Thiruvananthapuram: Anurag Agrawal, one of the directors of the government’s genome sequencing monitoring agency INSACOG (Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium) has revealed that the increase in the Covid-19 cases in Kerala is due to the religious gatherings. The state could have avoided the sharp surge in the cases if it had not resumed religious gatherings.
Agrawal said that to resume gatherings was a bad idea. ‘From 13,000 cases to 20,000 cases would not have happened if Kerala had not opened for religious gatherings’, Anurag Agrawal said.
He also said that the state was behind the pandemic curve as compared to North India and Covid-19 infections would continue to rise in the state. Delta variant of the virus is behind the sharp surge in cases in the state. The genome sequencing of samples from Kerala showed that at least 90 per cent of the cases were of Delta variant.
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Agarwal also predicted that the third wave of infection may hit the country in the September-October period. The second wave is till now not over as it reached different parts of the countries at different times, and the only way to avoid rise in infection as per Agarwal is to increase vaccination. He said Indian vaccines could give around 60 per cent protection against Covid infection.
“Previously recovered people will not get severe disease, hence the third wave will not be very severe. But all this will change if the virus changes its form’, said Agarwal.
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