Excelsior Correspondent
Srinagar, May 20: The Doctors Association Kashmir (DAK) today said vaccinating children holds the key to avert the third Covid-19 wave which is predicted to happen sometime in the fall of this year.
In a statement issued here, DAK President Dr Nisar-ul- Hassan said that getting children vaccinated against Covid could prevent the third wave which is expected to affect kids the most.
‘The first wave of the pandemic affected the elderly, the second wave is affecting the youth more and the third wave is expected to attack children,” he said.
Dr Nisar said if we vaccinate our children now, the third wave may not happen.
“Pfizer vaccine has been approved for use in children between 12 and 15 years of age. The vaccine is already given to people as young as 16. The vaccine is safe and 100 per cent effective in preventing Covid-19 in children,” he said.
He said that we should import this vaccine and start vaccinating children. “While Bharat Biotech has been permitted to test Covaxin in children, it has yet to start trials,” he said.
The DAK President said it is hard to defeat the Covid-19 pandemic without vaccinating children. “We won’t be able to achieve herd immunity until children are vaccinated,” he said.
DAK President said that to achieve herd immunity to Covid-19, more than 70 per cent of people need to be vaccinated. “That is unlikely to be achieved if children who constitute a huge proportion of the population are unvaccinated,” he said.
Giving out estimates, Dr Nisar said that there are around 4.8 million kids in Jammu and Kashmir who are unimmunized. “And, if we leave a large number of the population unimmunized, we will continue to have fresh waves and pandemic will linger on,” Dr Nisar said.
Follow our WhatsApp channel