THE LONG ROAD TO ENDING THE SCOURGE

Saro Thiruppathy discusses the global responses to the pandemic and the mammoth effort to vaccinate the world’s population against COVID-19

Nothing could have prepared the world for the COVID-19 pandemic declared by the WHO on 11 March last year. It literally brought the world to a stop as countries closed borders, and air, land and sea travel ground to a halt.

Governments imposed a range of restrictions that included sheltering places, lockdowns and curfews. The World Health Organization was calling the shots on what could and couldn’t be done during this period. Face masks became the order of the day, as did physical distancing and hand hygiene.

As the world watched in horror, the global death toll was being recorded in the millions and the caseloads kept rising steadily. And while there were intimations that a vaccine was on its way, the situation was bleak.

VACCINE HOPE Then in December, Oxford-AstraZeneca declared that its trials had been successful and applied for emergency use authorisation (EUA), and the UK announced that it would begin its immunisation programme in January.

Soon, the market saw the entry of vaccines such as Pfizer BioNTech, Moderna, Sinopharm, Sputnik etc.

A huge sigh of relief was heard around the world and developed countries in the West began preordering vaccines in massive quantities. Due to cold chain restrictions however, some vaccine types weren’t easily transportable and demand was outweighing supply.

The WHO continuously appealed to the developed world to desist from hoarding vaccines since the global population needed to be vaccinated before any mitigation of the virus could be seen.

The COVAX initiative (which is a joint effort by GAVI – the Vaccine Alliance, the WHO and others) started providing vaccines for at least a percentage of national population requirements in the developing world.

Regrettably, due to a handful of serious health issues such as myocarditis and blood clots, some countries suspended their immunisation programmes until they could source ‘safer vaccines.’ However, the majority of vaccinated people did not experience any serious side-effects.

DELTA VARIANT Meanwhile, there were rumbles about mutations of the virus in some parts of the world but people weren’t particularly bothered because vaccination roll outs were ongoing.

Masks were being discarded, and close contact between friends and family was back on track. Death tolls around the world were slowly dropping and it seemed that 2021 would be a year to celebrate.

But life has a funny way of reminding us that we shouldn’t be counting our chickens before they’ve hatched; and in April, the Delta variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus was discovered in India. It was more lethal because the rate of transmission was higher – and the disease itself was furiously claiming lives on the subcontinent.

The plight of Indians was broadcast graphically over social media in particular and a sense of fear gripped the world once more. Global vaccination drives were stepped up, and more countries implemented lockdowns and restrictions.

GLOBAL PROTESTS By this time however, some people in the developed world were becoming frustrated with their governments and the vaccine mandates. And they began protesting against mandatory vaccination, in favour of personal freedoms.

Protesters accused their governments of trying to control them through fear. In addition to vehemently opposing lockdowns and mask mandates, they fought for the rights of small businesses to not go belly up. They demanded to know why their governments were insisting on vaccines when medications such as Ivermectin were available.

Though the use of Ivermectin is discouraged by the WHO, it is considered suitable by leading doctors and scientists the world over. According to scientific research, it will stop the SARS-CoV-2 virus from replicating itself in the body, and thereby prevent it from invading the bloodstream and organs.

There are unofficial reports that some countries in the East, which were experiencing severe outbreaks a few months ago, have managed to control the situation through the administration of Ivermectin.

In the meantime, large swathes of populations have received at least one dose of a vaccine and many governments are now considering living with the virus rather than locking down each time a new variant appears on the horizon. However, health officials are sceptical about the early relaxation of COVID-19 health protocols.

Several pharmaceutical companies are researching ways that can prevent dissemination of the virus and it seems that nasal sprays such as COVIXYL-V and oral tablets (molnupiravir) are being readied for EUA and distribution.

For the moment, it’s still the vaccine together with health protocols that are keeping the majority of people safe from COVID-19.

It will be interesting to see if anti-vaxxers will buy into the anti-COVID nasal sprays and oral medications, since they too have been developed rapidly and may not provide sufficient scientific data to the sceptics.

Vaccine passports will soon be the norm as employers on the ground, in the air and at sea insist that only vaccinated employees and clients or passengers will be allowed on their premises, or on board their aircraft and ships.

As they say, in the end ‘the house always wins!’

So if the unvaccinated wish to survive economically, socially, physically and emotionally, their personal freedoms may need to be dumped in favour of the will of the community at large.