New Delhi: The National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) will meet on Monday to discuss and deliberate upon the issue of administering an ‘additional’ dose of Covid-19 vaccine to immunocompromised individuals and policies regarding child vaccination.
When the immune system's ability to fight infectious diseases and cancer gets compromised or is entirely absent, the individual is said to be immunocompromised.
ALSO ON ABP | Additional Covid Dose For Immunocompromised & Pediatric Vaccination: NTAGI To Take Call Today
Difference Between Additional Dose Of Vaccine & Booster Dose
An additional dose of vaccine is different from a booster dose. A Covid booster shot is an additional dose of a vaccine given after the protection provided by the original doses has begun to wane over time, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.
In other words, the booster dose is administered after a predefined period when the immune response due to primary vaccination is presumed to have declined. An individual is administered a booster dose after the immunity from the initial dose(s) starts to wane.
The booster helps people maintain their level of immunity for longer durations.
An additional dose originally called the third dose, is administered to people with moderately or severely compromised immune systems, and immunosuppressed individuals to improve their response to the initial vaccine shots, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.
People with a reduced ability to fight infections are said to be immunosuppressed. This is done when adequate protection from infection and disease is not conferred by the primary schedule of vaccination.
Covid-19 cases in China have recently been on the rise. Epidemiologists estimate that SARS-CoV-2 is likely to infect over 60 per cent of the population of China in the next 90 days. About 10 per cent of the world's population is likely to be infected with SARS-CoV-2 in the same period, and millions of deaths could occur.
The Indian government has said that a new and highly transmissible strain of the Omicron subvariant, called BF.7, is responsible for the Covid-19 surge in China.