E-Paper
Omicron ready: Mixing of vaccines might be an option, says ICMR former chief, Dr Gangakhedkar
Dr Gangakhedkar said that a “mixing strategy”, which is mixing two doses of the Covid vaccine, or taking a a booster dose, are options that need to be looked at
PUNE Dr Raman Gangakhedkar, former chief of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), now part of the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) scientific advisory group on the origins of novel pathogens said that a lot of questions till needs to be answered in light of the new Covid variant, Omicron.
He added that a “mixing strategy”, which is mixing two doses of the Covid vaccine, or taking a a booster dose, are options that need to be looked at.
He also said that the decision to reduce the gap between two doses should be considered as it should not reduce the efficacy, or the immunogenicity of the particular vaccine, which the Omicron variant might affect even in its current process.
Although Dr Gangakhedkar said that it is too early to panic due to the new variant, since we do not know if it increases hospitalisation or deaths, but we only know now that it has a high rate of transmission.
During the meeting when questioned about booster doses he said, “When we talk about reducing the gap between two doses we must be very careful while deciding on that to ensure that by reducing the gap we would do not reduce the efficacy or the immunogenicity of that particular vaccine. The variants themselves will reduce the efficacy of the vaccine. Instead we must prioritise fully immunising those who have a comorbidity or are aged above 45 years. We must develop vaccine coverage.”
Since confirmation of the new variant, the state health minister and various experts have commented on the need to give booster vaccine doses, however, Dr Gangakhedkar said that giving a booster dose of the same vaccine might not be a wise decision.
He said, “We are fortunate that we have not started booster doses because in any case we are going to use the same old vaccines which are based on the Wuhan virus, but you are now looking are the large number of mutations which have occured in the spike protein region which would mean infections would continue to occur. How much of protection you would provide by using the same old vaccine is a question which perhaps can be addressed better if we wait for the data to emerge.
“In my mind instead of using the first generation vaccine, the second generation should be used, but the second generation vaccine would not be made available in India as soon as we think,” he said, adding, “A mixing strategy would perhaps become good over a period of time. There has been no discussion on this issue so far, but maybe Covaxin and Novavax could work, because Novavax tends to have 16 different subunits or spike proteins, so some of them would continue to really useful and it is immunogenic. Those who have got Covishield could be give Covaxin as the booster. These questions are unaddressed and need lot of brainstorming.”
Dr Raman Gangakhedkar is also the Dr CG Pandit National Chair at the ICMR after he retired as chief of ICMR in July 2020.
Dr Gangakhedkar was director-incharge of the National AIDS Research Institute (NARI), Pune, before he moved to the ICMR headquarters in Delhi. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 2020 for his service and his research on HIV/AIDS.
