HYDERABAD: The Covid-19 vaccine is not the end of the coronavirus story, especially with the threat of a new strain of the virus looming large across the globe, a top scientist said on Thursday. With more than one million active cases currently in the country, physical distancing and wearing masks will remain the social vaccine against coronavirus for now, said Dr Rakesh Mishra, director of the CSIR Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology.
“Vaccine is not the end of the coronavirus story. When the first dose of the vaccine is taken, it takes two weeks for the immune system to respond and after the second dose, it takes another 45 days for the immune response to work. Till this period, a vaccinated person is also vulnerable,” Mishra said.
Analysing the efficacy results of vaccines, Mishra said the vaccine will not work for 15% of the population, and a new strain may emerge at any time. So, it would take 45 days for immune response to get triggered completely in the rest 85% of the population who gets the vaccine. “I got a vaccine, so I can do whatever will not work. That attitude won’t work. How long the vaccine protects the rest of 85% is still not known. It can be months or year, or two. Time will decide this. The best thing is social vaccine, like wearing mask, avoiding crowd and hygiene to defeat the virus,” he said.
Speaking to TOI on the occasion of one year of Covid-19 pandemic, he said most of the 7,000 mutations observed are inconsequential and have no impact, but any new virus mutant that can turn bad for the host is always a possibility.
“Vaccine is a very good tool to fight the virus. Covid-19 vaccines approved by all regulatory authorities are safe to use. More than a crore of people have been vaccinated, and all data shows they are safe. People should proactively get vaccinated,” he said, while cautioning people to be careful.