Fourth wave scare: Karnataka Health Minister says Covid-19 wave will start in June-July, last till Sept

New Delhi: Karnataka Health Minister K Sudhakar on Thursday quoting predictive studies said that the fourth wave of the Covid-19 will begin in June-July and will last till September adding that his administration is prepared to deal with any possible wave, IANS reported.

The minister often hailed for efficient Covid related policies said that there is no need to worry as of now and did not rule out the possibility of a fourth Covid-19 wave.

“The new XE variant of Covid-19 is prominent in 8 countries and people arriving from that country are being screened, he said.”

What steps are being taken in Karnataka to prevent outbreaks?

Answering a question, Sudhakar said that the mask is still essential in the state and there will be no relaxation on Coivd protocols.

The new XE variant of Covid-19 is prominent in 8 countries and people arriving from that country are being screened properly, said Sudhakar

K Sudhakar on children’s vaccination

5,000 children in the age group 6-12 who are not yet eligible for the vaccine will be said.

Speaking about India`s vaccination progress, Sudhakar pointed out that many vaccines previously given to kids reached India a long time after they were available elsewhere in the world.

 "I don`t want to bring politics in this collective fight against the pandemic, but people should know this. During the last 70 years when other parties ruled, vaccines came much later to India compared to the rest of the world."

The Hepatitis B vaccine was introduced across the world in 1985 but came to India only by 2005. Compared to the rest of the world, the BCG vaccine came 20-25 years later and the Japanese Encephalitis vaccine came 45 years later.

Today, 10 vaccines have been approved and are available in India and it is a proud thing that among them is one homegrown vaccine, the Covaxin developed by Bharat Biotech.

Other vaccines are the Covishield vaccine developed by Pune based Serum Institute of India which had tied up with Oxford University and AstraZeneca, Corbevax, and Zydus Cadila which is the world`s first DNA vaccine, Sudhakar said.

Speaking about Karnataka, he said, 10.54 crore vaccines are administered in the state. The second dose of the vaccine has been taken by 98 per cent of the people and another 32 lakh people are yet to take the second dose. He urged people to take the second dose and also the precautionary dose at the earliest.