Covid antibodies found in 71% of UP’s population; unvaccinated remain at risk
The sero suvery conducted in the last 10 days of June and the first week of July covered 28,975 people including children over the age of six across the country.
Amid apprehensions of the likely third wave of the coronavirus pandemic, antibodies against the virus were found in about 71 per cent of the population in Uttar Pradesh. According to a sero suvery conducted by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), antibodies against the coronavirus have been found mostly in people who have taken both doses of the Covid-19 vaccine. People, who have not received a single dose of the vaccine, were found to have lower antibodies.
The sero suvery conducted in the last 10 days of June and the first week of July covered 28,975 people including children over the age of six across the country. The survey covered 70 districts across 21 states and showed that 67.6 per cent of the samples had antibodies against the coronavirus. This is the fourth such sero suvery conducted across the country. The last sero suvery was conducted in December and January 2021.
New data by the Centre shows that Kerala has had the lowest exposure to coronavirus and only 45 per cent of the population in the southern state is projected to have been infected till early July. Assam at 50 per cent and Maharashtra 58 per cent were the two other states to have the lowest estimated exposure to the coronavirus. The states with the highest exposure were Madhya Pradesh at 79 per cent, Rajasthan 76.2 per cent and Bihar at 75.9 per cent. Nearly 67 per cent of the population across the country have been exposed to Sars-COV-2.
This sero survey was conducted on about 70,000 people in Uttar Pradesh. A large number of people were infected with the coronavirus in the state in April and May 2021. According to the sero survey, about 62,000 people were tested and a high level of antibodies were found in them.
Health department officials have said a sero survey was conducted in 11 districts in the state in September last year. The districts where sero survey was conducted included Lucknow, Kanpur, Varanasi, Gorakhpur, Agra, Prayagraj, Ghaziabad, Meerut, Kaushambi, Baghpat and Moradabad. At that time, antibodies were found in 22.1 per cent of the people in the sero survey. That is, every fifth person was infected with coronavirus at some point or the other. In June last, sero survey was conducted in all the districts of the state.
Uttar Pradesh’s Covid-19 tally stands at 17,08,410 and its death toll climbed to 22,756 on Friday with 42 people testing positive for the coronavirus disease and four more fatalities, according to a health bulletin. It also showed the total recoveries have reached 16,84,925 and that the number of active cases of Covid-19 in Uttar Pradesh stands at 729. UP, which is India’s most populous state has the highest number of vaccinations in the country at 47.5 million.
News Credit : Hindustan Times
