The Centre has blamed “pandemic fatigue” among Indians for the rising number of COVID-19 cases across the country. Even though they do not officially say it, the country is certainly going through its second wave of infections, and the worrisome trend is that the regions which earlier had very low caseloads are now witnessing a spike.
At the health ministry briefing, officials said that though the country has seen new variants of the virus and even a double mutation, the number of these cases is still low to account for the present surge.
They said people had begun lowering their guard regarding observance of COVID-19 appropriate protocols— wearing masks, observing social distancing and sanitising their hands. With the a string of festivals around the corner, starting with Holi, they said that it was extremely important to maintain the protocol, which was the best defence against the virus.
While Maharashtra and Punjab are high on the list of fresh infections, followed by Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, it is Chhatisgarh and Chandigarh which are extremely worrisome. Chhattisgarh had maintained a low caseload of less than 150 infections daily, but now it has surged to 1,500 new cases per day. Chandigarh, which had a below 100 daily rise, is showing a big spurt.
Chandigarh and Punjab, both of which are in the concern range, were given a rap for their poor performance with vaccination. Officials pointed out that these two regions were far below the national figures of inoculation of healthcare workers. Chandigarh has managed to vaccinate 63 per cent of its healthcare workers, Punjab 65. It may be recalled that when vaccination rolled out on January 16, healthcare workers were the first to be given the shots. Such a poor coverage, said the Centre, was worrisome, specially when there are vaccines available for domestic use.
The Centre said that the decision to open up vaccination for all above the age of 45 was because 88 per cent of deaths had occurred in this age group; the case fatality rate was 2.5 per cent for this group.
Meanwhile, experts note that vaccinations will help provide protection even against new strains, at least to the extent that even if a vaccinated person gets the infection, it will be a mild one.
