With more than 4,00,000 fresh positive cases reported on May 05, the coronavirus pandemic is literally wreaking havoc in India. As the number of positive cases in the country has increased drastically over the past month, the country's healthcare infrastructure has also crunched, and several patients in the nation are not even getting hospital beds for their treatment. Amid all this chaos, the Union Health Ministry, on Wednesday revealed that a potential third wave of Covid in the country is inevitable. Medical experts believe that the third wave in the country could be much dangerous, and it will attack people irrespective of their age group.
Medical experts unclear about the third wave timeline
The Principal Scientific Advisor to the Prime Minister informed the central government that the third wave in the country will happen for sure, considering the recent surge in fresh Covid cases. However, he made it clear that it is impossible to predict the exact timeline of the third wave outbreak.
The Principal Scientific Advisor to the PM Dr KV Vijay Raghavan also admitted that they did not anticipated the ferocity of the second Covid wave that is continuing its killing spree in the nation.
"Phase 3 is inevitable given the high levels of circulating virus. But it is not clear on what timescale this Phase 3 will occur. Hopefully, incrementally, but we should prepare for new waves. New variants will arise all over the world and in India too but variants that increase transmission will likely plateau," said Vijay Raghavan, ANI reports.
In the meantime, Randeep Guleria, director of All India Institute of Medical Sciences claimed that night and weekend curfews imposed in several states are not effective to curb the spread of the pandemic. Guleria also made it clear that a nationwide lockdown for a certain period of time is the only option to slow down the spread of Covid.
"If we talk about the lockdown, it has to be for a sufficient duration of at least two weeks. It has to be aggressive. There's no point in having a weekend lockdown or a night curfew. We can unlock early if it's needed depending on how the cases pan out," Guleria told India Today TV.
Deadly mutations could shatter India's healthcare infrastructure
Medical experts believe that the double and triple mutant variants are the main reason behind the sudden surge in Covid cases in India. However, it has been recently reported that an Andhra Pradesh variant named N440K is 15 times more virulent and deadly than the B.1.617 Indian variant.
As these multiple variants are creating more strains of coronavirus, scientists believe that the third wave will attack more people. It should be also noted that the first wave of coronavirus had made people deadly ill within 7 to 10 days, but the second wave of Covid is pulling people to critical conditions within 5 to 7 days. If the virus advances like this, the deadly third wave could completely damage the respiratory system of people within 2 or 3 days. Shockingly, the AP variant is currently doing the same thing, and it is pulling the patient to the ICU bed within 2 or 3 days.
Several studies had recently suggested that the third wave of Covid could attack more children. It should be noted that the first wave of coronavirus had created more fatalities among elderly people, while the second wave attacked youngsters as well. Moreover, India has not introduced a vaccination program for people under the age of 18, and all these factors could turn the third Covid wave deadly in nation. If coronavirus starts its killing spree among children, then schools and colleges in the country may remain indefinitely closed for several months.
According to the latest updates, 2 percent of India's population has received both the shots of vaccination. However, top US immunologist Anthony Fauci had recently claimed that a country will be safe only when 85 percent of its population gets vaccinated.
