Director of West African Center for Cell Biology of Infectious Pathogens (WACCBIP), Professor Gordon Awandare, has indicated a pending Covid-19 third wave to hit Ghana.

According to him, aside from the Alpha, the Beta and Hecta Covid-19 variants in the country, there are currently about 45 types in the circulation, of which five is of concern.

“Overall, we have about 45 or 46 different variants that are in circulation, but these five are the ones that are of concern,” he said Monday.

Gordon Awandare, who was speaking on Prime Morning on Joy Prime, noted that these new variants in the country may result from incoming travellers.

“All these normally come from travellers, so if you so if you look at the sequences in travellers and then the sequences in the local transmission, it mirrors the distribution of the variants,” he told Daniel Dadzie.

“So if you have more travellers coming in with a particular variant, then it reflects in the local population,” he apprised. 

The WACCBIP Director also noted that with the current occurrence in other countries, it is vital to anticipate the type of variant that may hit the country and revisit and enforce the measures to fight the disease.

“Now that the Delta is taken over the UK and most of East Africa, it’s just a matter of time before it will come here in large quantities.

“We also need to tighten the screening at the Airport and the mandatory quarantine. These are very important to limit the in-flask of the new variants.”

He suggested that the country’s effort in procuring the vaccine is guided by the anticipation of the other variants hitting it even as it is working assiduously to procure some vaccines.

“Our vaccine procurement should be guided by that anticipation, so we shouldn’t be fighting the last war and so all these procurements for vaccines, I think we need to revise them. If we are able to do that, we may be able to avoid the third wave.”

Prof Awandare perceived that the current variant in the UK may soon be replaced by some of the new variants, “especially the Delta from India,” as the variants are aggressive.

He, therefore, noted that the vaccine is the ultimate solution but suggested the country explore means of accessing other vaccines.

“Now we have to be looking at getting the right vaccines, all these while, we’ve been fixed on AstraZeneca and Sputnik V.

“We have to start shifting towards looking for more of Faisal and others which have a better chance of protecting against this variant because the future is these aggressive variants; that’s where we are going.”

He further stated that in anticipation of achieving herd immunity, the country needs to build a local capacity to help store the vaccines.

“Because those MRA vaccines which are more effective against the variant also require certain storage conditions for we need to prepare for.”