Bhubaneswar: Even when the shadow of second wave of coronavirus is yet to dwarf significantly, the country and states, including Odisha, have started their home-work to brace up for the third wave challenge. In the meantime, the SBI report released today on the severity and life-span of the possible third wave has put back the spotlight on how severe and larger it will be.
As per the SBI Ecowrap report, the possible third wave in the country will have life-period of 98-days as against 108-day duration of the second wave. The revelation the report made on the likely peak count in the third wave in India is simply mindboggling.
The report taking into account the international experiences on the behaviour of Covid-19 during the third wave, predicted that the third wave peak in India will be 1.8 times that of the second peak. The second wave peak had been 5.2 times of the first wave peak globally, the report outlined. As per SBI report, the second wave peak in India had been 4.2 times the first wave peak count.
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Moreover, the report has observed that in the second wave serious cases in the country have been as high 20 per cent of all cases. Therefore, SBI research report has emphasised the governments to ramp up the health infrastructure, so as to limit the serious patients to mere 5 per cent of all confirmed cases in the possible third wave.
"Along with faster vaccination and ramping up of the health infra capacity, the country can save a whopping 40,000 lives, if the count of serious patients in the third wave could be limited to below 5 per cent," the report outlined.
The report simply cautioned that the possible third wave in India could be as severe and as acute as the second wave that hit the country from February 2021 and peaked on May 7-15.
Odisha Scenario
In Odisha, the second wave took nearly 60 days to reach the peak as against 117 days in the first wave. Moreover, the second wave peak count in the State on May 22 has been nearly 3-times that of the first peak - when the national average has been 4.2 times. The first wave peak count was 4,356 (on September 26, 2020), and the big number on May 22 in the second wave stood at 12,862.
As per data available with the State Health department, the number of serious patients in the second wave has been around 17 per cent, who needed hospitalisation during the 60-day period when the total cases in the State reached the peak.
Third Wave Possibilty Real?
As per Centre For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and John Hopkins University, the high positivity rate (20-24 per cent) in second wave shows that the virus has been able to find a large host base. The larger the host base, the higher the chances of it taking deadlier mutations. So, till the whole population is vaccinated, the governments all over has to strictly enforce Covid-19 appropriate behaviour like use of mask, hand wash and social distancing.
So When Will Third Wave Hit?
A detailed glance of the countries that were hit by the third wave of coronavirus brings to fore a significant conclusion. Be it USA or European countries like France, the third wave hit the countries exactly after 4-months after the ebbing down of the second wave.
Going by the world-wide norm, the third wave may hit India, including Odisha, at around October-November. And if the SBI peak calculations (1.8 times of second wave peak) are to be relied upon, then the peak count in the likely third wave in Odisha may cross the 20k mark.
Why Third Wave To Be More Acute?
As per the epidemiological study of the virus across the world, during the first wave, the virus had an acute impact on the elderly persons across the countries globally. Post vaccination of the elderly persons, in the second wave, the virus mostly infected the younger age-group. And when vaccination in 18-plus category started in a big way globally, going by the behaviour of the virus, scientists world over predict children to be the likely target in the third wave.
The Reason: Following high transmission, there is every possibility of virus mutating itself to a more lethal type, observed CDC.
Countries That Recorded Third Wave
The countries that witnessed third wave are: US, France, Germany and many other European nations. The numbers in UK are on the rise for last few days. Therefore, scientists there predict that this may be early signs of third wave surge in UK.