COVID-19 third wave peak likely between October-November, says scientist - Read details

IIT-Kanpur scientist Manindra Agrawal has claimed that COVID-19 third wave is expected to peak between October and November but the intensity of the third wave would be lower than the second wave.

It is to be noted that Agrawal is a member of the three-member team of experts that have been tasked to predict any surge in coronavirus infections. According to Agrawal.

It is expected that the country may see only 1 lakh daily cases during the peak of third wave. It may be recalled that over 4 lakh cases were recorded daily when the deadly second wave was at its peak in May. The second wave killed thousands across India.

"Status Quo is when no new mutant comes and New Variant is when 50% more infectious mutant comes by September. As one can see, the only scenario with some semblance of the third wave is New Variant one for epsilon = 1/33. In this scenario, new cases rise to ~1 lakh per day," Agrawal tweeted.

Recently, the National Institute of Disaster Management (NIDM) has said in its latest report that pace of COVID-19 vaccination is very slow in India and had warned that daily new case numbers could cross 6 lakh per day during third wave if pace is not accelerated.

It is to be noted that NIDM functions under the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA). “The emergence of a third wave could be significantly challenged by expanding vaccination but only around 7.6 per cent (10.4 crore) are fully vaccinated… According to a recent study done by professors and alumni from Pandit Deendayal Energy University (PDEU) in collaboration with Nirma University, the vaccination rate of India is currently 3.2 per cent which if does not improve, India can witness 6 lakh cases per day in the next (third) wave,” the NIDM report stated.

“But if the government’s proposal to increase this rate by five times (1 crore doses per day) comes to fruition, India will see only 25 per cent of the cases (seen in the second wave) during the third wave peak," it added.