COVID 19

Experts warn of third wave of pandemic in India if health protocols ignored.

Published

3 years ago

24/06/2021

As the ongoing second wave of COVID-19 started a health decline in India, health experts have been giving out numerous warnings on how likely it is for there to be another wave of the outbreak, quoting the disregard for health protocol in the midst of eased restrictions and a lethargic vaccine rollout.

On Wednesday morning India reported 50,848 new cases in the last 24 hours, bringing the case tally to cross the 30 million mark and reach 30,028,709 while the death toll reached 390,660.

The recovery rate in the country has increased to 96.5 percent

Local governments across India ordered relaxations because of the declining number of daily cases but multiple amounts of experts and watch dogs have been giving warnings which have been pointing towards the possibility of a third outbreak.

The catastrophic second wave of the pandemic caught India unexpectedly and it saw the country’s hospitals overwhelmed especially in major cities and towns. The rush of patients coming in caused doctors to struggle due to the shortage of oxygen supplies and essential medicines.

The Indian authorities are the ones responsible for this according to experts for ignoring warnings and going ahead with conducting elections in several states, besides allowing a mega Hindu religious congregation called Kumbh Mela.

The eased restrictions in the capital Delhi caused thousands to crowd metro stations and shopping centers, prompting health experts to warn of the possible comeback of COVID-19 infections.

Last week, the Delhi high court informed that the violation of COVID-19 protocols will only hasten the third wave of the pandemic. The authorities were asked to take strict measures against violators and sensitize shopkeepers about the COVID-19 protocol.

The high court said if flouting of COVID19 continues “we will be in great trouble”.

With businesses resuming their activities in the capital, doctors have also given advice by saying that Delhi could face a “worse than second wave situation” if people are careless with a low guard and do not obey the safety norms.

Director of India’s premier health institute – All India institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Randeep Guleria said last week that the third wave of COVID-19 could hit the country in the next six to eight weeks.

V K Paul, member (health) of the Indian government’s top policy think tank, National institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog (commission), said vaccination against the COVID-19 gives at least 94 percent protection from infection and reduce the chances of hospitalization by 75-80 percent.

The nationwide vaccination against COVID-19 started in India on January 16^th and so far, only about 5 million people or some 5 percent out of the country’s total adult population of 940 million, have received the two doses of the vaccine, according to the health ministry

COVID 19

Japan provides USD 8.6 million through IOM Sri Lanka and Maldives

Published

2 years ago

20/10/2022

The International Organization for Migration (IOM), in partnership with relevant ministries of the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) and the Government of Maldives (GoM) launched a regional project ‘Strengthening Capacity of Border Control for Responding to Infectious Diseases in Southwest Asia’ on 17 October 2022.

With a fund of USD 8.6 million, provided by the Government of Japan (GoJ), the project intends to strengthen overall border management capacities in Sri Lanka and the Republic of the Maldives to prevent the spread of infectious diseases that would otherwise impede the revitalization of human mobility.

The dramatic reduction in human mobility has been one of the most significant effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. This had major economic and social impacts in Sri Lanka and the Maldives, which are heavily reliant upon income from international tourism, labour migration and business travel. The border closures and associated restrictions disrupted regular trade exchanges and impacted migration flows, as well as exposed border management agencies and cross-border communities to higher risks of infection.

Speaking on the timeliness of the project, H.E. MIZUKOSHI Hideaki, Ambassador of Japan to Sri Lanka said that “as Sri Lanka has been actively attracting international tourists and expects to see an increase in the number of tourists in the future, strengthening border control capacity to prevent outbreaks of infectious diseases and ensure the safety of staff and travellers is a very meaningful initiative that will contribute significantly to economic recovery from the current economic crisis and further economic growth in Sri Lanka, where tourism is one of the main industries.”

The component of the project focusing on Sri Lanka will improve safety and security, and support process efficiency at primary points of entry (PoEs) to ensure more effective preparedness and proactive response to potential public health emergencies due to infectious disease outbreaks.

Designed to enable secure and safe operations at PoEs to augur international travel, boost traveller confidence and prompt a return to pre-pandemic levels of cross-border mobility, the project will address gaps in passenger processing and health screening systems at PoEs through a combination of new technology, infrastructure, procedures, training, and renovation works. This will streamline the management of traveller information, reduce waiting times, implement contactless processes and procedures by border control personnel. The project will also institute infection prevention measures and emergency response modalities and guarantee the safe disposal of potentially hazardous medical waste at PoEs, resulting in a safe environment for staff, travellers and crew while reducing harmful environmental and health impacts. Travellers and other personnel working at the PoEs will be the main beneficiaries of this initiative, aside from the airport and seaport workers and officials.

“Designed on the lessons learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic, this project is anchored to IOM’s strategy on Migration and Sustainable Development and will support Sri Lanka and the Maldives to respond to future disease outbreaks and health threats,” said Sarat Dash, Chief of Mission to IOM Sri Lanka and the Maldives. He added, “IOM will work closely with its host government partners to harness the development benefits of migration while ensuring a hassle-free and dignified process for international travellers, including the migrant population.”

COVID 19

Could Omicron BA.2.75 sub-variant lead to a new global COVID-19 wave?

Published

2 years ago

06/07/2022

MNN

A new sub-lineage of the Omicron variant known as BA.2.75, which was first detected in India, has raised concerns among health experts, Indian media reported.

BA.2.75, which is said to be a second generation sub-variant of Omicron BA.2, has an 18 percent growth advantage over other Omicron sub-variants currently circulating in India, The Indian Express reported.

Sub-lineages of Omicron have been the dominant strains circulating across the globe, with new mutations continuously evolving.

BA.2.75 could be behind recent COVID-19 surge in India

BA.2.75 has been detected in about 10 states in India, which has been witnessing a surge in new infections in the last month or so, according to Indian media.

In the last 10 days, the number of new cases in the country has been hovering in the 15,000-19,000 range, while the number in the past few months stayed below 3,000.

Dr. Rajesh Karyakarte, a microbiologist at Pune’s B J Medical College and head of Maharashtra’s genome sequencing effort, and scientists elsewhere in India, have picked up three sub-variants, BA.2.74, BA.2.75, and BA.2.76, as the possible drivers for the current surge, according to The Indian Express.

The three sub-variants have more than nine changes in the spike protein, and are expected to outnumber the BA.4 and BA.5 sub-variants, which were the most common until a few weeks ago, according to Karyakarte’s team.

Besides India, the strain has also been reported by several other countries, including Japan, Germany, the UK, Canada, the U.S., Australia and New Zealand, according to data from Nextstrain, an open-source platform of global pathogen genome data.

Does it cause more severe disease?

So far, there is no evidence to suggest that the BA.2.75 leads to a more severe form of infection, although scientists are at a very early stage to know about it.

Evidence on its transmissibility and immune evasiveness is also still preliminary and emerging, according to a statement from New Zealand’s Ministry of Health on Tuesday.

Why are health experts concerned?

While there is not much known about the new strain, health experts have raised concerns about it.

In a series of tweets, Dr. Shay Fleishon from the Central Virology Laboratory at Sheba Medical Center in Israel, said the sub-variant may be “alarming because it may imply a trend to come.”

He explained that in recent months, there has been a trend of second-generation variants based on Omicron sub-lineages BA.1, BA.2, BA.3, BA.4, and BA.5.

He said until now the second-generation variants have only been found in a few cases within one region. But BA.2.75 has spread to multiple regions, the first of its kind to do so.

The BA.2.75 variant has new mutations in the spike protein, of which G446S and R493Q are of particular concern, as they give the variant the ability to evade several antibodies, dnaindia.com reported, citing unnamed experts.

This means it can infect people who have been vaccinated, or have been infected previously, the report said.

Research reveals that the R493Q mutation increases the strain’s ability to attach to ACE2, the protein that the COVID-19 virus uses to enter cells, according to the report.

Source: CGTN

COVID 19

Chinese experts caution against over-disinfection for COVID-19

Published

2 years ago

27/05/2022

MNN

Chinese health experts have cautioned against inappropriate disinfection practices to curb the spread of COVID-19, and called for minimizing the impact on people’s regular life when conducting necessary disinfection.

“We should avoid blind or excessive disinfection, and make it targeted. Disinfection is only necessary when the virus transmission can be cut off this way,” said Zhang Liubo, chief disinfection specialist of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), at a press conference on Friday afternoon.

“If we have multiple methods to block the spread of the virus, we can choose the safest, most effective, economical and convenient one. Disinfection is one of the available options,” he added.

For example, items not touched by the infected people in their homes can be sealed off and left unattended for a period of time, instead of getting disinfectant sprayed on them, according to Zhang.

During the battle against the latest Omicron wave in China, there have been media reports and online complaints about some questionable disinfecting approaches, such as workers in protective gear spraying disinfectant all over someone’s home.

Is indoor disinfection necessary?

In accordance with China’s Law on the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases, places and items contaminated by infectious disease pathogens should be strictly disinfected, said Lei Zhenglong, deputy head of the Bureau of Disease Prevention and Control at the National Health Commission.

Disinfection of places that may have been contaminated by the coronavirus, such as the living areas of the infected people, has played an important role in ensuring the safety of the environment, he said.

Zhang further explained that after the infected people were relocated to other places, there might still be living virus on the objects or in the environment that have been contaminated, which need to be sanitized.

Sometimes it’s difficult to determine whether there still exist living virus in the contaminated environment, because how long the virus can survive on the surfaces of objects is associated with a lot of factors, including the characteristics of the virus, the viral load, the temperature, humidity and the intensity of sunlight in the environment, he said.

Previous studies have shown that the novel coronavirus can live for two to three days on environmental surfaces, and even up to 28 days under certain conditions.

It is also possible that people can get COVID-19 by touching surfaces contaminated with the virus, both Chinese and foreign health authorities like the U.S. CDC have said.

Terminal disinfection of the contaminated places can ensure that the environment and the objects are free of living virus. Therefore, indoor disinfection of infected people’s homes is one of the effective measures to prevent against the virus transmission among family members.

Safe and effective disinfection stressed

Although proper disinfection of the contaminated environment is necessary, Lei pointed out that there have been problems in the disinfection practices in some places, like inadequate communication with the affected residents and improper operations.

It’s necessary to strengthen the training of proper disinfection procedures, as well as the supervision of the disinfection process, he said.

When organizing indoor disinfection of someone’s home, local health authorities should strictly follow relative technical specifications and procedures, and keep the residents informed about the whole process, so that they can understand and support the disinfection work, he added.

People should choose safe and effective disinfectants and disinfecting methods, Zhang said, adding that different methods should be adopted for different items and materials.

They should also protect the valuables and minimize the damage to the objects inside some’s home when conducting the disinfection work, he noted.

Source: CGTN