COVID-19 vaccine: NTAGI to decide on additional doses today

National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) will meet today to discuss the issue of administering additional doses of COVID-19 vaccine to immunocompromised individuals. Individuals who are expected to need the third dose of COVID-19 vaccine are cancer patients on therapy, AIDS patients, transplant patients and others.

Today’s NTAGI meeting is in line with the recommendations of the Indian SARS-CoV2 Consortium on Genomics (INSACOG) to offer booster doses of COVID-19 vaccines to those aged above 40 years of age with high-risk. Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya had recently informed the Lok Sabha that the NTAGI and the National Expert Group Vaccine Administration for COVID-19 (NEGVAC) were deliberating and considering scientific evidence on this issue.

“For now, the issue of booster dose is not on the agenda as studies are being conducted to ascertain its need and value,” Mandaviya told the Lok Sabha. For the unversed, a booster dose is different from getting an additional dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.

A booster dose is given to an individual after a predefined period when the immune response due to the primary vaccination is presumed to have gone down whereas additional doses are given to those who are immunocompromised and immunosuppressed when the primary schedule of vaccination does not provide adequate protection from the disease, as per experts.

Are COVID-19 vaccines working if need a booster shot? According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Yes. COVID-19 vaccines are working well to prevent severe illness, hospitalisation and death, even against the widely circulating Delta variant. However, public health experts are starting to see reduced protection, especially among certain populations, against mild and moderate disease.”

Health Ministry’s recent FAQ on Omicron also stated that while there is no evidence to prove that existing vaccines don’t work against the new Omicron variant some of the mutations may decrease the efficacy of existing vaccines. It also said that vaccines are important as they are expected to offer much better protection against severe disease.

Meanwhile, Serum Institute of India (SII) sought approval from Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) for using Covishield as a booster dose against COVID-19. Director of Government and Regulatory Affairs at SII Prakash Kumar Singh said in an application to the DCGI that UK-MHRA has already granted approval to the booster dose for AstraZeneca ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine.

He added that there is no shortage of Covishield doses in India and there is a demand of booster doses from those who have already taken two doses due to the emergence of new variants of the coronavirus.

(With agency inputs)

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