{"id":33370,"date":"2021-11-23T09:04:38","date_gmt":"2021-11-23T05:04:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/?p=33370"},"modified":"2021-11-23T09:04:38","modified_gmt":"2021-11-23T05:04:38","slug":"why-are-covid-cases-in-india-decreasing-despite-the-low-double-vaccination-rate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/why-are-covid-cases-in-india-decreasing-despite-the-low-double-vaccination-rate\/","title":{"rendered":"Why are Covid cases in India decreasing, despite the low double vaccination rate?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/u><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Other Voices<\/u><\/span><\/p>\n

Covid continues to slow down in India. The festival season, which includes Durga Puja and Diwali where large groups of Indians gather,\u00a0did not lead to a surge\u00a0in cases. Epidemiological modellers had\u00a0earlier predicted\u00a0a third wave peaking during October and November.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span>Bikas Das\/AAP<\/span><\/p>\n

Daily new cases have\u00a0dropped from a peak\u00a0of more than 400,000 per day in May 2021 to currently below\u00a010,000 cases a day.<\/span><\/p>\n

And while antibody tests might give us a clue as to why, we can\u2019t get complacent about vaccination rates.<\/span><\/p>\n

Signals from recent antibody tests<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

In India, \u201cserosurveys\u201d have been regularly conducted since the pandemic began. This is where blood is tested from large numbers of people to check for the presence of Covid antibodies \u2013 the things our bodies make after being infected with Covid or receiving a Covid vaccine.<\/span><\/p>\n

The\u00a0fourth national survey\u00a0in July reported 67.6% of people across India had Covid antibodies present, providing them with a level of immunity against the virus. At that time 24.8% of people were immunised with a single dose of vaccine and 13% were fully vaccinated. This means a large proportion of those with antibodies had actually been infected with Covid.<\/span><\/p>\n

Delhi reported\u00a097% of people were positive for antibodies\u00a0in October, including 80% of children. Some 95.3% of those immunised with the Indian version of the Astrazeneca vaccine Covishield had developed antibodies, as did 93% of those who received India\u2019s own vaccine Covaxin.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The state of Haryana\u2019s\u00a0serosurvey in October\u00a0found antibodies in 76.3% of adults, upwards of 70% among children, and negligible difference between urban and rural populations.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kerala had the\u00a0lowest sero-prevalence of 44.4%\u00a0in the fourth national serosurvey in July, but in October it had risen to\u00a082.6%\u00a0among the general population and 85.3% among residents of urban slums.<\/span><\/p>\n

What does this mean for a \u201cthird wave\u201d in India?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

A third wave in India is an unlikely scenario with these high levels of antibodies, and vaccination levels continuing to rise.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s now recognised those who become naturally infected with Covid and recover before vaccination\u00a0develop better immunity\u00a0than those who only have antibodies from vaccination. This is referred to as \u201chybrid immunity\u201d \u2013 those with previous SARS-CoV-2 infection mount\u00a0unusually potent immune responses\u00a0to the Covid vaccines.<\/span><\/p>\n

The\u00a0Centers for Disease Control<\/a>\u00a0in the US notes that both the fully vaccinated individuals and previously infected groups have a low risk of subsequent infection for at least 6 months.<\/span><\/p>\n

Results of the most recent national serosurvey\u00a0in India reflect the seroprevalence during the third week of June 2021; the Delta-led second wave had bottomed out at that time. Though about 30% of the population remained susceptible, subsequent serosurveys and an absence of any post-festival surge confirm continuing high levels of protection.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPatchwork vaccination\u201d areas, where there are pockets of low coverage of vaccination among areas with high levels of coverage, run the risk of small outbreaks, but are unlikely to be large enough to be of any major epidemiological concern.<\/span><\/p>\n

With high seropositivity among adults, many of the new cases can now be expected among children, particularly with the reopening of educational institutions. But high levels of immunisation among teachers (upwards of 90%) and the\u00a0emerging evidence\u00a0that reopening schools has not been associated with significant increases in community transmission, are reassuring.<\/span><\/p>\n

The WHO\u2019s chief scientist\u00a0said in late August\u00a0that India seems to be \u201centering some stage of endemicity\u201d.\u00a0Endemic\u00a0refers to the constant presence or usual prevalence of a disease in a population within a geographic area, where disease spread and rates are predictable.<\/span><\/p>\n

Could a new variant, such as the Delta Plus subvariant\u00a0first detected in India\u00a0in April 2021 threaten the current relative stability? While it has been said it might be about\u00a010\u201315% more transmissible\u00a0than the Delta variant, the\u00a0evidence from Europe\u00a0suggests it has not yet been able to establish any dominance over Delta.<\/span><\/p>\n

Is vaccination on track?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Of India\u2019s 1.4 billion people,\u00a026.9%\u00a0are fully vaccinated and 54.9% have received at least one dose so far. But\u00a035 million fewer women\u00a0have been vaccinated compared to men and\u00a0independent analyses\u00a0show tribal and rural districts continue to lag.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are two current targets: achieving 90% coverage of the first dose by the\u00a0end of November\u00a0and timely administration of the second dose. While the first is likely to be achieved, there are widespread reports of\u00a0complacency regarding the second dose. A\u00a0campaign is underway\u00a0to encourage people to complete the schedule.<\/span><\/p>\n

Delivering the\u00a0billion plus doses\u00a0has convincingly demonstrated vaccine confidence. But convincing people to take a vaccine when for many it seems like the risk has passed is a difficult task. Prior infection-induced immunity protects against reinfection but this acquired immunity wanes over time. Hence the\u00a0recommendation for Covid vaccination\u00a0for all eligible persons, including those who have been previously infected.<\/span><\/p>\n

Districts with relatively low vaccine coverage require greater outreach efforts to reduce prevailing inequities. India\u2019s immunisation program has demonstrated its strengths in polio eradication and measles-rubella elimination campaigns. We need to borrow some of those techniques to ensure all Indians are protected against Covid.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

* Published in print edition on 23 November 2021<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Other Voices<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":33371,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[30213],"tags":[30738,21808,30739,165,30737],"class_list":["post-33370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-pandemic","tag-aka-dialogue","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-in-india","tag-india","tag-indias-second-wave"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Vaccine.jpg?fit=1200%2C684&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8QzSF-8Ge","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33370\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}