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“I had no hesitation or fear in taking the vaccine”
| Health Minister’s condition improving The condition of Health Minister Pavithra Wanniarachchi who is under treatment for COVID-19 is improving, said Consultant Physician Dr. Ananda Wijewickrama. When asked, he told the Sunday Times that Minister Wanniarachchi is being managed in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the National Institute of Infectious Disease (NIID), Angoda. |
Dr. Ananda Wijewickrama. Pic by M.D. Nissanka
Senior Consultant Physician Dr. Ananda Wijewickrama, the first to be vaccinated in Sri Lanka says he decided to set an example mainly to squash rumours and myths that are circulating regarding the vaccine
“It is important to take the vaccine against COVID-19. I had no hesitation in doing so, as the first to be vaccinated in Sri Lanka symbolically on January 29, because I knew it was a safe and quality vaccine.”
This was the succinct and clear message from Senior Consultant Physician Dr. Ananda Wijewickrama attached to the National Institute of Infectious Disease (NIID), better known as the Infectious Diseases Hospital (IDH), where from Day 1 of COVID-19 infections, numerous patients have been treated.
Currently, the NIID is treating 170 COVID-19 patients with eight in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).
In a wide-ranging interview with the Sunday Times at the NIID in Angoda on Friday afternoon, he said that somebody had to take it first and when he heard that there had been a lot of rumours and myths going around, he decided to set an example.
Dr. Wijewickrama reiterated: “I had no hesitation or fear in taking the vaccine because it was evaluated by an Expert Panel appointed by the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) which authorised the use of COVISHIELD, the AstraZeneca vaccine being produced at the Serum Institute in India.
“I was one of the members of the expert panel. I knew that I was getting a quality and safe vaccine. During the evaluation process, we went through all the studies (various phases) done using the vaccine. The Serum Institute has been supplying many other vaccines to Sri Lanka for many years. It is an established manufacturing site, approved by the World Health Organisation (WHO).”
Since then, the vaccine has been given to a lot of people. Of course, as with any other vaccine, there are ‘expected’ side-effects, he said, explaining that usually the commonest group to get other vaccines are children who get fever and may become a little restless thereafter, which is common. It is nothing new.
“So, a similar thing happened with this vaccination. Some people got fever, some had body aches, lasting only about 24 to 48 hours relieved by paracetamol,” said Dr. Wijewickrama.
He did not have fever, “just a few aches and pains” but they were “not too bad”. He worked that Friday afternoon and also on Saturday.
Referring to “concerns” with regard to any vaccine which would be a severe allergic reaction leading to anaphylaxis, he stressed that small allergic reactions of lesser severity can occur in people who have allergies. There have been a few reports of itchiness of the injection-site, but no severe allergic reactions, which is “very reassuring”.
“As this is a new vaccine, to be on the safe side, we are giving it in hospitals. So even if somebody gets a severe reaction, which is an unlikely event, we can handle it,” said this Physician.
 GMOA on contributory causes for rise in COVID cases Looking closely at why the number of COVID-19 infected cases is on the rise, the Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA) picked up some contributory causes. Dr. Haritha Aluthge told the Sunday Times that the need is to look into the following: Prevention of delays – there is a delay in identifying a positive person through RT-PCR testing because there is a restriction in the testing; then there is a delay in receiving the test results which sometimes takes about 2-3 days (eg. 8 days to get the results of MPs) but ideally should be 24-48 hours maximum, which hinders decision-making; followed by isolation delays where positive people have to wait 2-3 days for ambulances to take them to hospitals or intermediate care centres; and also delays in contact tracing. Risk communication – it is very important to let people know in what area the COVID-19 risk is high. For this, there should be real-time GPS mapping done as red zones or green zones, so that people know where to avoid. Need to revisit the responsibility of each and every one – the people need to be shown the importance of adhering to the preventive measures of: hand-hygiene; wearing a face-mask; maintaining social distancing of 1 metre in public places and avoiding crowded places, close-contact settings and confined and enclosed spaces; following respiratory etiquette – coughing/sneezing into the elbow; and staying home when ill and contacting a doctor if having a fever, cough and/or sore throat. Need to speed up the immunisation process – with frontline healthcare workers and security forces personnel being vaccinated currently, there is a need to get quality vaccines for the population expeditiously. Meanwhile, Dr. Aluthge stressed that just one super-spreader event such as a wedding, pinkama, dane, party, etc could infect a large number of people. | |
| Good news on vaccine, but preventive health measures a mustThere is new evidence from the United Kingdom on the AstraZeneca vaccine that the first dose would provide protection for about three months (12 weeks), pointed out Dr. Ananda Wijewickrama, explaining that “we are considering the possibility of giving the second dose after 12 weeks which is said to be better rather than 4 weeks”. He said that the Health Ministry held a discussion chaired by the Director-General of Health Services, Dr. Asela Gunawardena, on this matter on Friday morning. The DG would be convening a meeting next week to discuss this further. The new evidence is in addition to other good things about this vaccine which are the prevention of severe disease and the reduction in transmission, an important factor, from those who have been vaccinated, he added. However, he urged that as we do not know how long its efficacy would last, we have to keep adhering to the preventive health measures. Looking at the present situation, Dr. Wijewickrama said that we should try to keep the numbers at this level or bring them down, as otherwise we could end up like the United Kingdom or the United States of America with serious consequences. He warned against gatherings as they were the cause of rapid spreads of the disease. If it happens, it may be too late to draw the country back. Rumours & myths on chips etc. Dealing extensively with rumours and myths being propagated by anti-vaccine lobbies not only in Sri Lanka but across the world, Dr. Wijewickrama said this has been the case with all vaccines. “Somebody asked me whether there’s a chip inside this vaccine that can collect data about us. This is a silly rumour. There is another that the vaccine makes females sub-fertile,” he said, dispelling such notions. PHIs warn against unrestricted travel, lifting of lockdown areas The rising number of COVID-19 positive cases is being attributed by the Public Health Inspectors’ (PHIs’) Union to the Christmas and New Year holidays as well as long weekends. Disturbed that their suggestion to restrict people from leaving the high-risk Western Province was not heeded, the union’s Secretary M. Balasooriya said that nowhere has travel restrictions been imposed and most of the lockdowns have been lifted. Mr. Balasooriya added that the testing of people at the borders of the Western Province is not successful as it is random and many people are still leaving the area. When there are signs that the situation is coming under control, the testing is halted but started again when numbers increase. This is while accurate ground level information is not being communicated to high-level officials.
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