Explainer | Does India need to give its entire population the Covid-19 vaccine?

The government made it clear that the vaccination shot would be given to a critical mass to 'break the chain' of virus transmission

As Britain is preparing to become the first country to roll out the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine this week, India is also set to distribute the vaccines to its citizens by the first quarter of 2021.

However, the nation is yet to give Emergency Use Authorisation (EUA) to pharmaceutical companies to start the process. On Sunday, pharma giant Pfizer became the first company to apply for an EAU for its vaccine in India, days after it received approval from the UK.

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Following Pfizer's application, Serum Institute of India sought EUA from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI).

However, even after these vaccines get regulatory approvals for emergency use, the larger question is: Will the entire Indian population of 1.38 billion people be vaccinated?

The government made it clear that it will not be inoculating everyone and the vaccination shot would be given to a critical mass to "break the chain" of virus transmission, at least initially.

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"Our purpose is to break the chain of virus transmission. If we are able to vaccinate a critical mass of people and break the chain of transmission, then we may not have to vaccinate the entire population," ICMR Director-General Dr Balram Bhargava told PTI.

Herd immunity would play a key role while breaking the chain of transmission. The World Health Organization estimated a 65-70% vaccine coverage rate as necessary to reach population immunity through vaccination though, the idea of herd immunity assumes a vaccine prevents transmission, not just the disease itself.

Virologist Shahid Jameel told PTI that over 1.6 billion doses would cover 800 million people or 60% of India's population. That would be enough to develop herd immunity, a form of indirect protection from infectious disease that occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population has become immune to infection.

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The health ministry has reiterated that the initial doses of the vaccine would be given to 'priority groups' with the priority being health care workers that will include all workers, medical or non-medical who are associated with government and private hospitals. The second priority would be the frontline workers.

In an interview to Outlook India, Health Minister Harsh Vardhan mentioned that the government aims to provide the Covid-19 vaccine to 30 crore Indians by August-September 2021 which covers 22 per cent of the total population.

With vaccines inching closer to rollout, a survey conducted between Oct 15-20th before any of the vaccines were announced found that 61 per cent Indians were not keen to get vaccinated.

A likely cause of hesitation among the citizens was the black marketing and possible counterfeiting of vaccines.

(With agency inputs)