The findings, published in the Medical Journal of Australia (MJA), were made from a new model developed by James Cook University (JCU), reports Xinhua news agency
People queue outside a vaccination centre in Melbourne as the city experiences its sixth lockdown while battling an outbreak of the Delta variant of the Coronavirus. Pic/AFP
A new Covid-19 pandemic tracking model revealed on Monday that Australia’s current vaccination strategy should now prioritise administering the Pfizer jab to people aged between 12 and 40 years old to achieve herd immunity.
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New model
The findings, published in the Medical Journal of Australia (MJA), were made from a new model developed by James Cook University (JCU), reports Xinhua news agency.
The model incorporated age-specific mixing, infectiousness, susceptibility, and severity to assess the impact of the epidemic under different public health intervention scenarios, and it also examined different vaccination programmes, such as AstraZeneca only, Pfizer only, and the mixed programme of vaccinating.
Epidemiologist Professor Emma McBryde from JCU’s Australian Institute of Tropical Health and Medicine said the modelling showed Australia’s current strategy of vaccinating the vulnerable older age groups first is the optimal strategy for reducing hospitalisations, deaths, and years of life lost, but it may be “unlikely to achieve herd immunity” due to the uncertain effective reproduction number of the Delta strain.
“The current plan to vaccinate 80 per cent of the adult population, or about 65 per cent of the total population, falls far short of herd immunity,” said McBryde.
Lockdown to be lifted in most of NZ
Most of New Zealand will move out of lockdown on Tuesday except for the largest city of Auckland, which will remain in the strictest type of lockdown until at least next week, the government announced on Monday. The nation has been battling an outbreak of the Delta variant of the Coronavirus since last month. All recent cases have been found in Auckland, including 20 that were found on Monday.
1,90,832
No. of new cases reported globally in the past 24 hours
22,09,33,684
Total no. of cases worldwide
45,71,383
Total no. of deaths worldwide
Source: WHO/Johns Hopkins
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