Hospitals in Europe are now better equipped to treat Covid-19. Measures such as social distance and wearing a mask have become commonplace and the recent outbreak of the infection has been seen mainly in young people, who are less likely to die if exposed to the virus.
Yet the cold weather has begun and the flu season is approaching. The infection has spread to the older population, and there are signs that people are getting tired of sticking to restrictions.
Michael Head, senior research fellow at Global Health, said, “Obviously we have no way to stop Covid from going around, except for measures of caudation or social distance; and we don’t have a vaccine yet.” The University of Southampton in the UK told CNN.
While he doesn’t expect death to reach the levels seen in the first wave, Head added: “We will see a lot of cases spread, we will see a lot of hospital admissions and a lot of stress on our healthcare.
“There will be a big death here too.”
From a young age
According to a CNN analysis of Johns Hopkins University data, the number of coronavirus cases reported in Europe reached 52,418 on Tuesday, above the seven-day rolling average. But on April 10, with a seven-day average, only 6,556 new deaths were reported, compared to 144 daily deaths (out of 1,8526 cases).
That compares to the seven-day average in North America on Tuesday, with 44,54747 cases and 226 deaths, with Europe having a population of 366 million compared to Europe’s 505,550 million people.
Hospitals are now better able to diagnose and treat the virus, meaning that the mortality rate for ICU patients in some European countries has dropped from about 50% during the spring to about 20%, Head estimates.
Head warned that the increase in cases would “at some point translate into infections in the elderly population whose mortality rate is high.”
“We are seeing an increase in case rates among older populations and vulnerable people in all European countries,” he said. “So, really it’s a very predictable pattern that, in the UK and France or Spain we’ve seen it affect small populations, and then after about four to six weeks … we’re starting to infect older people.”
Head added that more cases in the community mean more opportunities to enter organizations such as care homes for the virus, “There has been a huge increase in care home outbreaks here in the UK over the past month.”
Burden on hospitals
This, he said, means “there will be more stress on health services in the next few months and indeed for years to come.”
Peter Drobac, a global health practitioner and director of Ent Skford University’s Skill Center for Social Entrepreneurship, told CNN that he would be “irresponsible” if Europe allowed the death rate to return to April levels.
“While we haven’t been able to detect any kind of seasonal pattern from this particular virus,” the real risk is that cold weather could force people to return indoors, where transmission is likely to occur, ”he said.
While most countries now have more testing capabilities, Drobeb said “increasing testing doesn’t make sense for the cases we’re seeing in most settings” because we’re also getting a positive percentage of tests.
“It’s clear we’ll lose control of this.”
“We know enough about how the virus behaves – how it is transmitted, how to control it, how to treat it when people get infected – that we don’t have another catastrophic outbreak. Should be able to make sure, because eventually it causes a big death, when the health systems start to overflow. “
‘Absolute Storm’
Attitudes towards the second wave of infection vary throughout Europe. Leaders are trying to balance balancing to protect public health by avoiding catastrophic economic losses from national downfall.
A record 14,389 cases were reported every day in Spain last Friday. In Madrid, which has its third case, residents in the area areas were only allowed to go home for work, school or medical reasons, and parks and playgrounds were closed. From Monday.
The UK, which reported the highest number of cases since April on Wednesday, has banned gatherings of up to six people and will close pubs and restaurants at 10pm. Was. Mass.
“The bottom line is that the second wave is already here in many European countries,” Drobeb said. “Over the next few weeks and during the winter our actions will be crucial to stop the spread, but if we don’t get it under control soon, especially in places like the UK, Spain and France, we will definitely see an increase in deaths.”
Drobeb said Europe once again needed to “flatten the curve” through social distance and hygiene measures as well as strong testing and contact tracing.
He believes it is “unlikely” that countries will return to full national lockdown which was a common approach in spring resistance, partly due to public resistance or fatigue with sanctions. “I think it will be difficult for him to get political and public support. I think it will be difficult to implement and people are fed up.”
“In many ways, we think winter can be a perfect hurricane. That’s why I wish we could spend our summers better crushing the virus and making sure it’s in good condition for it.”
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