Delta COVID-19 variant can infect vaccinated people, claims AIIMS study

Vaccination is not a guarantee against the Covid-19 infection and it will only ensure that the infection does not become severe, experts have reiterated this, but now a preliminary study conducted by the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi has claimed the same after conducting a small study on 63 people. Out of these 63 people. 35 received both the dose of vaccines and 27 received only one dose. All of them got breakthrough infections (infections after vaccination) and among the samples which were genome sequenced, the Delta variant — the variant first reported in India — is predominant.

Here is all you need to know about this study:

1. Out of 63 samples, 36 were sequenced. 19 among them completed one dose and 17 got both doses.

2. Out of the 36 samples, the Delta variant (B.1.617.2) was found in 23 samples.

3. Among 63 participants, 1en patients received Covishield while 53 received Covaxin.

4. The patients had a mean age of 37 (21-92), of which 41 were males and 22 were females, AIIMS said.

5. It may be noted that AIIMS earlier said that there was no death among this group, which points to the premise that vaccination reduces mortality.

“Reinfections and vaccine breakthrough infections are rare occurrences and genomic sequencing of vaccine breakthrough infections can provide useful insights. In the present group of vaccine breakthrough infections investigated using genome sequencing, closely overlapping and mirroring the Covid-19 cases in the state of Delhi, the variants of concern B.1.617.2 and B.1.1.7 comprised the majority, but the proportions were not significantly different in comparison with the population prevalence of the variants during this period with high community transmission,” the study said.

Several studies are going on to understand the variants of the Covid-19 better. A recent study by Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad, and Banaras Hindu University has revealed that the Dela variant was the reason for the rise in the Covid-19 infections in Varanasi. India’s SARS-CoV-2 Genomic Consortia has also confirmed that the Delta variant was the factor behind the second wave and it is more infectious than the variant first found in the UK. Hindustan Times