New Delhi: ABP News on Thursday spoke to renowned chest surgeon, Dr Arvind Kumar from Medanta multi-specialty hospital in Gurgaon, on the current scenario of pandemic and potential third Covid wave, and what measures can limit the transmission of the infection if occurs any.
Speaking on the glum situation that the doctor fraternity and the country have been facing from past 12 to 18 months, Dr. Arvind said, "We as country want to erase the bitter memory of this pandemic era at full pelt".
Speaking on the preparedness, Dr. Arvind said, “Timely lockdown and extra precautions taken last year curbed the severity of Covid-19. The government took historical step imposing timely lockdown in the country. However, we lack the preparedness to fight second wave this year. And our poor preparedness prior second COVID wave cost us massive life loss in the country," he said.
Speaking on the severity of Covid variants occurring due to constant mutation of the viruses, the chest expert said, "We can't tell how serious could be the third wave as the novel coronavirus bursting out into new variant every time changing its behaviour. So there are two things which could help us to check the severity of third wave: firstly from the public end, people should religiously follow the Covid appropriate behaviour which include the four-step protocol of wearing masks, maintaining social distancing, not gathering as crowd in places and washing hands at frequent intervals. Secondly, it is the duty of our scientific communities and various medical research bodies like ICMR and CSIR to conduct real time monitoring of the virus and share the new scientific information with public as this will help us in strategic preparedness and response plan to new variants of the virus. Besides, Covid restraint and vaccines jabs are the most powerful weapons that we can have to fight against the virus," the lungs specialist said.
Is Covaxin effective on Delta, Delta Plus, and other variants?
On this, Dr. said, "The final answer on this is yet come from the experts as it is a subject of a research." Citing a recent U.S. Health Research Institute's report that says, Covaxin is effective on Delta and Delta plus, he said, "As matter of fact, the vaccine is effective and curbs the severity of viruses, and reduces mortality rate, however, only research will tell if the vaccine is 100% effective. But based on available date on vaccine, it is effective and every single person in the country should get their dose."
Being a lung expert, Dr Arvind Kumar also gave tips on breathing techniques. Check out video for details.
On foreign vaccines
Not taking the available vaccine jabs in country and waiting for foreign vaccines is a sheer act of mindlessness. This act simply exposes one to the coronavirus. He said, "My clear cut suggest to people is that, vaccines like Covishield, Covaxin, and Sputnik V are effective and safe with good efficacy. So I request everyone to get any of these vaccines in your vicinity. You can get foreign vaccines later when it arrives to country as a booster dose, but do not skip the available vaccines for waiting for the foreign jabs," he said.
Finally the chest surgeon said, "We should not assume Covid as the last virus that attacked humanity, we have seen SARS, MERS, and Ebola in past and there are possibility new viruses in coming time too. Accordingly, we need to advance our health sector in order to protect our people from severe Covid variants and other new virus occur in time ahead and protect out new generation."
The country is celebrating 1st July as Doctors Day to mark gratitude to the life saviours!