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The Czech government, which acted faster and tighter than almost any other country in the European Union, has at the same time lifted the rules on social isolation and wearing of masks. Now, two months later, an attempt is being made here to control the outbreak of new cases, well above the number recorded earlier this year when the virus swept Europe.
Unfortunately, the same trend is being observed in other EU countries, which have acted more decisively than countries like France and Spain, but are now fighting the resurgence of the virus as restrictions are eased.
Governments are reluctant to close schools and businesses after the quarantine has hurt their economies, even though neighbors are introducing new travel restrictions at the time.
“In June, we all felt that the virus was gone,” Czech Prime Minister Andrei Babish said on Sunday. “Unfortunately, we are wrong.”
With the resurgence of the coronavirus around the world, authorities in Slovenia and Croatia in the eastern part of the EU are taking a lax approach to imposing fines for mask wearing violations.
In Romania, where 1,713 new cases of coronavirus and 49 new deaths were reported on Wednesday, students protested against the opening of schools and urged the Minister of Education to resign, while several thousand people protested against face masks in Zagreb early in this month.
In Hungary, new infections double every week in September, with the numbers declining since the start of the pandemic.
Eight people died Wednesday, the most deaths in a day since May 29.
“Compared to the rest of Europe, the pandemic in Hungary is a proportion of the population,” Ferenc Jakab, head of the virology research group at the University of Pécs, said at an online conference on Tuesday. “That is the stark truth.”
However, Prime Minister Viktor Orban is opposed to measures that would halt some parts of the economy, as the country has already experienced one of the worst recessions in the region. His Romanian counterpart, Ludovic Orban (not a relative), also stated that the safety of citizens was his concern.
“I don’t think any further restrictions should be imposed,” said the Romanian leader. “On the contrary, we need constant dialogue and help people understand that they have a responsibility to take care of their own safety.”
Babish also rejects the possibility of a new shutdown of the economy, despite the fact that the former Slovak partners of the Czech federation have included the Czech Republic in their red list due to the reception of travelers.
Last month, the Czech prime minister ignored the recommendations of government epidemiologists on the mandatory use of masks in public. He also attacked the World Health Organization after it expressed concern about the deterioration of the situation and criticized his government for its intentions to reduce contact tracking.
Like other leaders who announced the virus a few weeks ago, he now tells people to wear masks and be more alert.
“I want to ask everyone to convince those who do not use them to start using them,” he said Sunday. – We all sit in the same boat. We have to work together. “
Bloomberg Reviewer Lionel Laurent: Some Countries Fail Coronavirus Test
If Europe has a strategy to stop the spread of Covid-19, it considers it well hidden. French President Emmanuel Macron has promised not to return to the dark times of the national quarantine, preferring to “live” with the coronavirus disease, but his government is not controlling the jump in new cases.
France reported more than 10,000 new cases in just 24 hours last weekend – such a harsh post-script to cut the two-week period of self-isolation required for the country’s decision in half.
Similar is the case of Spain, the country with the highest number of cases in Europe and the first to cross the barrier of more than half a million cases. The Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, also ruled out the possibility of a national quarantine, but disagreements between public health authorities between Madrid and regions such as Catalonia, and the initial lax approach to nightlife, have exacerbated the spread of cases post-quarantine. Given the size of the population, the seven-day average of new cases in France and Spain exceeds that of the United States.
UK cases are also lagging behind and are already at their highest level since May.
Austria warns that this is the beginning of a “second wave”. So far, it is unlikely if we take into account mortality and hospitalization rates, which remain well below the peak of the virus in April. Currently, the majority of new cases are young adults with no or only mild symptoms.
However, young people do not live in a vacuum, so infections are transmitted to the older and more vulnerable people. As commendable as it is to bring adults to the office and children to the classroom, it all accelerates the spread of the virus. Bank of America has an estimated transmission rate of more than 1 in all major European countries except Germany, which means that one infected person, on average, will infect more than one other person. Doctors warn that a severe winter without vaccine awaits us.
That is why testing, tracking and isolating infected cases as much as possible will be crucial to breaking the chains of virus transmission in the coming months.
Europe is currently testing much more than at the start of the pandemic, with 10% or even less testing showing a positive response, but resource allocation remains relatively deplorable.
Because testing is done for almost all suspected coronavirus cases, labs can no longer rotate. France is said to have to wait eight days for a test response, while the UK has amassed almost 200,000 unproven evidence, all as a ridiculous counterweight to the country’s ambitious political goals of at least one million people to the week.
It also undermines public confidence and the economy, as isolation must be watched while waiting for test results. It’s no wonder that people often only prevent the rules of isolation by hand.
Case tracking is also not going as well as you would like. Digital surveillance programs designed to easily trace the potential chain of infection have failed to attract a critical mass of consumers in some countries.
The UK has yet to release its updated version. People who work as contact followers suffer a decrease in the number of contacts associated with each positive case: in France this number is currently around 2, in Spain around 3. This is equivalent to looking for a needle in a haystack.
The testing capacity could be further strengthened or at least the available resources could be used more efficiently. It would be useful to have more mobile laboratories and test points. Test teams should target the populations that need them most, such as symptomatic cases or nursing staff, following a “bazooka” approach in clustered areas or areas of high population density.
Clear and simple rules about when a test is necessary could prevent testing in schools or offices from being too rushed.
There could also be more experimentation, such as ‘concentrating’ more samples taken at the same time, thus saving resources, or trying alternative test methods, such as using saliva samples, although this would increase the risk of false negative responses.
The contact tracking front needs better organization, more training, and more coverage. Hiring more people is one thing (France has already recruited an additional 2,000 contact followers), but they need extensive training, as that work requires close collaboration with local communities and the collection of sensitive information that people may not be. willing to share.
If digital applications fail, other techniques can be tried, such as “reverse” contact tracking, where new cases and their contacts are associated with events or locations where more potential cases (and clusters) may have occurred.
Of course, this is just one detail in a larger coronavirus puzzle. Masks and social isolation remain necessary precautions.
However, it is important not to lose sight of what an effective testing policy can do. In the north-western Mayen region of France, where the spread of cases was successfully controlled last month, massive tests were launched with the aim of obtaining results within 24 to 48 hours after sampling. Why not publish the same goal nationally? Perhaps this would help fulfill the promise that “there will be no more quarantine.”
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