In an interview with CNNthe head of the Department of Infectious Diseases at the Universidade Estadual Paulista (Unesp) and special consultant for Covid-19 at the Brazilian Society of Infectious Diseases, Alexandre Naime, defended that Brazil’s priority should be the application of the 2nd and 3rd doses against Covid -19.
“What matters most to Brazil is the 10 to 15% who have not even completed the second dose and the more than 70% who have not completed the third, there is no doubt that this is the priority”, he said.
However, he made a reservation that it is necessary to take into account the disparities between different locations in the country. “There are state and regional differences, with places like Botucatu, which is the headquarters of Unesp, with coverage above 80% for the third dose”.
“We started the fourth dose in the elderly and eventually the strategy may be useful for immunosuppressed people, like Israel and Chile, which had a high percentage of individuals with three doses and started with the additional dose”, he added.
At this time of high number of cases, with records of more than 200,000 infections daily, Naime highlighted that the “effectiveness of vaccines, compared to Ômicron, in reducing the chance of hospitalization and death has a fantastic role, very good efficacy, it reduces between 95 and 95 98% the risk.”
He reinforces that the peak of cases was not accompanied in the same proportion by hospitalizations and deaths. According to Naime, the scenario directly reflects the positive impact of vaccination in reducing deaths from the disease.
“The further we go with the third dose and maybe the fourth in the elderly, we go to the coexistence scenario, the virus will circulate, but without hospitalizations and deaths, there will come a point where we will be able to live without disproportionate damage, as with influenza”, analyzed.
Source: CNN Brasil
