Bengaluru
In a strange development, 5 doctors in Chamarajanagar district in Karnataka have tested positive for Covid-19 a week after they got the first shot of the vaccine.
Experts immediately stepped in to allay fears about the efficacy of the vaccine. Health authorities said contracting Covid after the first shot is not new and does not mean the vaccine is ineffective. The real effect can be seen only after the second shot, experts said.
Health authorities underlined the need to practice precautions like wearing masks, hand washing and avoiding crowded areas. Those who have received both shots of the vaccine should follow all precautions until a significant percentage of the population has been vaccinated, authorities said.
“All the five doctors are attached to the district hospital and the government medical college here. They are in the 40-50 age group and have mild symptoms. Of them, some took Covishield while others got Covaxin last week,” Dr MC Ravi, District Health Officer, Chamrajanagara, was quoted.
“It is highly likely their incubation period of catching the virus had started before they took the vaccine. They were tested only after they started showing symptoms. This issue is not related to vaccination and we are tracing contacts of these doctors,” he said.
The vaccine first dose induces immunity partially only about 2 weeks later, and that too is yet to be defined well due to lack of experience. Partial immune response will mean a serious disease will be rendered milder. But here, the 2 week was not available. It is only 5-10 days after the second dose the efficacy for the vaccine is in the 60-70% range, experts said.
In this case, it means they were probably infected before, or on the day they were given the vaccine. This is because the incubation period is 5-10 days and sometimes up to 14 days.
37 lakh get Covid vaccine shot in 15 days
New Delhi
India succeeded on Saturday till 7 pm in vaccinating a total of 37.06 lakh healthcare workers in record 15 days, 2.06 lakh Covid-19 vaccinations in a day. The vaccination had begun on Jan 16. Uttar Pradesh tops with the highest 4,62,793 vaccinations so far, followed by Rajasthan innoculating 3,26,745, Karnataka 3,15,343, MP 2,73,872, Maharashtra 2,69,064, Gujarat 2,44,398, West Bengal 2,42,761, Odisha 2,06,424, Andhra 1,86,581, Telangana 1,66,606, Kerala 1,58,687, Bihar 1,45,231, Haryana 1,25,898, and Tamil Nadu 1,01,840.
The second phase of vaccination of the frontline workers, including police, will begin from Monday. Union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan on Saturday reviewed the status of the vaccination with the state health secretaries and advised those lacking in the coverage below 50% to intensify the vaccination drive. He told them the vaccine is available in sufficient quantity and the technical glitches of CoWIN have also been resolved.
Less than 200 fatalities, Maharashtra tops
India recording less than 200 Covid-19 deaths every day in the past 3 weeks, with 137 fatalities in the past 24 hours while Maharashtra continues to top with 58 deaths, followed by 22 in Kerala, 11 in Punjab, 7 each in Chhattisgarh and West Bengal, and 6 each in Delhi and TN. The new cases are low with 13,081 reported on Saturday as against 14,808 recoveries in 24 hours. The active cases are down to 1.698 lakh, 1.58% of the total 1.07 crore cases detected in India so far in 13.84 crore tests since March.
The total recoveries at 1.04 crore are 96.98% of the total detections while the cumulative death toll is 1,54,147.
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