The third wave of COVID-19 could reach its peak around October-November if COVID-appropriate behavior is not followed, though there may be half the daily cases reported during the second wave, suggests a scientist of a government panel.

Manindra Agarwal, who is working on the mathematical projection of the COVID-19 trajectory, added that the third wave could spread faster if there is a new virulent strain. He mentioned about the three scenarios of the model - optimistic, intermediate and pessimistic - for predicting the third wave. In the optimistic scenario, the experts assume that life normalizes by August, and there is no novel mutant. In the intermediate scenario, they assume that vaccination is 20% less effective besides the optimistic scenario assumption. The pessimist scenario puts forward an assumption different from the intermediate one, where a new, 25% more infectious variant spreads in August (not Delta plus, which is not more infectious than Delta). In the pessimistic scenario, cases may increase to 1,50,000 to 2,00,000… (NDTV – PTI, July 4, 2021)