, not excluding healthcare providers, as well as those who have completed eight months after the second dose.
The joint statement makes it clear that protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection begins to decrease over time following the initial doses of vaccination. In the backdrop of the spread of the Delta variant, there is evidence of reduced protection against mild and moderate disease, and hence “a booster shot will be needed to maximise vaccine-induced protection and prolong its durability”. The United States is contemplating a booster dose after seeing that vaccinating more than one half of its population fully has not stopped the spread of the virus. The country, which had opened itself up after a successful vaccination drive by June, has received a setback as the new variant targeted mostly unvaccinated areas. Worse, it has hit the children much more than in the earlier wave, with close to 2,000 paediatric hospitalisations being reported every day. Reports say 2.4 per cent of the total hospitalisations are of those aged below 12 years. The economic uptick could also take a hit, and signs of the softening of crude oil price are attributed to the dim prospects of the economy making an early comeback.
It may be remembered that the US continues to rely on vaccination as the best tool to fight the virus. This is true of India, too. But we have been able to administer at least one dose of the vaccine to only 32 per cent of the population; and the share of the fully vaccinated people stands at a mere nine per cent. The government has been non-committal on meeting the deadline of December 31 of this year that it had itself set for the vaccination programme.
The experience of the US, therefore, is to be clearly assessed and the right lessons learnt here in India. There are at least two primary inferences that one can arrive at looking at the US scene. One is that the longer we take to complete the vaccination programme, the higher the chances of new variants appearing and infecting people; Second, the efficacy of the vaccine declines as days pass by, requiring a booster dose. Both these scenarios are something that a populous country such as India can ill-afford.
The government has of late showed a renewed vigour on vaccination and administered 88 lakh doses of the jab on Tuesday. It must see to it that such high numbers don’t occur as a blip on the vaccination dashboard but is made into a regular feature. Given the US experience, it must also contemplate offering the booster dose to health workers, frontline workers and seniors. It must prepare a plan to vaccinate the children, too. India cannot wait for a repeat of the US occurrence.
The government has
of late showed a renewed vigour on
vaccination and administered 88 lakh doses of the jab on Tuesday. It must see that such high numbers aren’t a blip on the vaccination dashboard.