British scientists now found which people are better protected from the dangerous Delta variant. The study gives hope.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has classified the variant, which was first detected in India, as “of concern” because it is more contagious than the original form of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Experts estimate that Delta could also play a crucial role in Austria by the fall.
“It is to be expected that the highly contagious Delta variant will spread even faster than the previous variants,” warns Frank Ulrich Montgomery, president of the World Medical Association. The tricky thing about this variant, he says, is that infected people very quickly have a very high viral load in their throat and can thus infect others before they even realize they have been infected.
While variant B.1.617.2 is now responsible for 96 percent of all new infections in the United Kingdom, there are “only” 71 cases in Austria so far (as of June 15), according to AGES. Most of these were sequenced in Vienna (32), 19 in Salzburg, seven in Tyrol, six in Lower Austria, five in Styria and one each in Carinthia and Upper Austria. The number of unreported cases in the rest of Austria is higher, fears Vienna’s health councillor Peter Hacker.
Several laboratory tests show that the delta variant is apparently more resistant to vaccines than other variants. But according to a British data analysis by Public Health England (PHE), full vaccine protection with two doses of the agents from Biontech/Pfizer or Astrazeneca prevents severe disease progression just as effectively as with the alpha variant.
According to the study, two doses of Pfizer/Biontech’s agent prevented hospitalization in 96 percent of cases for variant B.1.617.2. For AstraZeneca’s vaccine, the rate was 92 percent. The study confirms the importance of getting the second vaccination, said U.K. Health Minister Matt Hancock. Notably, with the Astrazeneca vaccine, the protective effect after the first dose was still noticeably lower (about 33 percent), according to the evaluation.
In Austria, 4,372,190 people received at least partial vaccination, or 55.54 percent of the population, according to AGES on Thursday. 2,375,827, or 30.18 percent, people are fully immunized.
— source: heute.at/picture: pixabay.com
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