ABSTRACT
Introduction: the virus is changing the world and human lives;medical education is not an exception for this. Anatomy as a medical subject is the substratum in the medical education, which helps the clinicians to prosper their clinical knowledge. The dissection of cadavers during anatomy teaching is a signature learning experience in medical education system. Whole medical education system including anatomical education been impacted by the Covid-19 because of unexpected sudden nation-wide lockdown. The digital switchover in teaching is the only option at present not only for Indian anatomists but throughout the world and was achieved with least delays. This transformation is not easy for students as well as for faculty. Each faculty was trying to deliver the subject knowledge to the pupils however learning anatomy on virtual platform is not an easy task. It has its own ineluctable glitches. In the present questionnaire based cross-sectional study, 93 out of 100 first year students of MBBS 2020-2021 batch (Institute of medical sciences, Banaras Hindu University) had participated. They reported, that their study been affected for 20 days on average. Out of 93 students, 34 students (37%) were not comfortable with online mode of teaching either due to poor internet connectivity or due to lack of good devices and due to unavailability of books and notes at home during lockdown. According to students, online learning mode of Anatomy is much difficult as compared to physical offline mode learning. Not only in anatomy, 69% students were also facing similar problem in learning the subject in biochemistry and physiology. 70% students reported uncertainty of concepts in online teaching, and fear of failure in exam because of not able to understand the certain topics in online teaching mode. © 2022 Thieme Medical Publishers, Inc.. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
Introduction: India recently faced a devastating second outbreak of COVID-19 infection, in which a majority of the viral sequences were found to be of the B.1.617.2 lineage. While India and the world focused on vaccination, reports of vaccine evasion by the virus, termed 'breakthrough cases', emerged worldwide. Materials and Methods: We analysed whole genome sequences of 150 SARS-CoV-2 viral samples isolated at our laboratory. We retrospectively found 9 cases of breakthrough infection, five of whom were fully, and four partially vaccinated. We followed-up these patients and can report that the variant lineages associated with these cases were B.1.617, B.1, and A. The mutations seen in these sequences in the Spike and ORF regions would have produced amino acid changes known to improve viral replication, confer drug resistance, influence host-cell interaction, and lead to antigenic drift. Increased virulence culminating in vaccine evasion may be inferred from these mutations. India, recently faced a devastating second outbreak of COVID-19 infection, in which a majority of the viral sequences were found to be of the B.1.617.2 lineage. While India and the world focused on vaccination, reports of vaccine evasion by the virus, termed 'breakthrough cases', emerged worldwide. We isolated mRNA from SARS-CoV-2 samples and outsourced them for whole genome sequencing. Results: We noticed that nine individuals had been fully (two doses of vaccine) or partially (one dose) vaccinated at least 14 days before infection. When we examined the sequences from these individuals, we found amino acid changes in the spike and NSP proteins, which were predicted to confer increased virulence upon the virus. We report the presence of three strains in the breakthrough cases;A, B.1, and B.1.617 (Nextstrain Clade G). We found one mutation, NSP6 T77A, that was present in both A and B.1 strains in the breakthrough cases, but not in other A and B.1 strains isolated, from patients of the same city. Additionally, we found multiple changes in the non-structural NSP proteins, which enable faster viral replication. Conclusion: It is clear from our case series that the strains A, B.1, and B.1.617 can attain increased virulence culminating in vaccine evasion.