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5 reasons why the coronavirus nightmare may soon be over
By Matt Ridley.
"Like the ancient mariner, the virus refuses to leave us alone. Resurging in Blackburn,
Spain, and America, it is still going to be around here when the winter
comes. As we head indoors, it will be back for a dreaded second wave,
disguised among a host of colds and flus. Yet I am now optimistic that
the nightmare will end this year or at least by the spring. Here are
five reasons.
First, vaccine trials were promising. Having proved safe and capable
of raising both a T-cell response and an antibody response, Oxford
University’s vaccine, developed in collaboration with Astrazeneca, is
now more likely to succeed than to fail, so long as its side effects are
manageable in the elderly. And behind it comes a stream of other
vaccines, some of which will surely work.
The second reason for hope is that, as Oxford University’s epidemiologist Sunetra Gupta has
argued, herd immunity may be achieved more easily than we first
thought. Indeed, from the way that infections have continued to dwindle
despite lessening social distancing it seems probable that herd immunity
has already been achieved in London at least. Half the population could
be immune already because of recent exposure to coronavirus colds,
while children seem to resist catching Covid-19, let alone passing it
on. As the chief medical officer Chris Whitty has conceded, the epidemic
was already in retreat before lockdown began. That is because the virus
depends heavily on a few superspreaders, and pre-lockdown measures we
were taking in March are remarkably effective: no handshakes, frequent
hand washing, no large gatherings and so on.
So the third reason for optimism is that
as long as we continue with these measures then this virus will
struggle to keep spreading in the community. The one place where the
virus did spread with horrible ease was in care homes and hospitals. Why
was this? T-cell senescence
is an issue, so old people’s immune systems are just not as good at
coping with this kind of infection, and there were dreadful policy
mistakes made, like stopping testing people, clearing patients out of
hospitals to care homes without tests, and assuming no asymptomatic
transmission. Healthcare and care home staff were not properly protected
and were allowed to go from site to site. Many were infected and became
carriers.
The fourth cause for cheer is therefore that now we know about asymptomatic transmission,
we have more protective equipment and we have a better, if still
imperfect, capacity to test, track and isolate cases, it is likely that
the hospital-acquired epidemic of the spring will not be repeated.
My fifth excuse for being hopeful is that we now know better how to
treat people who get seriously ill. Ventilation is not necessarily the
answer, blood clotting is a real threat, making patients lie face down
is helpful, dexamethasone can save lives and some antiviral drugs are
showing promise.
These are reasons that even if a lot of
people catch the virus this winter, fewer will die. Colds and flu
viruses usually peak in mid winter when we are indoors. Viruses survive
longer in colder and drier conditions, and centrally heated air dries
out our protective mucus membranes. Covid-19 will certainly be hoping to
peak then. But Australia offers a glimmer of reassurance. It’s winter
there now, and this is proving to be the country’s weakest flu season on
record. From January to the end of June, 21,000 Australians were
diagnosed with flu. Last year more than 132,000 people were diagnosed in
the same period. Social distancing is presumably the main reason. If
that is repeated here, then not only will Covid have fewer flus and
colds to hide behind, but it too will struggle to mount a seasonal peak.
And fewer people will die from flu.
If we can beat this virus, then we can beat most respiratory ones.
The ridiculous way in which we tolerate cold-spreaders, mocking them for
taking a day off and praising them for trudging into work while feeling
miserable, has to stop. It should be socially unacceptable to go to a
party with a cold, let alone kiss the host on the cheek when you get
there. Our children’s permanently runny noses need not be inevitable.
Ten years from now, I predict that we will not only have defeated Covid-19, but made colds rarer too.
Our bigger challenge this winter will be to tackle the backlog of
treating cancer and other medical problems delayed by Covid. And to
unleash economic growth to help those who lost their jobs."
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