Covid-19: What you need to know today

Last week, as a number of instalments of this column had identified, was going to be essential for India when it comes to how the trajectory of the coronavirus illness would play out within the nation. It was to point out whether or not India too would see the vacation impact seen in virtually each different nation the place mass festivities and celebrations resulted in a spike in circumstances weeks later. Diwali, maybe the most important pageant in India, was in mid-November, and if each day case numbers have been going to rise on account of the events, household gatherings and journey related to the celebrations, final week is when this might have proven up. The week has come and gone. We are actually on December 7, and India seems to have escaped the vacation impact.

Daily case numbers by the primary six days of final week, Monday to Saturday, have been: 31,182; 36,421; 35,414; 36,653; 36,212; and 36,439. That works out to a six-day common of 35,387. All these numbers are from the HT dashboard. The common is the bottom India has seen in four-and-a-half months. That would take us again to the third week of July.

These numbers result in two fascinating questions.

The first query is why did India not see the spike the US and international locations in Europe noticed after comparable celebrations and gatherings?

The apparent reply — and since it’s apparent there may be additionally a robust chance of it being the unsuitable reply however extra on this shortly — is that Diwali coincided with the tip of the primary wave of infections in India (or the start of the second), and due to this, it didn’t see a spike in circumstances two weeks later, regardless of individuals flouting social distancing norms or taking extra dangers by travelling.

This doesn’t add up as a result of if nothing actually modified within the virus’s means to contaminate individuals (it didn’t; as an example, there wasn’t a sudden mutation that made it much less virulent), and if individuals really took extra dangers than they beforehand did, there ought to have been a spike in infections. This is strictly what occurred within the US after Labor Day and which consultants say is now occurring after Thanksgiving. And that is precisely what occurred in European international locations.

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This means that the reply may lie within the chain of an infection being damaged extra typically and extra simply than it was beforehand, and regardless of violations of social distancing norms — one thing that’s attainable provided that the virus, because it seeks to leap from individual to individual, encounters extra people who find themselves proof against it. It’s troublesome to say this for positive within the absence of normal, widespread exams for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies — blood exams which might be popularly known as sero-surveys — however the reply appears to lie in that path.

The cause for the absence of a post-Diwali surge, then, could possibly be a mix of two complementary components: masking, social distancing and different security protocols that some nonetheless adopted (and proceed to); and a comparatively excessive stage of publicity to the virus within the inhabitants, leading to an equally excessive stage of safety.

This is to not counsel that India has achieved herd immunity or is near doing so. Nor is that this an endorsement of any strategy that focuses on reaching herd immunity. It is merely scientific conjecture that seeks to elucidate why India has not seen a post-Diwali surge.

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The second query (which, in some methods, derives from the primary) is concerning the waves during which the coronavirus illness impacts populations. We know {that a} wave begins waning when testing, tracing, and isolation begin lowering the potential for an infection, and waxing as life returns to regular, as enterprise and leisure and social actions improve, however there may be additionally a pure trajectory to the an infection. For occasion, at a sure stage of an infection (or publicity), the variety of new infections will begin falling, regularly at first after which sharply. So, primarily based on an understanding of those (the extent of exercise, and the an infection fee), can one predict the timing of the following wave?

That is for the consultants to reply.

Post Script: With India escaping the post-Diwali surge, if its present coronavirus illness trajectory stays within the plateau during which it finds itself until the tip of the month, it’s possible (a low however important chance) that the second wave in India can be much less intense — not simply when in comparison with that within the US and Europe, however when in comparison with the nation’s personal first wave — as a result of if all goes nicely, India may begin vaccinating the individuals within the first of its six precedence teams (prioritised when it comes to when they are going to be administered the vaccine) early subsequent yr.