The number of Covid-19 vaccinations worldwide has exceeded the total number of confirmed cases, an important moment highlighting progress in taming the pandemic, despite growing concerns about the threat of new variants.
According to the Financial Times vaccine, the total dose administered climbed to 105 million late Wednesday while the number of confirmed cases was 103.5 million.
While the vaccination rate is accelerating rapidly, the increase is decreasing in cases of Covid-19, although this is due to measures other than vaccines, as it has not yet affected transmission in most places.
The figures are incomplete due to the fragmented nature of the reporting – and the actual number of infections is likely to be many times higher than the total confirmed by diagnostic tests.
But Michael Head, global research fellow for health at the University of Southampton, said: ‘The fact that we have so many vaccines is a very good news story that has been fed to us. This moment brings it together, showing how fast we have moved and how far we have come. ‘
Health experts attribute the slowdown in infections to continued barriers and social distance measures, with a possible contribution of immunity gained from previous infection in some places.
Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, said the new infection rates peaked worldwide in early January and were now back at the level of October last year.
Israel is the only country where vaccines are already reducing transmission, because vaccination has been rolled out wider and faster than anywhere else in the world. “There is evidence from Israel that the vaccine is starting to reduce infection,” said Dr. Head said.
But vaccines will soon make a big difference to the transfer, at least in affluent countries where billions of doses will be available over the next few months after weeks of wrestling – especially in the EU – over stocks.
Data released by the University of Oxford on Monday indicates that the vaccine developed with AstraZeneca will reduce transmission by 67 percent. Experts expect other leading vaccines, such as those manufactured by BioNTech / Pfizer, Moderna, Novavax and Johnson & Johnson, to have similar effects, although hard data is not yet available.
Devi Sridhar, Professor of Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh, said: ‘A year ago I could not have imagined that we would have so many effective vaccines. It is a true proof of human ingenuity. ”
Sean Marett, chief operating officer of BioNTech, the pioneering Covid-19 vaccine manufacturer, said: “There will be enough doses in the second half of this year to vaccinate everyone in the industrialized world who wants to be vaccinated.”
One threat to progress, however, is the emergence of new variants of the virus that occur more frequently as cases increase. Some are more contagious – and less susceptible to neutralization by the immune systems of people who have been vaccinated or infected against older forms of viruses.
Vaccine manufacturers believe that their existing products are still working against all the mutations detected so far, although they are less effective against some new products such as the South African strain. They also insist that vaccines can be rapidly adapted if necessary to respond to further mutations, which will offer the costly prospect of needing annual or biennial jabs in the future.
It is unclear how long it will take to vaccinate the entire world. Confirmed purchases of Covid-19 vaccines amount to 7.2 billion doses and 5.3 billion of them have been purchased by high-income, higher-middle-income countries, according to the Global Health Innovation Center of Duke University. Most of these vaccines require two samples.
The Wellcome Trust estimates that anyone who needs a vaccine will only be able to receive one in 2023 or 2024. Others think it may be sooner if affluent countries and organizations donate excess doses to poorer countries.
Another possible problem is the reluctance of vaccines, and especially whether enough young adults, who know that their risks of requiring intensive care or are very low due to Covid-19, will agree to be vaccinated.
Prof Sridhar said that one way to persuade young people to be vaccinated – and to bring about herd immunity in the community – is to indicate the significant risk of developing debilitating “long covid” symptoms in patients who are not serious did not become ill.
“Two million people worldwide have died in this pandemic,” she said. “I am optimistic that we can reach the end of this without another two million deaths.”