By Lian Cheng
The Delta variant of Covid-19, which was first identified in India, has become the focus of global attention recently due to its high transmission rate, spreading to more than 77 countries and regions in the past month.
Described as the dominant variant of the various United Kingdom (UK) Covid-19 variants, it is responsible for the potential new wave in the country, despite the high vaccination rate of two-thirds of its adult population.
CNN, in an article titled ‘Britain thinks it can out-vaccinate the Delta variant. The world isn’t so sure’ today stated that nearly 120,000 new cases have been reported in the past week, an increase of 48,000 as compare to the previous seven days, attributing the source of infections to the Delta variant.
Schools were reported to be the breeding grounds of the new variant, as it is more prevalent among the younger age groups, unlike the Alpha variant.
“This variant (Delta) has the potential to change the shape of the pandemic in your country,” said CNN, quoting Deepti Gurdasani, a senior epidemiology lecturer at Queen Mary University of London who was further quoted as saying “once this variant enters a population, it’s easy to lose control of it”.
Covid-19 vaccines however, have been noted to have played their expected part with lower rate of hospitalisation and deaths so far, even in the face of this new threat.
Public Health England (PHE) has been quoted as saying that the Pfizer-BioNTech (Pfizer) and AstraZeneca (AZ) vaccines are showing high efficacy of 96 per cent and 92 per cent against hospitalisation from the Delta variant after two doses.
Besides the UK, the Delta variant is found to be responsible for one in every five infections in the United States (US).
Quoting the Center of Disease Control and Prevention, Scientific American in an article titled ‘How Dangerous is the Delta variant, and will it cause a Covid Surge in the US?’ described the Delta variant as a “variant of concern”.
“It is the most hypertransmissible, contagious version of the virus we’ve seen to date, for sure — its a super spreader strain if there ever was one,” said Scientific American, quoting Eric Topol, a professor of molecular medicine as well as an executive Vice President of the Scripps Research Institution.
According to Topol, vaccines remains the best tool for combating a Delta surge.
While vaccination is globally recognised as the best available solution to fight Covid-19, even the highly transmissible Delta variant, the question for Sarawakians now is how effective is the Sinovac vaccine against the Delta variant?
The question is pertinent as the majority of Sarawakians have been administered with Sinovac, in comparison to the other two vaccines, Pfizer and AZ. Following of the detection of Delta variant cases in Labuan and Peninsular Malaysia, there is growing concern whether Sinovac can provide enough protection against the variant.
According to a Reuters’ report titled ‘Explainer: Are Chinese Covid-19 shots effective against the Delta variant?’ dated June 29, there are no conclusive answers.
The report quoted Zhong Nanshan, an epidemiologist who helped shape China’s Covid-19 response, who said that based on analysis of infections in Guangzhou city, where the results are preliminary and the same size, “researchers found that Chinese vaccines are somewhat effective in reducing the risk of symptomatic and severe cases caused by Delta”.
Sinovac spokesman Liu Peicheng was quoted in the same article to say “preliminary results based on blood samples from those vaccination with its shot showed a three-fold reduction in neutralising effect against the Delta”.
A third booster shot, he said, may trigger stronger and more durable antibody reactions against the variant but so far had no data to support his statement.
Similarly, Feng Zijian, former deputy director at the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention was quoted as saying “antibodies triggered by two Chinese vaccines are less effective against the Delta compared with other variants”.
Guangdong reported its first locally transmitted Delta variant infection in May.
Later, 146 cases were reported in Guangzhou and several cases in Shenzhen and Dongguan. There was also no new domestic transmission of any variant reported in Guangdong since June 22.
The only consolation perhaps is that those vaccinated did not develop severe symptoms after Delta infections while all severe cases recorded had only affected those who were unvaccinated.
There is a general lack of data when Chinese vaccines are concerned and the World Health Organisation (WHO) has only validated Sinovac for emergency use. — DayakDaily
