COMMONWEALTH Healthcare Corp. Chief Executive Officer Esther L. Muna on Friday said that being vaccinated against Covid-19 remains the best tool to bring the pandemic, including the delta variant, under control.
A Covid-19 specimen that the CNMI sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on July 31 was identified as a delta variant.
Using the CDC database, it was shown that the variant identified in the specimen was very closely related to a specimen reported in Kansas.
“It does take time for us to get results back,” Muna said. “But the virological evidence indicates that transmission of the delta variant occurred while the traveler was in the United States. As the delta variant now accounts for an estimated 93% of Covid-19 cases in the United States, it is likely that incoming passengers from the U.S. will continue to identify with this variant,” she added.
But she said this news of a delta variant identified in the CNMI is not intended to scare people, even with the rise in recently reported positive Covid-19 cases.
“The Covid-19 vaccines remain effective and are still the best tool to bring the pandemic under control,” she reiterated. “There is very good evidence that vaccination may make the illness less severe for those who are vaccinated and still get infected. We need to get more people vaccinated.”
She added, “The delta variant is…coming out of people because of the minimal number of people who are vaccinated, so it spreads and then it gets smarter, and then it eventually becomes more transmissible.”
The problem, she added, is that this variant could create another variant that may be even more transmissible than the delta variant.
“That is why it is very important for us to be vaccinated. We continue to encourage individuals to get vaccinated because at the end of the day, when you’re vaccinated and wearing a face mask, you have a better defense tool to fight this variant and other variants that might come up,” Muna said.
The CNMI’s current goal of reaching 80% immunity might even increase to 85% or 90%, she added.
“The more people in the CNMI are vaccinated, [the better protected is] the entire community,” she said.
The bottom line, Muna said, is that the CNMI community needs to protect itself.
“It’s been discussed with other health officials that there is a possibility that there is going to be a variant that is going to be tougher than this one,” Muna said.
As for booster shots, she said, “As a public health official, my role is to get as many people vaccinated first before I even start talking about booster shots. We need to get more people vaccinated before we even discuss that…. It is critical to get more people vaccinated, to get to the herd immunity in this community so that we can get people protected.”
