COVID-19 in India is moving towards 'endemic' stage: AIIMS senior epidemiologist

The novel coronavirus or COVID-19 pandemic is gradually sliding into the 'endemic' stage, a senior epidemiologist at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi said on Sunday. Speaking to ANI, Dr. Sanjay Rai asserted that on observing the rate of vaccination and natural infection, it can be predicted that "a majority of us will be getting infected." Citing medical studies, Dr. Rai remarked that people who have contracted the virus are "most-protected."

"Looking at the COVID-19 vaccination status and the natural infection, we can say that very soon, the majority of us will be getting an infection. And then this virus will convert into an endemic virus," Senior epidemiologist at AIIMS, Dr. Sanjay Rai, was quoted as saying by ANI.

It is to mention that endemic is a stage where cases are clustered to a particular geographical location and the infections are present throughout but in significantly diminished numbers. Explaining the propensity of the virus, Dr. Rai also noted that SARS-CoV-2, commonly known as COVID-19, is an RNA virus, i.e. it has ribonucleic acid as its genetic material and has "mutated thousands of times." However, "the variants of concern are only five - alpha, beta, gamma, delta and current Omicron, which is a very fast transmitting disease. So very fast transmission is taking place all over the world," the senior AIIMS epidemiologist stated.

When asked if immunity against the virus will be impacted with the movement into the endemic stage, Dr. Rai elaborated, "The overall severity is less so the majority of us will get this infection." He also referred to thorough reviews and claimed that those who have contracted the novel virus tend to develop the most natural kind of immunity.

"Based on the current scientific evidence, we can say those who recovered from the COVID they are best-protected person as of now then the second-best person is those who have the vaccination," Dr. Rai said. Notably, India has clocked over 162 crore vaccinations against COVID-19, 68.1 crores who are fully vaccinated.

Omicron is in 'community transmission' stage in India: INSACOG

The highly-transmissible Omicron variant has mostly impacted metropolitan areas like Delhi, Mumbai due to the density of population. In rural areas and the eastern part of India, the progression of the virus is notably slow, the epidemiologist pointed out. His statement came after the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG), on Sunday released a bulletin saying

"Omicron variant of COVID-19 is in community transmission stage in India and has become exponentially dominant in multiple metros" where fresh infections are rising exponentially. On January 22, India reported nearly 3,33,000 new COVID-19 cases, taking the total tally to 3.92cr infections since the beginning of the pandemic. However, as per the INSACOG bulletin, while the cases have remained less severe than the previous Delta variant, hospitalizations and ICU cases have considerably increased, leaving the threat levels unaltered.

(With inputs from ANI)

(Image: ANI/PTI)