Romania might get closer to herd immunity against COVID-19 in August

Chairman of Romania's National COVID-19 Vaccination Coordination Committee (CNCAV) Valeriu Gheorghita says that according to healthcare officials' estimates, Romania this August will get closer to a 50-percent threshold of heard immunity against COVID-19 that includes vaccinated persons and COVID-19 survivors, agerpres reports.

"As far as the vaccination targets and goals are concerned, they are obviously based in particular on reaching the threshold of herd immunity, group immunity that will bring benefits in terms of epidemiological control. That is why we want the vaccination to speed up. Our models are based, on the one hand, on the intention to get vaccinated, on the other hand, on the vaccination rate, always evaluated for the last two weeks, and I mean here the first dose of the vaccine, because that is the most relevant. They are also based on data related to the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases of and the percentage of overlap of confirmed persons with persons who have been vaccinated. Together they create that concept of herd immunity that can vary from 25-30-40 to 50%," Gheorghita told a news briefing on Tuesday when asked what the vaccination targets are set to allow for more easing of the COVID-19 restrictions, and and if they are taken into account locally depending on the degree of vaccination.

He added that, according to specialists' estimates, this August Romania will get to a threshold of herd immunity.

"Our estimates are that somewhere this August, on August 1, we will reach the threshold of herd immunity, meaning about 50% of both vaccinated persons and COVID-19 survivors," said Gheorghita.

He added that the vaccination targets are 5 million people immunised by late May, 6 million in July and 7 million in August.

He said the current epidemiological development nationwide is good, but there is a need to consolidate the favorable trend.

"Taking into account the estimate, the epidemiological developments in the number of cases, fortunately the epidemiological situation nationwide is a good one, but we need to consolidate this favourable trend and fulfil the long-term prediction that by vaccination the number of people susceptible to infection decreases and we should no longer have the risk of epidemiological relapse after we gradually and progressively ease up on all these restrictions," said Gheorghita.