Top Virologist Shahid Jameel Quits Covid Panel After Criticising Government’s Handling Of Pandemic

Senior virologist Shahid Jameel has resigned as the head of the Indian SARS-COV-2 Genomics Consortia (INSACOG), the scientific advisory group coordinating the country’s genome sequencing work. Jameel had been critical of the government’s efforts to contain the spread of the coronavirus, particularly during the second wave.

While he has confirmed his resignation, the virologist has not given any reason for it.

Recently, he had written an opinion piece on The New York Times in which he insisted that Indian scientists were “facing stubborn resistance to evidence-based policymaking”. “All these measures have wide support among my fellow scientists in India. But they are facing stubborn resistance to evidence-based policymaking,” he wrote.

He had also made suggestions including- increasing testing, improving vaccination pace, boosting vaccine supplies, and needing a larger healthcare workforce.

Last week, he was the guest at an Indian Express Live event where he had said that government authorities had erred in prematurely believing that the pandemic was over in January. Last month, Reuters reported that a forum of scientific advisors had warned government officials in early March of a new and more contagious variant of the coronavirus in the country.

Jameel had also criticized the Supreme Court’s recent decision to appoint a task force to manage oxygen supplies. “This is really unfortunate. We are short on doctors and we have taken some of our best doctors and told them you play oxygen-oxygen. You decide who will get oxygen. It is really a sad day for us. These good doctors know about medicine, but what do they know about oxygen supply chain and logistics,” he had said at the event.

INSACOG was launched in January this year as a scientific body to promote and expedite genome sequencing of the SARS-CoV2 virus and its variants. The consortium had established a network of ten leading laboratories to carry out gene sequencing of virus samples from across the country.