No one safe until all vaccinated for Covid, track hospitalisations: Johns Hopkins scientist

Vaccine inequity remains an issue both within India, where less than 2 per cent of the population has received a Covid booster, and the globe with 56 countries unable to inoculate even 10 percent of their people, says Johns Hopkins scientist Amita Gupta.

Tracking hospitalisation rates which provide an indicator of severity of illness is key, the chief of the Division of Infectious Disease, and Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine said while stressing that no one is safe from Covid until everyone in the world gets vaccinated.

She cited the example of the Omicron variant to buttress her point.

The highly transmissible variant is believed to have emerged in November last year in South Africa and Botswana due to inadequate immunisation in African countries before spreading globally, Gupta said, adding that another variant is likely to follow the same trend.

Global vaccine inequity remains an issue both within India and globally. For example, in the continent of Africa less than 20 per cent of the population is currently vaccinated and there are countries in Africa still with less than 2 per cent vaccinated, Gupta told

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