Vaccines aimed at curbing severe COVID: experts

Available drugs in India to reduce mortality, not for preventing infection

COVID-19 vaccines are not infection-preventing but disease-modifier vaccines, said Samiran Panda, member of the government’s National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid-19 (NEGVAC). Dr. Panda was speaking to The Hindu on apprehensions about using a vaccine that isn’t 100% effective in disease prevention. He said both the vaccines now available in India now will prevent the asymptomatic stage from moving into symptomatic stage and from symptomatic stage to developing severe disease where one requires intensive care. The vaccines also help in reducing the number of deaths significantly, he noted. “Scientifically, it is proven that the efficacy of both the vaccines available in India is more than 70-80% . The World Health Organisation recommends that any vaccine with a 50% efficacy will be useful in a pandemic time. So, people should not be hesitant about taking the vaccine,” said Director General of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) Shekhar Mande.