COVID-19 vaccine is useless even its vaccination rate higher than Israel?

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COVID-19 vaccine is useless even its vaccination rate higher than Israel?

COVID-19 vaccine is useless even its vaccination rate higher than Israel? The vaccination rate is much higher than that of Israel, but the number of new cases is the highest in the world; what truth is this country telling us?

It is widely spread in the world: After Israel was vaccinated with COVID-19 vaccine, the number of new COVID-19 infections continued to decrease. Israel not only gives us hope, but also satisfies our expectations of being free from the COVID-19 pandemic, but this is not the whole truth.

Seychelles, a country with a much higher rate of COVID-19 vaccination than Israel, has seen the exact opposite of Israel in the last month. It is currently the country with the highest number of new cases per million people in the world.

In Seychelles, a high rate of vaccination has not prevented the spread of COVID-19.

This cruel reality needs to be known by us.

60% of Israel’s population has received at least one dose of the vaccine, and 55.9% of the population is fully vaccinated.

In Seychelles, 72.6% of the population has received at least one dose of the vaccine, and 63.9% of the population is fully vaccinated.

While other countries were waiting for vaccines, Seychelles once made other countries envy. But now, on a per million population basis, Seychelles has more than 4,000 new cases per day, the highest in the world; 16 times that of India, and it has been increasing continuously in the past month.

Obviously, the high rate of vaccination still did not stop the outbreak in Seychelles.

The epidemic in Seychelles has allowed us to see another real world after vaccination; it also makes people question whether human beings can be freed from the COVID-19 pandemic through vaccination.

What happened in Seychelles in the past few months?

According to a CNN report, Seychelles was very satisfied with the control of the COVID-19 epidemic more than a month ago. After the vaccination, no one was seriously ill and no one died at that time. Everything is as expected, or in other words, the same as Israel.

72% of Seychelles’ GDP comes from tourism. As a country that relies on tourists, Seychelles has lifted restrictions on tourists, as long as people who have a negative PCR test can enter the country and do not need to be quarantined.
In addition, the people of Seychelles like to party. Since vaccination is the highest in the world, people naturally relax their vigilance.

In this context, Seychelles has seen an increase in COVID-19 cases from a month ago.

Even more frightening is that the local government stated that as of May 8, 37% of the new cases in Seychelles had been fully vaccinated. The percentage of breakthrough infections is too high!

The CNN report shows that Seychelles vaccinated mainly the inactivated virus vaccine of China National Pharmaceutical Group and the AstraZeneca adenovirus vector vaccine produced in India. Among all fully vaccinated people, 57% received the Sinopharm vaccine, which is for people aged 18-60, and 43% received the AstraZeneca vaccine produced in India, which is for people over 60 years old.

Is the vaccine useful?

CNN further interviewed.

In the eyes of some people, the epidemic in Seychelles seems to show that Seychelles vaccination is ineffective.

But the local government, scientists and the World Health Organization (WHO) said: The epidemic in Seychelles is basically in line with expectations!

Scientists and local officials said that if these infected people are analyzed in depth, the vaccine is not without effect.

The Seychelles Ministry of Health said on Monday that about 20% of the people who were hospitalized were vaccinated, but their condition was not serious. Almost no cases requiring intensive care or death were vaccinated.

Therefore, the Seychelles government believes that:

“The conclusion is: vaccines are protecting people.”
“If there is no vaccine, the situation will be worse.”

Although the two vaccines vaccinated in Seychelles have been approved by the World Health Organization, neither vaccine has 100% protection. AstraZeneca’s clinical trial results show that it has 76% protection against symptomatic COVID-19 and 100% protection against severe, critically ill or hospitalized cases. Sinopharm’s protection against symptomatic COVID-19 is 79%.

WHO official Dr Richard Mihigo said:

“The current situation in Seychelles is in line with the results of clinical trials, proving that the COVID-19 vaccine is very effective in preventing severe illness, hospitalization and death from illness.”

He said in an email:
Unless everyone is protected, there is no reason why the epidemic will not continue to spread.”
The WHO is also reviewing data from Seychelles to further assess the country’s epidemic and vaccine protection.

Associate Professor Michael Z. Lin of Stanford University said:
“The protective power of the vaccine means that even if everyone is vaccinated, 20% of people will still be infected with symptomatic COVID-19.”
“As long as the epidemic is spreading, whether it is an unvaccinated infection or a breakthrough case after vaccination, it is not surprising.”
Professor Lin emphasized that compared with those who have not been vaccinated, in addition to the low infection rate, the proportion of people who have been vaccinated who are seriously ill and need to be hospitalized seems to be lower.

However, it is not yet known how each of the two vaccines vaccinated in Seychelles performed, or whether the infection was caused by a variant strain. Especially for the South African mutant strain, the AstraZeneca vaccine is almost ineffective; the Sinopharm vaccine has no real-world data.

In this regard, Cassie Berry, professor of immunology at Pas Murdoch University, pointed out that the epidemic in Seychelles does not fully represent the same in other countries.
“The infection rate of vaccinated people will depend on many factors, including the type of vaccine they are vaccinated and the susceptibility of the population. Countries that use more protective vaccines are more likely to achieve herd immunity. For example, Israel, which uses Pfizer vaccine That’s it. The protective power of Pfizer vaccine is more than 90%.”

Professor Lin emphasized that even if the case fatality rate is reduced by 1%, this is a desirable achievement. Any vaccination can significantly reduce the fatality rate than no vaccination.

Jennifer Huang Bouey, an epidemiologist at the California RAND Corporation, pointed out that not every country can get a more effective vaccine, especially considering that some vaccines require harsh transportation and storage temperatures.

What inspiration does the epidemic in Seychelles give us?

1. Even if extensive vaccination is carried out, the infection cannot be completely blocked; low-protective vaccination requires a higher vaccination rate to achieve herd immunity.
2. Although the currently available vaccines cannot provide complete protection, they can reduce severe cases.
3. Vaccines are not a panacea, especially when humans are facing more mutant strains. Non-pharmacological interventions such as maintaining social distancing and wearing masks are critical.

Finally, we use three sentences from scientists to summarize our position.

Jeremy Lim, Associate Professor, National University of Singapore:

“It’s just a reflection of perhaps how naive or how how foolishly optimistic we are,”

“Covid is not going to suddenly disappear. The most likely scenario is that the world will just have to live with Covid,”

Professor Stanford Lin:

“It’s advantageous to take the vaccine you can get, rather than wait for something perfect.”

The key Point:

Regardless of the perspective, Seychelles, which has a higher rate of vaccination than Israel but has the highest rate of new infections in the world, reminds people that even countries with a high vaccination rate cannot relax their vigilance; This is especially true in the circumstances.

(source:internet, reference only)

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