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Last week, the Ministry of Health reduced the quarantine period from 14 to 7 days and lifted the negative test requirement, which means all Covid patients can leave quarantine after a week without being tested.
Also, PCR tests will be performed on only those with symptoms.
These measures are aimed at "herd immunity," according to Prof. Şebnem Korur-Fincancı, the chair of the Turkish Medical Association (TTB).
"These deaths and diseases are preventable as long as you take the right measures. They insist on not taking the measures. They are trying to leave people to herd immunity," she told the ANKA news agency.
The new might have intended to reduce the high workload of PCR labs, Korur-Fincancı suggested.
"It is also known of late that PCR positivity may also show some virus-related residues, thus revealing a non-infectious positivity.
"However, we can take precautions ... with rapid screening tests, ensuring that people who will be in crowded environments are checked with rapid tests, and those in schools are checked with rapid tests."
While the hospitalization and death rates of the Omicron variant are lower, with the increasing number of cases, the workload of the hospitals will increase with the rising number of cases, she noted.
Judging by test positivity rates, it can be assumed that the number of daily cases may be around 200,000, well above the official figures, Korur-Fincancı said. "This is very risky because even one percent of these people die, we will see days when 2,000 people die every day."
Turkovac
Korur-Fincancı also reiterated the TTB's concerns over the efficacy of Turkovac, Turkey's domestic coronavirus vaccine, saying that there is no sufficient data to evaluate the vaccine.
"You have to choose the most effective, the safest of all that is currently in use. We know that even mRNA vaccines are less effective on Omicron.
"There is a new study about Coronavac in the US. It shows that it is not effective at all. They say 'Turkovac is not worse than it.' But [coronavac] is not sufficiently effective, anyway." (AS/VK)
