In response to the recent increase in COVID cases in India, Union Health Minister Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya stated that no changes will be made to the COVID immunization policy for the time being. On Monday, he claimed that there was enough vaccine stock in India and that the government had no immediate plans to acquire additional vaccines.

He revealed that there was no need to be alarmed as the sub-variant of Omicron that is currently circulating in the country had not increased hospitalization or severity of illness. As for the total tally updated at 8 a.m. on Monday, the total death toll has risen to 5,308,922 with 11 fatalities. Out of these, 3 were reported from Maharashtra and one from each of Delhi, Kerala, Karnataka, and Rajasthan in 24 hours.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), SARS-CoV-2 is still evolving, and experts in the WHOs Technical Advisory Group on SARS-CoV-2 Virus Evolution (TAG-VE) agree that Omicron represents the most divergent variation from earlier variants based on comparisons of antigenic cross-reactivity using animal sera, replication studies in experimental models of the human respiratory tract, and evidence from clinical and epidemiological studies in humans.

The global health agency added that, in contrast to pre-Omicron VOCs, Omicron viruses have continued to evolve genetically and antigenically with an expanding range of sub-lineages. To date, all of these sub-lineages can be characterized by the evasion of existing immunity and a preference for infecting the upper respiratory tract. They also added that the Omicron viruses accounted for over 98% of the publicly available sequences since February 2022.

(Source: https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/no-revision-in-covid-vaccine-policy-says-health-minister/article66695380.ece )