Parents, school staff must be vaccinated for children's safety: Jacob John

John says that the world needs to start talking about eradicating Covid

India may not be out of the clutches of the ongoing second wave but discussions are rife about an impending third wave and how it might affect children. T Jacob John, virologist and former professor at the Christian Medical College, Vellore, tells Ruchika Chitravanshi that there is no scientific basis for either of these predictions but it is important to be prepared. He also says that the world needs to start talking about eradicating Covid. Edited excerpts:

Everyone is talking about the third wave. Why do you think that is a possibility and has it happened in other countries? 

No idea who got the ball rolling on that. However, those who failed to predict the second wave are being over-smart and predicting a third wave. If it does not come, no one will find fault. And if it does, they can say: Told you so.

There is no logic in predicting a third wave as of today. Some countries have had several waves but that does not mean it will be the same for India. Many countries took aggressive steps in the first wave. India’s first wave was very different and it lasted from March to December, 2020, during which period other countries had second and third waves. In almost every other country, the first wave was for three or four months. We were told that the variants, including those from the UK, Brazil, South Africa and B.1.617, were rampant in India. If that was known, people would have predicted a second wave. Lack of scientific information did not enable scientists to predict a second wave.

Predicting the third wave is unnecessary, except for being prepared for any event­uality. The virus will be there and those with comorbidities will be at risk. Whether there is another wave or not is in our hands. So it could either be a self-fulfilling prophecy or we be smart and do everything to prevent it.

There is a lot of concern that children would be vulnerable if there is a third wave. 

Children have always been vul­ner­able. Covid in child­ren was always known. The numer­ical risk has incre­ased because they are getting infected much more now. But there is no science to such a predict­ion. There is a difference bet­ween the first wave and the second. More children and pregnant women got infect­ed. Is it a quantitative or quali­tative change? We don’t know. Exaggerating what happened in the second wave into the third wave is a false logic. The third wave may be milder. We don’t know. Getting prepared is a good idea.

Government and private hospitals are taking steps to ramp up infrastructure for childcare. What is it that parents can do to safeguard their children?

Parents must be vaccinated themselves. And wait for children’s vaccines to become available. It is important to protect them from infection. We don’t know how many children were infected. Can schools be reopened? We need an overall picture of the age group. Last time children were not very vulnerable, partly because the virus was not a very heavy transmitter. School staff should get vaccinated. A vaccine made through inactivated virus is quite safe and it is being investigated for safety in children. All this should have been done in 2020 itself. Better late than never.

We are struggling with vaccinating even the adult population right now and there is huge scarcity of vaccines. What should be the future strategy to get a handle on this situation?

Why can’t the world think of eradicating Covid? Like small­pox and polio. Set the goal of eradication. Vaccine manu­facturers will keep up. There will be a global vaccine dem­and for the sake of eradi­ca­tion. WHO can propose an eradication agenda. That is the next step. Planning will take six months, fundraising another three months by when you can decide how much vaccine is needed. Pool all the world’s resources.

It is not a different app­roach but it means doing it more systematically. It requires more monitoring and management. Eradica­tion does not mean vacci­na­ting 100 per cent but targeted immunisation. That way you get more mileage out of vaccination. It is eminently possible if everyone wants to. WHO should lead it. We are not talking about this. It doesn’t get people as excited as talking about a third wave.