Health experts in the country have said that the people who refuse to get vaccinated against Covid-19 are the reason behind cases surge in UAE recently. Doctors and heads of medical facilities renewed calls and urged residents to take Covid-19 vaccine. This came a day after a senior health official said that large number of Covid-19 infections in Dubai are among people who haven’t received the vaccine yet.

Dr Alawi Al Sheikh Ali, deputy director-general of Dubai Health Authority (DHA) said that nine out of 10 Covid-19 patients who were hospitalized and admitted to ICU were unvaccinated. He added that eight in 10 Covid-19 positive people were yet to take the jab. Medical professionals said that these figures should be a wake up call for all people to break the chain of infection.

“Developing immunity through vaccination means there is a reduced risk of developing the illness and its consequences. This immunity helps you fight the virus if exposed. Getting vaccinated may also protect people around you because if you are protected from getting infected, you are less likely to infect someone else,” said Dr Tholfkar Al Baaj, chief clinical officer of Al Futtaim Health Group. He explained, “This is particularly important to protect people at increased risk of severe illness from Covid-19, such as healthcare providers, the elderly, and people with other medical conditions.” 

Dr Gunjan Mahajan, a clinical pathologist at Burjeel Hospital, Dubai, said “the vaccine will help us achieve herd immunity when enough people have been vaccinated and have developed protective antibodies against future infection.” 

Dr Mohammed Salman Khan, a general medicine specialist at Aster Clinic, Qusais 1, said, “Unfortunately, many people have still opted not to take the vaccine, and it could have led to the sudden rise in the number of Covid-19 cases recently.” 

However, Dr Sarla Kumari is confident of UAE being on track of vaccinating 100% of eligible people by 2021 end. UAE so far has administered more than 13.8 million vaccine doses with vaccine distribution rate of 139.61 doses per 100 people. 

“The percentage of people who need to be immune to achieve herd immunity varies with each disease. For example, herd immunity against measles requires about 95 per cent of a population to be vaccinated. The remaining five per cent will be protected by the fact that measles will not spread among those who are vaccinated,” said Dr Kumari, specialist physician and diabetologist at Canadian Specialist Hospitals.

 For polio, the threshold is approximately 80%. “The proportion of the population that must be vaccinated against Covid-19 to begin inducing herd immunity is still unknown. This is an important area of research and will likely vary according to the community, the vaccine, the populations prioritized for vaccination, and other factors,” added Dr Kumari. 

“Most people who are infected with Covid-19 develop an immune response within the first few weeks, but we don’t know how strong or lasting that immune response is, or how it differs for different people. There have also been reports of people infected with the coronavirus for a second time. Until researchers better understand Covid-19 immunity, it will not be possible to know how much of a population is immune and how long that immunity lasts for, let alone make future predictions. These challenges should preclude any plans that try to increase immunity within a population by allowing people to get infected,” she added. 

The people exempted from Covid-19 vaccine are:

· Patients with active Covid-19 infection

· Children under 12 years old

· Pregnant women (until further data becomes available)

· Those who are allergic to vaccines or any of their ingredients

· People suffering from conditions that may ‘conflict with the vaccine.’

· Volunteers in Covid-19 vaccine clinical trials

· People vaccinated outside of the country

· People who have previously contracted Covid-19, following a medical assessment

Why getting vaccinated is important?

 “Most Covid vaccines elicit this response by presenting the immune system with copies of the novel coronavirus’ spike proteins,” explained Al Baaj. 

Two doses of vaccine are critical for maximum benefit – first dose prepares immunological response while second dose strengthens it. “You can think of it as a gradient. One dose of the Pfizer vaccine can reduce the average person’s risk of getting an asymptomatic infection by about 50 per cent, and one dose of the Moderna shot can do so by about 80 per cent. Two doses of either vaccine lower the risk by about 95 per cent,” he added. 

Dr Kumari said: “It doesn’t matter if it’s early by a few days or late by a few days or even a couple of weeks. It’s important to go back and get that second dose because the first dose actually presents this new antigen to the immune system to prime it.” 

Dr Khan added: “Research during the trial phase for each of the two-dose vaccines showed that after a certain time, the rate of immunity to Covid-19 infection plateaus with just one dose but that the second dose helped boost the immunity to higher rates.”