To avoid future waves, aggressively follow COVID Appropriate Behaviour: Dr.
Guleria
New Delhi
;It is a piece of misinformation that subsequent waves of the COVID-19 pandemic
are going to cause severe illness in children. There is no data - either from
India or globally - to show that children will be seriously infected in
subsequent waves.” This was informed by Director, All India Institute of
Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Delhi, Dr. Randeep Guleria, during a media briefing on
COVID-19, held at National Media Centre, PIB Delhi today.
Dr. Guleria cited that 60% to 70% of the children who
got infected and got admitted in hospitals during the second wave in India, had
either comorbidities or low immunity; healthy children recovered with mild
illness without need for hospitalization.
COVID Appropriate Behaviour is
Key to Preventing Future Waves
Director AIIMS explained why waves occur in any
pandemic. Waves normally occur in pandemics caused due to respiratory viruses;
the 1918 Spanish Flu, H1N1 (swine) flu are examples, said Dr. Guleria. “The
second wave of 1918 Spanish Flu was the biggest, after which there was a
smaller third wave.”
- Multiple waves occur when
there is a susceptible population
When a large part
of the population acquires immunity against the infection, the virus becomes
endemic and infection becomes seasonal – like that of H1N1 that commonly
spreads during monsoon or winters.
- Waves can occur due to change
in the virus (such as new variants)
Since new
mutations become more infectious, there is a higher
chance for the virus to spread.
- One of the reasons behind a
wave can be human behaviour
Dr. Guleria
cautions: “Whenever cases increase, there is a fear in people and human
behaviour changes. People strictly follow COVID Appropriate behaviours and
non-pharmaceutical interventions help break the chain of transmission. But when
unlocking resumes, people tend to think that not much infection will happen and
tend to not follow COVID appropriate behaviour. Due to this, the virus again
starts spreading in the community, leading potentially to another wave.”
The Director said that if we have to stop subsequent waves, we
need to aggressively follow COVID appropriate behaviour until we can say that a
significant number of our population is vaccinated or has acquired natural
immunity. “When enough people are vaccinated or when we acquire natural
immunity against the infection, then these waves will stop. The only way out is
to strictly follow COVID appropriate behaviour”.
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