A year after COVID-19 vaccines came to U.S., they're still our best hope to end pandemic | Opinion
Have you ever wondered what you can do to save one life?
The answer is simple. Help get 300 to 500 people vaccinated.
How did I come to this conclusion? As an infectious disease doctor I am still seeing people die from Covid in the hospital. As an epidemiologist I can see upstream as to where and why they are coming and how we can prevent it.
So here is a back of an envelope calculation. In Tennessee, so far, we have had 2 million reported cases and over 20,000 deaths. So, for every 100 reported cases, one COVID-19 death occurs.
However, we know that all infections that occur are not reported. In fact, for every reported case there are 3 or 5 or higher number of infections. So, likely we have 300 infections or more in the community, leading to 100 reported cases which leads to 6 people being hospitalized and 1 person dying from COVID-19.
In May 2021, nearly all, 98% to 99% of the covid deaths, were among the unvaccinated. Recent data shows those who are unvaccinated are 20 times more likely to die from COVID-19 as compared to the vaccinated. In essence, we are experiencing an Omicron hospitalization and death epidemic of the unvaccinated.
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A preventable tragedy
I am seeing this on the ground as an infectious disease doctor. I saw a 40 year old man, unvaccinated, infected with COVID-19 with no underlying health problems in the ICU struggling to breath. “I did my research on the vaccine, I was just looking at the wrong websites. I wish I had gotten vaccinated.” He said. He was lucky and lived to go home.
Another 44 year old, unvaccinated, Covid positive patient is on the ventilator for over a month and another passed away leaving behind three young children and his wife. There are many more like them. Each day in US nearly 1,600 unvaccinated people are dying from Covid.
So, if we want to save a life, we need to go upstream from the ICU beds, upstream from the hospitalizations, upstream from those who get COVID-19 infection to reach those in the community who are not vaccinated. We need to find them and help them understand the dire consequences of a poorly informed decision of not getting vaccinated.
They are our friends, family, neighbors, work colleagues, church members and fellow human beings. Being unvaccinated with the highly transmissible Omicron variant is a grave danger in the present circumstances.
Yet, if you convince 300 people to get vaccinated you are not just saving one life but averting 6 hospital admissions due to COVID-19. These admission take up hospital beds and health personnel resources leaving others without a hospital room for admission. A teenager with concussion may not get an ICU bed, a middle aged woman with abdominal pain and an inflammation in the appendix does not have a ready room to go to.
An elderly man with a heart attack and heart catheterization showing multiple blockages does not have an ICU bed post-op so surgery is delayed. Or a patient with uncontrolled diabetes has a foot ulcer which he neglects due to a busy emergency room and now the leg has turned gangrene and requires amputation.
The pandemic and the rapid spread of Omicron may not be preventable in the number of cases but our response with vaccination can prevent severe illness and death. One in every 388 people in America has died of COVID-19. Now, we need to reach out to others. So go and convince 300 unvaccinated people to get vaccinated and save one life.
They don’t know it now, but they will thank you later.
Dr. Manoj Jain, an infectious disease physician in Memphis, is also a member of the City of Memphis-Shelby County Joint COVID Task Force.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: COVID-19 vaccine remains the best tool to save lives | Dr. Manoj Jain
