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The WHO director of Health Emergencies said it is not possible to forecast the end of the disease.
The new Sars-CoV-2 coronavirus, the cause of covid-19 disease, has the potential to become an endemic virus and “never go away.”
This was indicated by the director of Health Emergencies of the World Health Organization (WHO), Mike Ryan, when evaluating the possibility that the pathogen continues the course of other viruses following assets in the world.
“It is important to put this issue on the table: the virus could become another virus endemic in our communities and these viruses may never go away, “Ryan said Wednesday.
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Therefore he warned that it is not wise to generate expectations on a possible future date that mark the end of covid-19 infections, first detected in late 2019 in China.
“I think it is important that we are realistic and it does not seem to me that anyone can predict when the disease will disappear,” he said.
“I think there are no promises for this and there are no dates.”
Until this Wednesday, the WHO registered 4.1 million confirmed cases of covid-19 worldwide, as well as 287,000 deaths. America In the last hours it surpassed Europe as the most affected region.
Ryan said it is very difficult to project how long the virus will circulate the way it does now, as studies being done in various countries show that only a relatively low percentage of the population has been infected.
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That percentage includes asymptomatic people – who did not know they were infected because they had no symptoms or were very mild – but who have produced antibodies because they had covid-19.
The head of Sanitary Emergencies also pointed out that if a vaccine is obtained, for it to be effective must be highly effective, with availability for everyone and applied in a massive way.
What is an endemic virus?
The measles, Ryan exemplified, is an endemic virus that has remained in the world for several decades and for which there are vaccines, however could not be eradicated.
But there are many other examples of diseases that have become endemic in the past, such as malaria, dengue hemorrhagic fever, Chagas disease, whooping cough, yellow fever, measles, and HIV.
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About 100 vaccines are being investigated worldwide for covid-19, Ryan said.
Rosalind Eggo, an infectious disease scholar at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, explained to the BBC that a disease is called endemic when “it is present in an area permanently, at all times for years and years. “
However, just because a virus is endemic does not mean it cannot be suffocated.
Speaking about the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), Mike Ryan noted, “HIV has not disappeared, but we have come to adapt to it.”
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The development of a vaccine does not imply the end of an endemic disease.
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus emphasized that Sars-CoV-2 can still be controlled, but cautioned that it requires a coordinated effort.
“The trajectory is in our hands, and it is everyone’s business, and we should all contribute to stopping this pandemic,” he said.
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