KOLKATA: The Bengal government has decided to prioritise vaccination for women who have children below 12 years old, ahead of the pandemic’s anticipated third wave, during which a large number of kids could be infected.
The government has also decided to conduct vaccination camps at each of the 250 containment and micro-containment zones.
“Since there is no vaccine available yet for children below 18 years old, we have decided to vaccinate mothers who have children below 12 years old, to ensure some protection ahead of the third wave,” chief minister Mamata Banerjee said on Wednesday, explaining the decision.
This measure is called “cocoon vaccination” pointed out Prabhas Prasun Giri, an Institute of Child Health associate professor.
“Since the susceptible persons (children, in this case) cannot be vaccinated, the idea is to immunise people who would be in close contact with them.
In this case, it is the parents.
This is an effective strategy.
Fathers also need to be inoculated, as in most cases it’s the men who go out to work, and hence, have a higher chance of virus exposure.
In fact, all adults in the family should be vaccinated to protect the children,” Giri, the paediatric ICU in-charge at ICH, said.
Health experts believe that the third wave could hit India around November and infect children who are yet to be covered by the vaccination programme.
Bengal has taken taken multiple measures to ramp up healthcare for children, including setting up 1,300 paediatric ICU beds by end-July, and earmarking 10,000 Covid beds for women, where they can be admitted with their children.
A committee of experts has also been set up to provide guidance to the health department on paediatric care and help chalk out a plan of action.
The state also plans to maintain 30,000-plus Covid beds and review and increase the oxygen infrastructure.
In the first wave, only around 14,000 children in the state tested positive through RT-PCR.
In the second wave, over 21,000 children tested positive between February and May in the state.
The decision to inoculate young mothers is a great initiative, which will reduce the chance of infection among children, said Dipyaman Ganguly, an immunologist at the Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, Kolkata.
On the vaccination camps at containment and micro-containment zones, CM Banerjee said it would curb the pandemic’s spread.
“Just like we are vaccinating super-spreaders like vendors, hawkers, transport workers and other categories of people, we have decided to vaccinate people in containment zones to stem Covid spread,” she said.
Public health specialist Anirban Dalui, attached with Swasthya Bhavan, said vaccines were one of the best weapon to prevent the spread of Covid and decease disease severity.
“We need to vaccinate adequate number of people so that the community is protected.
Our government has started the drive with frontliners and vulnerable sections of the population by age and co-morbidity.
Now the time has come to inoculate those in containment zones, especially those who have never had Covid, on a priority basis as they have now become vulnerable.
Judicious, planned and early vaccination can be a game-changer,” Dalui said.