ICMR to conduct national sero-surveys to assess Covid-19 spread: MoFHW

The ministry said almost 78 per cent decline in daily new Covid-19 cases has been noted in India since peak on May 7

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) is set to launch its fourth round of national sero-survey later this month to check the extent of people’s exposure to SARS-CoV-2, NITI Ayog member V K Paul said on Friday, asking the states to launch their own sero-surveys, too.

"The ICMR will begin work for the next sero survey this month, which will help assess the intensity of spread of Covid-19. But if we want to protect our geographies, we can’t depend on one national sero-survey alone and will have to encourage states and union territories to do sero-surveys at their levels also," Paul said.

The third ICMR sero-survey was carried out in December on 28,500 people from 70 districts. It showed a Covid-19 prevalence of 21.4 per cent among the adult population, which went up to 31.7 per cent in urban slums and 26.2 per cent in urban non-slum areas.

The fourth survey will be held in the same 70 districts in 21 states and will include children aged 6 years and above.

On reducing the gap between two doses of Covishield shots as was done by the UK, Paul said there was no need to panic and immediately switchover, but the issue would be discussed at the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation.

Several experts have asked for a review of the current spacing of 12-16 weeks for the second dose of Covishield in India. The UK government's recently decided to shorten the gap to eight weeks following scientific studies showing that this would increase the vaccine’s efficacy against the more infectious Delta variant.

“There is no need for any panic, suggesting a need for immediate switchover or change in the gap between the doses. All these decisions must be taken very carefully,” Paul said, brushing aside apprehensions on whether the current dosing regimen will be effective against the Delta variant, which is the dominant strain in most parts of India.

“We must remember that when we increased the gap, we had to consider the risk posed by the virus to those who have received only one dose. But the counterpoint was that more people will then be able to get the first dose, thereby giving a reasonable degree of immunity to more people. The NTAGI will now review the new data,” he added.