Unvaccinated most at Delta risk

ISLAMABAD: People who have not been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 are most at risk, reports foreign media.

Inci Yildirim, MD, PhD, a Yale Medicine pediatric infectious diseases specialist and a vaccinologist, isn’t surprised by what’s happening. “All viruses evolve over time and undergo changes as they spread and replicate,” she says.

But one thing that is unique about Delta is how quickly it is spreading, says F. Perry Wilson, MD, a Yale Medicine epidemiologist. Around the world, he says, “Delta will certainly accelerate the pandemic.”

From what we know so far, people who are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus appear to have protection against Delta, but anyone who is unvaccinated and not practicing preventive strategies is at risk for infection by the new variant, the doctors say.

Delta is the name for the B.1.617.2. variant, a SARS-CoV-2 mutation that originally surfaced in India.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has called this version of the virus “the fastest and fittest.”

“It’s actually quite dramatic how the growth rate will change,” says Dr. Wilson. Delta is spreading 50% faster than Alpha, which was 50% more contagious than the original strain of SARS-CoV-2, he says.

Kids and young people are a concern as well. “A recent study from the UK showed that children and adults under 50 were 2.5 times more likely to become infected with Delta,” says Dr. Yildirim. And so far, no vaccine has been approved for children 5 to 12 in the U.S., although the U.S. and a number of other countries have either authorized vaccines for adolescents and young children or are considering them.

If Delta continues to move fast enough to accelerate the pandemic, Dr. Wilson says the biggest questions will be about transmissibility—how many people will get the Delta variant and how fast will it spread?

One important question is whether the Delta strain will make you sicker than the original virus.