Warns of the spread of a very dangerous strain of delta – vaccination may be mandatory for some

When asked if the end of the quarantine in Lithuania could cause problems, he first asked us to call him lokdaunu or the universal “blockade” of a country.

“It just came to our attention then. But let’s not confuse quarantine with universal restrictions. These are two different things. Quarantine can be used as a tool when there is an outbreak of diarrhea or any other infection in a nursery, a nursery hospital or operating room, then quarantine is applied immediately.

Therefore, quarantines can be applied to a department, product, company, institution, a certain local area. Of course, the quarantine can be applied to a city or to several, sometimes half of the region. But we did the same with swine fever, if you remember African swine fever. “

Andriukaitis: the pandemic is now neither under control nor over

According to him, in this case pig farms, establishments and territorial quarantines were applied. However, global or lokdaunas it is a much broader set of rules, restrictions, and even prohibitions.

“I think we need to make it very clear to the people now that, unfortunately, the pandemic is neither under control nor over. It is obvious that the delta variety is very widespread and if we, while in Lithuania, think that we are a little better here. , we will make many mistakes.

Right next to us are the countries where this variety is now widespread. First of all, with our Russian neighbors, in Central Asia and other European countries. The delta variety is very dangerous. We also know that we have not reached the adequate level of vaccination. The WHO has offered that figure at 70%, but we don’t even have it in Lithuania. “

According to Vice President Andriukaitis, since such a level of vaccination has not been achieved both throughout the European Union and throughout the European region, it is understood that the delta variety can also spread more quickly during the summer.

“It has become very widespread in India in hot climates and those mutations in the virus are also related to weather conditions and other things. So there is no reason to calm down, so there are two paths that need to be implemented very clearly. First, the activity of the people to be vaccinated should be encouraged as much as possible. Now those active people who have been vaccinated have done their job, and large groups of different people remain. <...>that he did not.

So to have safer conditions now to prevent the delta from spreading, vaccination is needed. The second thing, as I mentioned, is not to assume that there cannot be local outbreaks, so those local quarantines where there are many people are really possible ”.

However, according to him, a global restriction o lokdauno it was not necessary for a long time, because it lasted too long in Lithuania, even in a scientific sense.

“In an epidemiological sense, lokdaunas it should not be introduced for more than three weeks. After that, we need to think about what to do next, and during that time we need to teach the entire company, the entire public sector, and everyone to understand that everyone is responsible for risk management.

People and themselves must learn to understand where the risk of getting sick is greatest and also certain measures should not be revoked: masks, physical distance, hand disinfection, ventilation and room disinfection. It remains and must remain. This does not mean that establishments should be closed or prevented from operating indoors with only a limited number of people or very strict epidemiological safety conditions. “

According to the vice president of Andriukaitis, strict safety requirements at work must be maintained and people must clearly understand the message that they should get vaccinated and not fly into large meetings with their heads. Nor did he rule out the possibility that mandatory vaccination is required for some professions.

“It is quite clear that vaccination is mandatory and exists, so there is nothing new here. Did I say something new here? You probably know that there are professions in which mandatory vaccination is necessary. For example, in dentistry, surgery, the entire food industry, etc.

You cannot stand by the bowl and make buns or wrap pizza with open tuberculosis. It cannot because it can infect many users. That is, there are mandatory controls and established medical regimens. I don’t know why people don’t know it or don’t listen to it and don’t want to understand. “

According to him, compulsory vaccination and voluntary vaccination are not mutually exclusive.

“If you can reach 90% voluntarily. Society to vaccinate it, then that’s fine. If you can’t, and the epidemiological situation continues to be threatening, why should you keep the whole society at risk when there is an opportunity to mandatorily determine when, where and how to get vaccinated? What is contradicted here? What human rights are being violated here?

Those who shout it show their total ignorance. The European Court of Human Rights has repeatedly stated that if there is an epidemiological threat to human health and because a person lives in society and not like Robinson Cruz on an uninhabited island, it is necessary to use what would protect human health. “

The interviewee assured that both voluntary and mandatory vaccines have been in force for centuries and that this practice has been proven over time.

Delta variety – highly contagious

Delfi recalls that the delta variant of the highly contagious pandemic coronavirus is stimulating new outbreaks of COVID-19, even in countries with large populations, and experts warn that vaccination efforts are essential to manage this new threat.

Globally, the pace of the COVID-19 pandemic is slowing. The World Health Organization (WHO) reported that the number of new confirmed cases of coronavirus infection in recent days was the lowest since February, as well as the reduction in mortality related to COVID-19.

However, the new option is increasingly worrying and encourages the introduction of new limitations in countries that have previously been able to control coronavirus epidemics in their territories. “There is global concern about the delta option at the moment, and the WHO is also concerned about it,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director of the United Nations agency, at an earlier press conference.

The Delta SARS-CoV-2 variant pandemic coronavirus was first detected in India. It began to spread in this country in April. In Europe, the delta strain first established itself in the UK, where it quickly began to spread faster than the previous alarming variant of Alpha infection.

Delta variant infection now accounts for 95% of cases in England. genetically tested COVID-19 patient samples. The delta is estimated to be 40 to 60 percent. more contagious than the Alpha variety. The latter, in turn, is more contagious than the original SARS-CoV-2 variant, which led to the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic early last year.

A similar scenario was repeated in other countries. In the United States, 35 percent last week. A delta variant was identified in samples from COVID-19 patients undergoing genetic testing. As of June 5, his stake is about 10 percent.

In Israel, a similar dynamic of the spread of the new variant is observed. The European Center for Disease Control (ECDC) predicts that in the European Union, the delta could account for around 70% of all newly recorded COVID-19 cases.

Anthony Fauci, the US government’s top infectious disease specialist, called the new variant “the greatest threat” to controlling the virus and called for increased vaccination.

This was reported by the US media on Tuesday. Several studies have shown that vaccines are very effective in protecting against delta, although slightly less than against other strains, but only after the second dose.

Recent figures released by the British government show that it is around 96 percent. fully vaccinated people are protected from hospitalization and 79 percent. – symptomatic delta. With just one dose, the protection is much less – just 35 percent.