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Patients are being evicted from hospitals lacking beds and oxygen as the number of new cases grows at a record rate every day, triggering a national crisis with global repercussions.
Experts warn that the more the virus spreads, the more likely it is to mutate and develop variants that may be resistant to current long-term vaccines. This could jeopardize the progress of other countries to stop the pandemic.
“If we don’t help India, I am concerned that diseases could increase around the world,” said Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the School of Public Health at Brown University.
For this reason, the outbreak in India is a global problem that requires a coordinated response. Some countries are already trying to ship stocks.
Oxygen concentrators, medical devices that compress oxygen from the air, arrived in the United States this week. On Wednesday, the UK, Italy and Germany provided more medical equipment, while Russian planes took off from Zhukovsky to Delhi with medicines, monitors and ventilators.
While the immediate priority is saving the lives of those already sick, vaccination is believed to be essential to stop the spread of the virus. However, India does not have enough vaccine doses and there is no quick and easy way to produce more.
Western countries have been criticized for stockpiling vaccines, but UK Health Minister Matt Hancock said on Wednesday that the UK had no replacement vaccines to ship.
US President Joe Biden said Tuesday that he had spoken with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and confirmed that the United States intends to send coronavirus vaccines to India. Earlier this week, the United States said it would pass 60 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccines to other countries, but did not specify which countries or when. The White House warned that its delivery could take several months.
Director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci said it was very important to distribute the vaccine fairly around the world.
“It just came to our attention then. It is an interconnected world. And countries are responsible to each other, especially if you are a rich country and you are facing countries that do not have the resources or the capabilities that you have, “he told The Guardian earlier this week.
If India’s outbreak does not spread and spreads to neighboring countries with low numbers of vaccines and weak health systems, experts warn that the world is at risk of replicating the images seen in India, especially if variants are allowed to take hold. newer and potentially more contagious.
Since India plays a key role in producing vaccines for other countries, the inability to stop the spread of the virus in this country could threaten the introduction of vaccines around the world.
A new variant of coronavirus
December. Researchers in India have discovered a new variant called B.1.617, although due to a lack of genomic care, it is not known whether this led to a local outbreak.
However, Anurag Agrawal, director of the Institute for Genomics and Integrated Biology, said on Friday that there is a link between the increasing prevalence of variants and the sudden increase in diseases in India.
“In Maharashtra, we have seen an increase in the number of B.1.617 cases, we have seen an outbreak. These are very important epidemiological links, “said A. Agrawalas.
However, he noted that in Delhi and North India, the other option, first introduced in the UK and known as B.1.1.7, was more dominant than B.1.617.
Option B.1.1.1.7 is more contagious.
Fauci said recent data showed that the COVID-19 Covaxin vaccine, made in India, neutralized the B1.617 variant, suggesting you could be vaccinated against it.
“Vaccines could be a very, very important antidote,” he said, adding that more information was being collected every day.
Other variants, first identified by scientists from South Africa and Brazil, are also believed to be more contagious than the original variant and have already reached several other countries.
To date, the Pfizer / BioNTech, Moderna Inc., and Johnson & Johnson vaccines have had different efficacy than these variants. However, the spread of the virus can mutate and there is no guarantee that available vaccines will protect people from new variants.
As a result, no country would be protected, no matter how many people were vaccinated.
“For selfish reasons, every country should worry about major outbreaks that are out of control,” Jha said. “Countries like the UK and the US are doing a great job of vaccinating, and they should feel good, but that’s only as good as there are options.”
More than 142 million. people in the US and 33 million. People over the age of 18 have received at least one dose of the vaccine in the UK, about 43% respectively. and 64 percent. vaccinating the population.
In India, meanwhile, on April 27. India’s Ministry of Health reported that some 129 million received at least one dose of the vaccine. people. This represents a little over 8% of the total population of India. Experts blamed the slow introduction of the vaccine and the lack of supply.
Epidemiologist Brahmar Mukherjee says India should inject $ 10 million over the next five to six months. daily doses to be vaccinated in all adults. This is done as long as there are enough doses.
Supply can be stopped
In addition to the risk of new varieties emerging, the second wave of Indian cases poses another more pressing problem for the world.
The country is one of COVAX’s key players in the Global Vaccine Exchange Initiative, which provides free or reduced doses of vaccines to low-income countries.
India has pledged to contribute 200 million. COVAX doses distributed to 92 poor countries. However, the rapidly deteriorating situation in the country has forced Delhi to focus not on COVAX but on vaccinating its citizens.
The Indian Serum Institute (SII) has already introduced 28 million. doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine said in March. report, but in March and April. he had to hand over another 90 million. dose.
Delays in deliveries are noted due to increased demand in India.
“I don’t think world leaders have talked about how bad this delay can be for the world,” said Shruti Rajagopalan, principal investigator at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University.
According to her, when India lacks vaccines and stores its stocks for domestic use, it means that other countries like South Africa and Brazil will have to wait.
John Nkengasong, director of the African Disease Control Agency, warned earlier this month that the suspension of Indian exports could be “catastrophic” for the introduction of continental vaccines.
Despite supply disruptions from India, COVAX said it will be able to deliver all planned doses in the first half of this year and expects to deliver two billion doses by the end of the year.
The whole world must respond
At a meeting of the World Trade Organization (WTO) last year, India and South Africa proposed that the organization suspend intellectual property rights to encourage the production of COVID-19 vaccines for low-income countries.
This proposal was supported by more than 80 developing countries. A temporary ban would allow many entities to start production faster than concentrating production in the hands of multiple patent holders, The Lancet wrote.
However, richer countries, including the UK, Switzerland, EU countries and the US, blocked the proposal, arguing that suspending intellectual property protection would not lead to a sudden increase in the supply of vaccines.
They argued that protecting intellectual property would stimulate research and innovation.
Jha said that intellectual property is not a major barrier to producing more vaccines. He said the main problem was lack of capacity.
But go back to the beginning again. The longer the Indian health system is unable to respond to this public health crisis and the longer there is a vaccine shortage, the longer this virus will pose a threat to the world.
This global pandemic requires a coordinated response around the world.
“For this reason, we and other rich countries must assume, in my opinion, a moral responsibility to help the rest of the world tackle this problem,” Fauci said. – A year from now, we will certainly be in better condition than now, but there will be other countries that will not be in that condition. The sooner we protect the rest of the world, the more secure our protection will be. “
Prepared according to CNN inf.
