This is an archive article published on July 3, 2021
PCMC sero-survey finds 70% children in 6-18 age group have antibodies against Covid-19
The sero-survey was carried out over a period of 10 days from June 16 to 26, and in 200 clusters including slums, chawls, housing societies and buildings. The sero-survey, the second one by the PCMC, covered 10,082 citizens.
The sero-survey has shown that 81 per cent of the residents of Pimpri-Chinchwad have developed antibodies against SARS-COV-2. (Representational image)
While experts have been predicting a third wave of coronavirus infections which is likely to affect children more, residents of Pimpri-Chinchwad can breathe a tad easy as a serological survey has revealed that children in the age group of 6-18 years have 70 per cent antibodies.
The sero-survey was carried out over a period of 10 days from June 16 to 26, and in 200 clusters including slums, chawls, housing societies and buildings. The sero-survey, the second one by the PCMC, covered 10,082 citizens.
The first survey was carried out last year and covered 5,000 residents.
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On an average, the sero-survey has shown that 81 per cent of residents of Pimpri-Chinchwad have developed antibodies against SARS-COV-2. Members of the 6-18 age group were found to have 70.6 per cent antibodies while those in the 18-44 group had 78.9 per cent antibodies. The level of antibodies in the 45-60 group was 91.1 per cent and for those above 60, the level of antibodies was 90.5 per cent.
“The survey showed that 70 per cent of the children have antibodies against coronavirus. This is a very high figure and we have reason to feel somewhat relieved as it has been predicted by experts that children are likely to be more affected in the third wave,” Dr Laxman Gofane, medical department head of the PCMC, told The Indian Express on Saturday.
These children either had mildly symptomatic Covid-19 or had been asymptomatic earlier, he said. “Usually, antibodies last for 3-4 months. However, in some people, they last for even for seven-eight months” he said.
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Though 70 per cent children have developed antibodies, Dr Gofane said it would be too early to say that they are in the safe zone. “This is because we have no clue as to whether these antibodies are effective against the Delta-plus variant of coronavirus… we will have to wait and watch. It is too early to draw a definite conclusion,” he said.
For the sero-survey, blood samples of 1,464 citizens living in slums were collected. Of these, 82.5 per cent were found to have developed antibodies. The survey found that 84.5 per cent people living in chawls and 80 per cent of those living in residential societies had antibodies.
Dr Gofane said a higher percentage of those living chawls or in ‘gaothan’ areas were found to have antibodies.
“This was a quantitative survey bigger than the first survey. We will also soon release details about the amount of antibodies that were detected among citizens,” he said. “In adults too, we will have to see how effective the antibodies are against the Delta-plus variant,” added Dr Gofane.
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The survey has, however, raised eyebrows as it also included those who have been infected with Covid-19 earlier or have been vaccinated. Responding to his, Dr Gofane said, “It was a random survey. We did not check whether the person was infected earlier or vaccinated.”
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Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.
Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More
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