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The coordinator of the vaccination campaign, Valeriu Gheorghita, stated that the Delta strain will become dominant globally and not only in some countries and has a transmission rate at least 60 pct higher than the classic variant.
"I bring to mind the fact that the Delta strain has full capacity of becoming the dominant strain in what regards the number of cases of COVID-19, through the fact that it has this increased transmission capacity, by at least 60 pct [greater], it has an increased capacity to tie to the specific receptors of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and, also, can associate to some measure with the reduction of vaccine efficiency if the vaccination scheme is not complete. Thus, it's very important to have a complete vaccination scheme, in order to benefit from maximum protection against this viral variant," stated Gheorghita, on Thursday, in a press conference.
He mentioned that the WHO and the European Center for Disease Control estimate that the Delta variant will become dominant at the global level and not only in some countries and until the end of August, according to forecast data, there will be a prevalence of this strain in over 90 pct of COVID-19 cases.
"That is why I remind the population the importance of vaccination as a prevention measure. Even if today the epidemiological situation is a very good one, it's important to continue to vaccinate, in order to ensure that level of sufficiently high collective immunity so that we may prevent an accelerated spread of this infection among the population, because the data from the United Kingdom shows an increased spread among unvaccinated persons and among persons not vaccinated with the complete scheme," said Gheorghita.
He recalled that the first patient deceased from the Indian strain of COVID-19, in Romania, is a person aged 72 from Arges County, unvaccinated and with comorbidities.
"From the information obtained from INSP [the National Institute of Public Health] Arges, there is another person who, at this time, is confirmed with the Delta strain, admitted to the ICU, non-COVID ward, given that it is at a considerable time since the onset of the disease and is no longer considered contagious at this point," Gheorghita also said.
