Dr Faisal Sultan, the Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Health has urged people to get vaccinated without any hesitation.
In his video message, he said that there has been a lot of talk about the new COVID-19 variants and if the vaccine provided in Pakistan is effective against it or not.
“All viruses go through a process of evolution over time,” Dr Sultan explained. “As a result, new variants and types of the virus keep coming up.
Some months back, a new variant in Britain was found which was later called B.1.17 and the strain is presently being reported in most countries across the world.
“Similarly, the strain from South Africa known as B.1.351 was reported and another one was found in Brazil,” he said, adding that multiple new strains will continue to be introduced.
Dr Faisal reassured that COVID-19 vaccines will provide resistance and protection against these viruses and people should remain confident.
“When your turn comes, go get vaccinated so that you can protect yourself from extreme scenarios such as hospitalisation.”
UK, ‘highly contagious’ South African variants detected in Karachi
On Friday, Sindh Health Minister Azra Pacheco said that in addition to the UK variant that has gripped Karachi, the South African variant, also known as B.1.351 that is highly contagious, has been detected in the port city.
According to the minister, the health department inspected 22 coronavirus samples, out of which the UK variant was detected in 18, while the South African variant was found in two cases.
Experts fear that the B.1.351 variant could be resistant to existing vaccines and treatment. According to Al Jazeera, the South African variant, also known as B.1.351, was first discovered late last year. It has since been detected in dozens of countries around the world.
It contains two mutations that have raised concerns that it could be more infectious than previous strains of the virus and could be able to evade some of the antibody response caused by vaccines or previous infections.
