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Experts all over the world are wondering as to what has gone wrong in India suddenly where the Covid situation has gone out of control.
The first wave of the pandemic was managed very well by India and contrary to world’s prediction, we had very less cases. All of us assumed that the virus had minimal or no impact on Indians due to their immunity.
But after almost one year, number of cases have started jumping and so are the number of deaths. Oxygen has become most precious commodity overnight. People are gasping for oxygen from pillar to post. People are dying because of need for oxygen, hospital bed, medicines etc. Governments are implementing strict lockdown type restrictions causing serious joblessness once again just to prevent spread of Covid.
Over the past 1 year, I have been examining the Covid situation across the world and the people cheering the vaccination drive in India.
India approved emergency use of Covishield and Covaxin in Jan 2021 and started vaccinating its population, first the frontline workers from 16th Jan 2021 and then people above 45 years from 1st March 2021.
A belief has emerged that Vaccination is the way to fight this pandemic and put an end to it. The pace at which this pandemic has spread across the whole world has let all of us run a race against time and hence vaccines were introduced with limited testing. I agree that it has worked well on certain segments of the society in different parts of the world and hence, efforts should be made towards maximising this. At the same time, it has been observed that vaccines are having adverse effects on certain segments of recipients and rather than providing protection, it has caused infections.
My mother was really concerned about safety of the vaccine but with repeated assurances by Medical community and Political Leadership, we somehow convinced her to get vaccination on 14th April, 2021. Within one week of the jab, she contracted Covid -19 and her oxygen levels dropped to below 90 without any comorbidity. Her HR CT scan displayed 30% lungs damage. I wondered how and when did it happen. So is the case with many other people in my circle across the country who have similar experiences, i.e., contracting Covid just after the vaccination, a few even dying despite the much-touted protection of vaccine.
In Feb 2021, total number of cases were below 10k per day which has jumped to 75k by end of March 2021 and 400k by end of April 2021. Is it just a coincidence that the 2nd wave started just after the vaccination drive started?
Without blaming anybody, I would like to most humbly highlight few facts over here about India’s vaccination program
It seems very strange that no other country witnessed such a surge post the vaccination drive. Most countries have reported positive outcome, then why is India witnessing the reverse? Is it because
– we are using a different vaccine variant?
– complete efficacy of the vaccines was not ascertained before launching it?
– our immune response is different from others?
– the current mutations are different than the ones on which vaccine was tested?
Given what is happening, I’m writing this open letter to all who’re concerned to contemplate about vaccination.
The current situation calls for extensive surveys in the direction to ascertain the impact of the various vaccines being introduced in the country and eliminate any adversities. Instead of lockdown, we can perhaps stop the vaccination drive in the country for a few weeks to conduct random sampling of these vaccines along with large-scale trials and develop the vaccination infrastructure.
We should not forget that we were better off without vaccines and with rampant vaccinations, things have only become worse.
Before ending, I would like to add disclaimer that all views expressed here are my personal views and nobody should draw any inference without recommendations from medical experts.
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