Padma Bhushan Dr D Nageshwar Reddy is hopeful in conquering COVID-19
Renowned medical expert Dr D Nageshwar Reddy has good news amidst this panic-ridden situation due to the coronavirus outbreak. He assures that this is something which we can easily conquered. There is no need to panic as the current lockdown should not prolong beyond 3-4 weeks.
He shares his two key findings that give India reason to hope - one emerging from a study on genome sequencing and another from research on the impact of temperature on the virus. He also elaborates on why he abhors the term social distancing and how staying positive could prove vital.
According to Dr D Nageshwar Reddy Coronavirus is an RNA virus. This particular strain seems to be in bats but whether it directly came from the bat or not, they are still not sure. A small mutation occurred which allowed it to get transmitted from bats to humans. But the most important thing is that when this virus spread to say Italy or the US or to India, the genotypes of this virus turned out to be different. Sequencing of the whole virus has been done in four countries - the first in the USA, second in Italy, third in China and fourth in India.
What they are finding is that this virus has different genome sequencing in India compared to say Italy. This has a lot of significance because in the Indian virus, there is a single mutation occuring in the spike protein of the genome. Spike protein is the area that attaches to the human cell. One small mutation has happened, making that attachment weak. So, this will become an important factor for us in India.
Whereas in the Italian virus, three mutations have occurred, making it more deadly to these people. In Italy, other aspects are also at play. The age of many patients being above 70-80 years, smoking, alcohol, comorbid conditions like diabetes, hypertension and so on. Therefore, with this combination, mortality levels are higher than usual, sometimes 10%, whereas in India, in the USA, in China, the mortality is only about 2%. There is variation in mortality and infection rate based upon the genome of the virus. Host immunity is also playing a role.
In our country, because of the demographics and because of the scale involved, extensive testing is not feasible. The only alternative is to do a complete lockdown, which has been done.
He feels unless there is a high community spread that they still can’t control. But looking at the curves that they are getting now, it looks like, to some extent, the community spread is being controlled. In a country like ours, it is very difficult to have a complete lockdown for long periods because social unrest will increase.
The mortality rate, even among very old people in India, is still not as high as it is seen in Italy. So he believes that the panic should go. He also feels positive messages should go to the public.
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