Will the Omicron variant really spell the end of the covid pandemic? “Plausible” according to WHO Europe DG – at least until last Sunday – which refers to the entry into “a new phase”. Caution, however, because it is a “mistake to assume” an immediate and ‘downhill’ epilogue for the director general of the World Health Organization who today issued a new warning. Alongside the articulated opinions of the WHO, the opinions of experts on the subject, however, agree on the fact that the new mutation “could” lead to the end of the pandemic by “very close to what are the characteristics of a virus circulating in an endemic phase”. But for now, they clarify, the data are still insufficient to be able to reach a definitive sentence.
THE WHO MONITOR
“Learning to live with Covid 19 cannot mean that we give this virus the freedom to circulate. It cannot mean that we accept nearly 50,000 deaths a week. It cannot mean that we accept an unacceptable burden on our health systems”, and on ” exhausted operators “who every day” return to the forefront “. There are “different scenarios as to how the pandemic could go and how the acute phase could end, but it is dangerous to assume that Omicron will be the last variant or that we are at the end of the game. On the contrary, globally the conditions are ideal for the ’emergence of more variants “. This was the warning launched yesterday by the director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in his speech at the 150th session of the WHO Executive Board.
“To change the course of the pandemic, we need to change the conditions that are driving it. We recognize that everyone is tired of this pandemic – he noted – that people are tired of restrictions on movement, travel and other freedoms; that economies and Businesses are suffering, that many governments are walking a tightrope, trying to balance what is effective “against the virus” with what is acceptable “to society. “Each country is in a unique situation and must map out a way out of the acute phase of the pandemic with a careful and gradual approach”, he urged while acknowledging that “there are no easy answers”. But if countries use the strategies and tools available today “in a complete way – he assured – we can put an end to the acute phase of the pandemic this year: we can put an end to Covid as a global health emergency and we can do it” in 2022.
The fact remains, explained Tedros, that Omicron still poses an important challenge: “This Sunday – he recalled – marks 2 years since I declared Covid an international public health emergency, the highest level of alarm, and at there were fewer than 100 cases and no deaths reported outside of China. Two years later, nearly 350 million cases and over 5.5 million deaths were reported, and we know these numbers are underestimated. On average, the Last week, 100 cases were reported every 3 seconds and someone lost their lives to Covid every 12 seconds. Since Omicron was first identified just 9 weeks ago, more than 80 million cases have been reported to the WHO, more than those reported in the whole of 2020. So far the explosion of cases has not been accompanied by an increase in deaths “. In light of this scenario, “the questions that many are asking are: Where are we at? And when will it end?”.
Vaccination fairness will be crucial, the WHO DG reiterated. “Vaccines alone are not the golden ticket to get out of the pandemic – he repeated – But there is no way out if we do not reach our shared goal of vaccinating 70% of the population of each country by half of We have a long way to go. At present, 86 Member States in all WHO regions have not been able to meet last year’s target of vaccinating 40% of their populations and 34 Member States, the Most of them in Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean region have not been able to vaccinate even 10% of their population. 85% of the African population has yet to receive a single dose of the vaccine. We simply cannot end the phase. pandemic emergency unless we close this gap. “
“A NEW PHASE”
The Covid-19 pandemic “is far from over” but “two years later we could enter a new phase with a plausible hope of stabilization, but it is too early to let our guard down”. This is the clarification of the WHO Europe director yesterday, Hans Henri Kluge, in a note after Sunday, in an interview, he had considered “plausible” that with the Omicron variant Europe “is heading towards the end of the pandemic”.
Kluge explains: “I hope we can put an end to the emergency phase in 2022 and face other health threats that urgently require our attention. Arrears and waiting lists have increased – he says, referring precisely to welfare benefits for diseases other than Covid – essential health services have been disrupted and plans and preparations for climate-related health stresses and shocks have been suspended across the region. “
“This pandemic, like all others, will end, but it is too early to relax. It is almost a given that new variants will emerge and return, with the millions of infections occurring around the world that will occur in the coming weeks and with the decline of the immunity and winter seasonality. But with strong surveillance and monitoring of these new variants; a high prevalence of vaccination and third doses and fair and affordable access to antivirals; and again with targeted testing, the protection of high risk with high-quality masks and physical distancing if and when a new variant appears, I believe a new wave may no longer require a return to total lockdowns for the entire pandemic-era population, or similar measures. “
THE OPINION OF THE EXPERTS
“The WHO speaks with too many voices and discordant. Last week it announced the arrival of lethal variants and today it is talking about the end of the pandemic with Omicron. I think it has lost some credibility and trust in the eyes of the citizens. This pandemic it hurt him a lot. ” So at Adnkronos Salute Matteo Bassetti, director of the Infectious Diseases Clinic at the San Martino hospital in Genoa, commenting on what was said Sunday by the WHO Director General for Europe. “In any case, what the WHO Europe said is something all the researchers say”, adds the infectious disease specialist.
“The numbers are evident: there is stability between the people hospitalized yesterday in intensive care and those 10 days ago. We are in a phase in which there has not been an increase in access to resuscitation and today this must be, together to the data of the medical areas, the most important indicator. We have reached the peak and this week we hope to go down with hospitalizations as well, but it takes some time to discharge a person as it will take time to see a decline in deaths ” Bassetti says. The Genoese infectious disease specialist then adds that “the scientific community agrees that we are moving towards the end of the pandemic and for this reason I believe that the strategy must be changed, we cannot use the same rules and procedures as a year ago”.
“Making predictions with such a variable virus is always very complicated. I believe that the WHO is just a wish but, today, there are not enough elements to say that with Omicron the end of the pandemic has arrived. We could have all this security in between a little, “he says Massimo Andreoni, head of infectious disease at the Tor Vergata Polyclinic in Rome and scientific director of the Italian Society of Infectious and Tropical Diseases (Simit).
“Certainly the Omicron variant is bringing us very close to the characteristics of a virus circulating in an endemic phase – observes Andreoni – and also the immunity that is being achieved with vaccines and those recovered is indicative of an endemic”. According to the infectious disease specialist “this element does not bring us many guarantees on the fact that another variant with characteristics that make vaccines less effective will not appear,” he warns.
“The booster dose must also be done by the youngest who have taken the two doses and not only by the elderly and the frail – underlines Andreoni – The data on the recall testify to the effectiveness of the booster against Omicron because it avoids hospitalizations and serious illnesses. but it is very contagious. I can see it from what happens in the hospital, Omicron is less pathogenic than Delta but if you haven’t done the booster it can get inside and in many subjects, perhaps with previous pathologies, it can create problems “.
“The Omicron variant, as the WHO said, could take us out of the Covid pandemic”. He is convinced of it Massimo Ciccozzi, head of the Medical Statistics and Epidemiology Unit of the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery of the Campus Bio-Medico of Rome. “It is out of the question – says the expert at Adnkronos Salute – that this variant is the one that gives us a bit of a turning point, because it is very contagious and very little lethal. It is a variant that finally” behaves as viruses do. , “that is, it infects and multiplies as much as possible, so it does its job at an evolutionary level. Therefore it will tend to become endemic, it will stay with us and this may mean that the frail may get a vaccine every year as for the flu.” All this except for nasty surprises, warns the epidemiologist. “The virus will endemic because it will become a virosis, that is a passage of a human-human virus. But there is the unknown factor of the human-animal-human passage – warns Ciccozzi – Let’s think of the hamsters that are infected, the raccoons, and let’s not forget the minks or the feline cases. It’s always a zoonosis. If this happens, and it is possible, it would be a problem – he warns – because in that case the virus would adapt to that animal and then come back to us because we he has already been there and therefore knows how to do it. For this reason the animal passage of Covid must also be monitored and studied “.
“This pandemic – recalls the specialist – has taught us that we must monitor both the animal and the human part both with classical epidemiology and with molecular epidemiology, therefore genomic tracing. This is true for humans and for humans. animals. Always in order not to run after the virus, but to try to anticipate it, which we have not been able to do in this pandemic “.
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