Odisha May Become Covid-Free By February 2021: Experts

Bhubaneswar:  At a time when the daily cases of coronavirus are declining significantly in Odisha, the 90 per cent effectiveness of Pfizer’s vaccine has brought hopes that the global health crisis may end soon.

US drug-maker Pfizer has released preliminary data from late-stage human trials of the Covid-19 vaccine it developed with German biotech firm BioNTech. The vaccine has been found more than 90% effective.

The company claimed that it has not noticed any side effect of the vaccine. The company added that it hopeful of supplying up to 50m vaccine doses in 2020 and up to 1.3bn doses in 2021 globally.

On the other hand, Dr E Venkata Rao, Principal Investigator in the Covaxin human trial in Odisha said all preparations have been completed for the third-phase trial of Covaxin in India. He believes that it would play a significant role in prevention of the disease.

"The third-phase Covaxin human trial is going to start soon, probably within less than a week time. It is the biggest efficacy trial in India," said Rao.

"It is certainly a good news that Pfizer's vaccine showed 90 per cent effectiveness. The government may give nod for emergency use authorization for use of the vaccine," health expert, Dr Niroj Kumar Mishra said.

Meanwhile, the declining trend of coronavirus infections in Odisha has also soared the hope of end of the pandemic in near future. Ganjam district which was once the worst-hit district in the State, has registered significant improvement in the Covid-19 situation. All the 3,593 antigen tests conducted in the district on November 9 came out negative. Rayagada district also showed improvement in Covid-19 situation.

"As the test results of all the 3,593 antigen tests came out negative, it indicates that the Covid-19 infection has significantly declined in Ganjam," said Ganjam Collector Vijay Amruta Kulange.

"We are carrying out aggressive testing and tracking, but the number of infection has declined. The number of patients have also decreased," said Dr, Artabandhu Nayak, CDMO Rayagada.

Similarly, the daily Covid-19 infections in the State dropped to three digit after a gap of several months. According to experts, Odisha witnessed the peak of coronavirus infections in September and the infection is decreasing significantly thereafter. If the trends continue, Odisha will become Covid-free by coming February, the experts added.

(Edited By Pradeep Singh)

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