There are twenty patients that lie in the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital (KHMH)’s COVID wards, and of that number none of them has received the COVID vaccine, KHMH Chairman Dr. Andre Sosa told this newspaper this week.
Expecting a surge in the number of COVID cases over the next couple of weeks, Sosa implored residents to take the vaccination before the number of new infections puts undue strain on the hospital’s already limited resources.
“There are sufficient vaccines for everyone and I would beg people to please go out and get vaccinated. We’re asking people now to get their second jab at eight weeks; don’t wait for the twelfth week because with one jab you’re not very well protected against the Delta variant.”
Sosa explained that even people who have only gotten one shot of the vaccination so far can experience some of the more severe symptoms if they happen to contract the deadlier and more easily transmissible Delta variant.
Dr. Mark Musa has taken to the Facebook platform to also educate people that COVID is a pandemic of the unvaccinated.
“The vaccine is not a cure nor does it completely eliminate getting infected with the Covid virus. But what is indisputable is its effectiveness at preventing severe disease, hospitalization and death,” Musa wrote, referring to recent surges in Delta variant cases in India where the majority of its people are unvaccinated and the US, where COVID deaths have also been among the unvaccinated.
“The devastation in India is sad, and disturbing with hundreds of thousands of persons dying in the last four months. In the USA, 99.2% of the COVID-related deaths from the Delta variant have been in unvaccinated persons. Death from COVID is now largely a vaccine-preventable fatality,” Musa summed up, agreeing that there are risks and side effects, but risks that have impacted only a tiny fraction of people who have taken the vaccines worldwide.
Data suggests that Pfizer’s and AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccines were 30% effective against COVID-19 with symptoms caused by the Delta variant three weeks after the first dose. However, a person’s immunity is boosted to over 60% two weeks after the second dose.