new delhi unless india sees four weeks of low and stable numbers of covid19 cases with only minor fluctuations the disease cannot be considered to be entering the endemic stage noted virologist dr t jacob john saidhe also said the endemic phase of covid19 is expected to last many months and it is most unlikely that another variant with higher transmissibility than omicron and greater virulence than delta will emergethe third wave of covid19 in india has been plateauing the number of cases started declining after january 21 when 347254 infections were reportedas of tuesday indias daily covid19 cases have remained below one lakh for nine consecutive daysjohn said the term endemic is meant to qualify a patternwhen case numbers in a community are plotted on graphs the pattern of rise peak and fall represent epidemic or outbreak and case numbers as a horizontal steady state are called endemic when an epidemic pattern repeats we call each a waveso unless we see four weeks of low and stable numbers with only minor fluctuations we cannot call the valley as endemic just as yet john told ptiomicron wave is receding so fast that in a few more days we may reach the valley but we will wait for four weeks to be sure of endemic prevalence he saidasked what can be expected in the coming months the former director of the indian council for medical researchs centre of advanced research in virology said it cannot be predicted but only speculatedmy intelligent guess we will slip into an endemic phase for many months without any more waves with alpha beta gamma delta or omicron it will be most unlikely that yet another variant that will spread faster than omicron and more efficient in immune evasion that delta or omicron will emerge john saidhowever just as omicron surprised us another weird variant could surprise us yet again he warnedhe also said that during the endemic phase some will be infected sick hospitalised and even diejohn cautioned that without high vaccination coverage small waves may recur perhaps once a year or once in a few years modulated by vaccination coverage in all age groupswe have vaccines for all current vaccines two doses plus a booster are the minimum schedule additional boosters will be decided on future information he addeddr chandrakant lahariya a physicianepidemiologist and executive director of the delhibased foundation for peoplecentric health systems said it is of limited relevance from the perspective of the general public whether covid19 has become endemic in india or notthis is a discourse which will continue for a while from the perspective of interventional epidemiology which focuses on operational solutions india soon in a few weeks would be at a stage where everything should be fully openthat point onwards people would have to adapt to the new way of living with the virus depending upon their level of risk but because of covid19 nothing should be stopped lahariya told ptito facilitate a smooth transition he said there