The current Delta variant does not offer herd immunity, according to the Oxford Vaccine Group.On Tuesday, Prof. Sir Andrew Pollard testified before MPs that the fact that vaccines didn't stop the spread Covid was proof of the mythical threshold for total immunity.This virus is not measles. According to him, the virus could not be transmitted in the population if 95% of the population was vaccinated against measles.Even if you have been vaccinated, the Delta variant can still infect you. This means that any person who is not vaccinated will still be infected by the virus at some point. We don't have any vaccines that can stop this transmission.While the current vaccines are effective in preventing severe Covid illness and death but they don't stop someone who is fully vaccinated from getting infected with the virus that causes Covid-19,The concept of population immunity or herd immunity is based on the fact that a large percentage of a population has been infected or has received vaccinations. This provides indirect protection against an infectious disease for those not vaccinated or who have never been infected.A recent React study by Imperial College London shows that fully vaccinated adults aged 18-64 have a 49% lower chance of contracting the disease than those who are not vaccinated. Also, fully vaccinated individuals were three times more likely to become infected if they had come into contact with people who had Covid (3.84% against 7.23%).Around 75% of adults in the UK have had both their jabs.Sajid Javid, the health secretary, said Tuesday that plans are in place to offer Covid booster jabs starting next month to the most vulnerable people in the UK. He stated that the flu jab will be available at the same moment.Pollard, who is the chairman of Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation but is not a member of Covid JCVI committee, questioned whether boosters were necessary.We would need to increase our time if there is evidence of an increase in hospitalizations or the next stage, which would be people who die among those who have been vaccinated. He said that this is not what we see at the moment.He said that even if the vaccine-induced antibodies levels were to decline, our immune systems would likely remember the vaccine for decades and provide some protection against the virus. There is no reason to panic at the moment. We are not experiencing a breakthrough severe illness.Scientific debate has also been sparked in the UK by the question of whether or no to vaccinate under-16s as countries such as the USA, Ireland, and Israel.Only children between the ages of 12 and 15 should be vaccinated, or those who live with at-risk parents. Some critics suggested that wealthy countries with high levels of adult vaccine coverage such as the UK should not hoard vaccines for children, but rather should give those doses away to poor countries. Many of these countries have not vaccinated their most vulnerable populations.Professor Devi Sridhar of the University of Edinburgh's global public health chair pointed out that only the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was approved for use in the UK.She said that the real issue isn't about vaccinations for children versus the rest of the world, but about how to deal with boosters. This is what is being discussed in rich nations, as those are the doses that could potentially be traveling abroad.AstraZeneca has a very powerful vaccine that can be used around the world. However, it is not going to fix our problem with children.
