On June 14, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that the plan to lift all restrictive measures to prevent Covid-19 in the country, which had long been set for June 21, would be delayed for another 4 weeks due to
`We understand the extremely cruel logic of this exponential increase,` Prime Minister Johnson said, referring to the skyrocketing number of nCoV infections, adding that the full reopening was postponed to July 19.
The clearest evidence for the cruel rule that the British Prime Minister mentioned is the Covid-19 situation in India.
Although the number of new daily infections in India has decreased after peaking, the number is still alarmingly high, with about 62,000 new cases on June 16.
People sit outdoors at a restaurant in London, England, on June 14.
Last week, US officials said that the Delta variant accounts for about 6% of new nCoV infections in the country, while the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) added Delta to the list of `worrying variants`.
`If you live in an area with low Covid-19 vaccination levels, or have not been vaccinated yourself, you are clearly vulnerable,` said Andy Slavitt, former senior adviser on Covid-19 response.
The US is predicted to not achieve the goal set by Biden of injecting at least one dose of Covid-19 vaccine to 70% of adults before Independence Day, July 4.
`This is a race between the Covid-19 vaccination campaign for the people and the current and future mutations,` said Dr. Lee Norman, head of the Kansas state health agency, USA.
Speaking at an online meeting on June 16, Maria Van Kerkhove, Covid-19 technical official of the World Health Organization (WHO), said the Delta variant has been detected in more than 80 countries.
Washington Post commentator Adam Taylor pointed out the important problem is that nCoV has spread so widely that there are many opportunities to mutate.
The Delta strain, first discovered in October 2020 in India, is 60% more infectious than Alpha, the strain first discovered in the UK, British officials said.
The good news is that Covid-19 vaccines still protect fully vaccinated people against the Delta variant.
However, the effectiveness of both vaccines drops to 33% if only one dose is given.
Although the Delta variant emerged through natural mutation, human factors are believed to have driven the spread of the virus.
In India, the rapid spread of the Delta variant in the spring is attributed to the government’s loosening of restrictions and slow vaccination.
`The Delta strain has hindered the world’s path to escape the pandemic. The UK is probably not the first country to pause reopening, instead switching to accelerating vaccination in the hope of overcoming the challenge,` Taylor said.
This commentator raises the issue of needing a broader discussion, not only on how to respond to the Delta mutation within countries in the short term, but also on how to control the virus’s global spread.
The number of nCoV infections is increasing in many parts of the world.
At the recent G7 summit, rich countries pledged to do more to share about a billion vaccine doses with the world.
`We don’t want to be in a situation where the virus mutates so much that we have to return to its starting point. That’s why we need to prevent Covid-19 infection as much as possible right now,` said WHO official Van Kerkhove.
