The Third Wave of CIVID-19 is not much far away from all of us. The committee under The Ministry of Home Affairs warned for the third wave of COVID-19. It will be at its peak during October. Kids are believed to be more susceptible this time.

Let us understand what the committee and other health professionals said.

Committee report

The report that has been submitted by the committee members under the Ministry of Home Affairs said that all the facilities related to the pandemic such as doctors, staff, equipment, ventilators, equipment, ambulances, etc. are required in large numbers to defend against this coronavirus pandemic as a large number of children would become infected with this. 

There is an urgent need for vaccination drives primarily focussed on children with physical disabilities. Also, COVID wards have to be made again so that kids and other children could be safely monitored as well.  

The report has been submitted to Principal Medical Officer (PMO). 

Committee members

The members of the expert committee were Anurag Agarwal, the Director of Institute of Genomics & Integrative Biology and Council of Scientific and India Research (IGIB-CSIR), the ex-Director of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Naveen Thacker, the professor of Christian Medical College in Vellore, Gagandeep Kang and AK Pandey, the Chairman of State Monitoring Committee on Shelter for Urban Homeless.  

Other recommendations

Besides this, the study 'Third Wave Preparedness: Children Vulnerability and Recovery' suggests that there could be possibilities of children being more likely to be affected by this. 

There should be a holistic approach or a home care model that will act as an immediate increase in the pediatric medical capacities and will calculate the mental health issues among children. The kid's vulnerability to COVID-19 has not been discussed yet.  

Experts concern  

The most expert view suggests that it will be more prone to severe infections. The experts showed their concern for the shortage of 82 percent primary health cares, 63 percent of vacancies are there in the community health center.  

During the second wave of COVID-19, about 60-70 percent of children were admitted to hospitals, health care centers, it has been noticed that co-morbidity and low immune systems were the primary cause for the development of rare and serious conditions of COVID-19 known as Multi-system Inflammatory Syndrome (MIS-C). 

Santosh Kumar, the coordinator of the expert's committee and the Professor Head of Governance and Public Policy at the National Institute of Management Officer (NIDM) stated, key learning from the past two waves is preparedness. We all must take proactive actions now in this third wave. Also, states should start enhancing pediatric COVID care facilities for treatment which includes Intensive Care Unit (ICU), pediatric ambulance, medicines and pediatricians as well.”  

Also, the expert's committee member exclaimed, “There is a great gap between the urban and rural India in terms of awareness, digitization and medical facilities. It can be easily said that the pandemic outbreak has only exacerbated social inequities and highlighted shortcomings of our society.” 

The committee members said, “The third wave can tangle the situation with the new variant of SARS Cov-2 which can escape the immunity from earlier infections and in some cases that are prevalent in the vaccines.”