Large part of India developed 'hybrid immunity', positive against Omicron: CSIR scientist

Dr Anurag Agrawal, Director, CSIR Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, on Friday, said that a large portion of India's population has "hybrid immunity" against the coronavirus. He said the "strong" resistance that hybrid immunity comes with is a positive thing amid the Omicron cases reported in India.

"Right now people with best immunity are those with hybrid immunity, which is the largest proportion of the country's population," Dr Agrawal said, adding, "Even one dose of COVID-19 vaccine gives you good immunity if you have previously had an infection." 

He informed that there are three types of immunity. The first one is natural immunity which comes from infection, the second is vaccine immunity and the third is hybrid immunity which is developed if the person is previously infected and then gets vaccinated.

"India has all three types of people. A large number of people have been infected, we know that from the ICMR sero survey. Our big vaccine push was after the second wave, and therefore, these people were infected before they got the vaccine. Hybrid immunity is the strongest of all immunities," he said.

When asked the immunity of the people who got double jabbed before the COVID-19 hit, Dr Agarwal said, their immunity against COVID-19 would have declined and stressed for a booster dose. Furthermore, he stated the worst immunity is in non-vaccinated people.

"They (healthcare workers fully vaccinated before the second wave) might become susceptible again and we must provide an appropriate way of protection like a booster (dose). And that is something for us to consider as we meet other priorities," he said.

India reports 2 Omicron cases

Two cases of Omicron variant of COVID-19 were reported in India on Thursday, the Union Health ministry informed. Both the cases were found in Karnataka. One person who tested positive for this strain is a South Africa returnee and another is a doctor with no travel history. 

On Friday, Union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya informed that RT-PCR tests have been conducted on 16,000 passengers who returned from 'at risk' nations and 18 samples have been forwarded for genome sequencing to detect if they have Omicron strain or not.

(With inputs from ANI)