A worrying milestone as any, Saturday will mark a year since the World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC), WHO’s highest level of alarm.
“At the time, there were fewer than 100 cases — to be exact, 98 cases — and no deaths reported outside China,” recalls WHO chief Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. This week, the reported cases of Covid-19 crossed 100 million internationally, with over two million people losing their lives.
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The world did witness collaborative research deliver its fastest vaccine yet. But the concern for health administrations across the world now is whether the vaccines being rolled out in different parts of the world will work against variants of the virus, reported out of the UK and South Africa, among other countries.
In fact, parts of Europe are already under a lockdown or are going in for one to break the chain of transmission of this highly transmissible and possibly more deadly variant. But India sees a scenario quite different, as the number of deaths come down to less than 200 a day, for the last several days.
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Experts, however, caution that divergent trends in the western world and India should not be a reason to let down one’s guard.
Virologists explain the trends with reasons varying from, India reporting the virus later than other countries (which means a spike in cases could come later), to other factors including the BCG or polio vaccines that the Indian population has received (a feature not seen in developed countries) and the hygiene-factor leading to greater local immunity.
Presently, India has the second highest number of Covid-19 cases (10,720,048) , behind the US (25,769,185), according to the Johns Hopkins University. And in terms of mortality, the US has the highest number of deaths (over 4.33 lakh), while India has reported the fourth highest number of deaths (1.54 lakh), after Brazil and Mexico.
Surveillance to pre-empt action
For India, the next couple of months will be a test of sorts, as theatres, travel and trains open up to the public in more regions, including Mumbai’s famous locals. The real indicator though will be after the upcoming monsoon, as SARS-CoV-2 has been around in the country for a year, says a virologist, indicating that a conducive environment could also cause a spike in cases.
Besides the multiple vaccines that are being given and the personal measures to keep the virus at bay, there is need for stronger disease surveillance and reporting, he adds, so the administration can mount pre-emptive measures and not react every time there is an outbreak.