An increase in infectious strains of the SARS-CoV-2 virus has dashed hopes for mass immunity, even in countries with high vaccine acceptance (Photo: Marcelo Casal Jr./Agência Brasil)
As vaccination campaigns have progressed in countries, groups of scientists have already begun to speak publicly about the possibility of this COVID-19 It never ends, i.e. becomes endemic, as is the case with the H1N1 virus.
In mid-September, Wellcome Trust Director Jeremy Farrar suggested that Covid-19 was indeed endemic. “[Políticos estão alegando que] You can have zero deaths, no control measures, vaccinate whether you want to vaccinate or not, and it’s all over. I just don’t think it’s realistic,” said German podcaster Pandemic. The Wellcome Trust is a London-based charitable research support organization.
This line of thought was echoed by other scholars. Secondly wired report, who interviewed specialists on the topic, the main problem is that the increase in the most infectious strains of Sars-CoV-2 has dashed hopes for herd immunity, even in countries with significant acceptance of the vaccine.
“I think the opportunity to eradicate the disease globally was missed long ago at the start of the pandemic,” says François Ballou, head of the UCL Genetic Institute. “You can eliminate it locally, but as long as there is a focus somewhere in the world, it will eventually come back. By February 2020, it was clear that eliminating the disease would not be possible.”
Control measures
The exact picture of how countries deal with endemic coronavirus is likely to vary from community to community, depending on vaccination coverage and protection measures. Countries like Denmark, which has vaccinated 84% of its entire population, have removed all restrictions in a similar way to the UK and rely on a high level of testing.
Other countries, such as Singapore, which publicly abandoned its Covid Zero policy and revealed a roadmap for a “new normal” in June, are looking to open their activities while keeping covid-19 under control using existing measures to suppress tuberculosis and influenza.
“It’s difficult now because we now have the delta variant, which is more contagious. But the public health goal is certainly to reduce mortality and ill health as low as possible. Of course, we don’t know what’s coming, and that’s another good reason to try to do more,” he says. Martin Mackey, Professor of European Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Want to check out the exclusive contents of Época Negócios? Get access to the digital version.
