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“What we are seeing is an increase in the number of cases […]. These numbers are increasing in many countries, they have been increasing in different periods of time, but definitely [mais] in recent weeks ”, contextualizes in an interview with the Lusa agency, the deputy director of the ECDC disease program, Piotr Kramarz.
According to the scientist, However, it cannot be said that this is already the second wave of the new coronavirus in Europe: “Some countries have probably not even come out of the first wave, while others have had a reduction in the number of cases and are now seeing an increase. “.
“It is not a clear second wave, but what we see is that there is a resurgence of infections,” adds Piotr Kramarz, alluding to the strong increases in the number of daily cases in countries such as Italy, Spain, France and Germany in the last weeks. that have been the most affected since the start of the pandemic in Europe.
As the new coronavirus is still unknown to specialists, the head of the ECDC even risks saying that with “covid-19 the situation is a little more complicated”, making it difficult to distinguish the different phases of the outbreak.
“This nomenclature, second wave, comes from the influenza epidemic [infeção respiratória viral que originou epidemias sazonais como a Gripe A]. What usually happens is that there is a first wave, then a period of low propagation and then a second wave or even a third wave ”, but this will not necessarily happen this time, he explains.
Piotr Kramarz emphasizes, however, that the increase in the number of cases may not always mean the reappearance of covid-19, as it may be related to the increase in testing.
“At the beginning of the pandemic, the amount of testing was limited, as was the capacity of countries, and therefore only the most serious patients and patients traveling to hospitals were further tested, but now many countries are they have expanded [o número] testing and they are testing people with mild symptoms, or even no symptoms, and they are detecting cases, ”says ECDC’s deputy director of disease programs.
“In some countries, this [aumento] It is related to tests because more and more people are testing ”, reinforces Piotr Kramarz.
The official notes that “the approach to testing differs greatly from country to country,” which is why ECDC is “preparing guidelines for a common approach to testing, under which it is suggested how countries should assess their population.” . “.
In the latest risk assessment report, released by this European center in early August, Portugal was among the EU countries that performed the most tests on the population, with an average of 923.3 tests per 100,000 inhabitants, just behind Luxembourg. , which introduced a mass testing strategy, Denmark, Malta, Cyprus, Austria and Ireland.
But the increase in the number of tests is not the only indicator evaluated by the ECDC, according to Piotr Kramarz, who assures that there are “resurgences” [na Europa] looking at other indicators “such as active outbreaks or community transmission.
Therefore, the expert urged countries to continue “quickly detecting cases and tracing contacts.”
“At this stage of the pandemic, we recommend that all people who have symptoms compatible with covid-19 get tested. And if countries can test all these symptomatic people, they can also consider testing asymptomatic people , which despite not having symptoms may have been in contact [com alguém infetado]”, he appealed in the interview to Lusa.
Based in Sweden, ECDC’s mission is to help European countries respond to disease outbreaks.
The covid-19 pandemic has already claimed more than 832,000 deaths and infected more than 24.5 million people in 196 countries and territories, according to a report by the French agency AFP.
The disease is transmitted by a new coronavirus detected in late December in Wuhan, a city in central China.
