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There is “no end” to the covid-19 pandemic and we will have to live with the virus for many years. Who says so is Jeremy Farrar, the doctor who runs the British NGO Wellcome Trust, dedicated to scientific research, and one of the first to alert about the first cases of an unknown respiratory infection detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan in 2019. virus, now consider the expert “It will remain in the population for many years and perhaps forever. “
“We have to learn, through treatments and vaccines, to control the disease, reduce its impact and live with it, as we do with the flu, other coronaviruses or HIV. [O vírus] It is not disappearing “, says the British in an interview with El País.” It is a virus of animal origin that found people, who alreadyá is endemic to human populations and will continue to have repercussions throughout the world. Currently, there is no escape from that. “, he warns.
Despite the current moment, when several countries face a new wave of infections, such as Spain, France, the United Kingdom and also in Portugal, Farrar believes that the return to “a certain normality” could occur next year. Everything will depend on the development of science in the fight against covid-19.
“I believe that [medicamentos e vacinas] It will arrive in 2021. I think we will have results in November and December of this year. AND we will have good vaccines in 2021, which may be available to everyone in the world who needs them. And that will be the beginning of a new era in 2021. Society will return to a certain normality “, considers. But don’t think it will be the life we had before the pandemic, says the expert. It will be “a little different”.
To achieve this certain normality, the vaccine against the disease will be essential, but there must be a strategy for results. “If we vaccinate 20% or 30% of the population of each country, we can return to normality”, defends the British doctor.
“The way to save lives, open the economy and reopen schools is to vaccinate some people in every country. This is the fastest way out of this pandemic.”
According to the expert, the solution is to vaccinate only a few people in some countries and not all in a single country. At the forefront of vaccination should be people who belong to risk groups, such as the elderly and the chronically ill, and those most exposed to the risk of contagion, such as health professionals, they argue.. “They are the ones who get sick and die. If these people are vaccinated in all countries, we will reduce transmission, save lives and make the economy work again,” he says.
Jeremy Farrar believes that this is the fastest way to get out of the pandemic, so that life returns to such normality, which should not be the same as we had before the covid-19. “The reason it is so important to vaccinate some people in every country, rather than everyone in one country, is that we have to get the economy going again. We need schools so that children have opportunities in the future. We need universities and companies to go back to work ”, he argues.
And this is how we can quickly see the recovery of the economy and the saving of lives, the expert emphasizes.
“The way to save lives, open the economy and reopen schools is to vaccinate some people in every country. This is the fastest way out of this pandemic.”, Farrar reinforces when considering that there can be no place for nationalism in the acquisition and distribution of vaccines at a time when the world faces an unprecedented situation. “The pandemic will not end if we do this. We have to be together. We have to decide in the coming weeks whether we are going to unite or separate.”
Especially because, once the vaccine is approved, “we will not be able to vaccinate seven billion people. It is impossible. We need to think about the best way to use vaccines so that all countries recover, so that economies can grow and children go back to school “.
The British doctor does not doubt that this vaccination strategy “is the correct thing from a scientific point of view”.
He’s optimistic about a COVID-19 vaccine, but sends a cautionary message.
“There are nine experimental vaccines in the last phase of development. We do not know which ones will work. First we have to check if they are safe,” says the specialist who runs the NGO Wellcome Trust, which finances vaccines that are in the most advanced phase, among than Oxford / AtraZeneca.
More than $ 30 billion needed for tests, treatments and vaccines
Wellcome Trust also participates in the international ACT Accelerator initiative, promoted by the World Health Organization (WHO), to accelerate the development and production of tests, vaccines and treatments against COVID-19.
“To have the drugs and vaccines we need, we need $ 35 billion. This would be the best investment in human history.” said the British doctor, who highlights the importance of the WHO initiative in raising funds to combat the pandemic. “ACT Accelerator unites the world, shares the risks and benefits, and offers insights on how to emerge from the pandemic through science.”
And the development of science “is the only way” out of the health crisis facing the world.
