“There is no worry because everything is widely expected. Both outbreaks were identified immediately and circumscribed, so the system put in place holds “: this is the analysis of Rainier War, deputy director of the World Health Organization, on the Covid-19 outbreaks in Mondragone and Bologna. “It is inevitable,” he said to Agora, on Rai3, “there are outbreaks around Italy and Europe”.
Like the Spanish flu
According to Guerra, the behavior of the new coronavirus broadly adheres to the hypotheses of the scientific community. The comparison that draws the WHO Deputy Director in particular is that with the Spanish influence, “Which behaved exactly like Covid: went down in the summer and fiercely filmed in September and October, making 50 million deaths during the second wave. “
In short, Guerra does not agree with the analysis of the experts who spoke of the “emergency over”. On the contrary, the scenario of a second wave, for the WHO, would be definitely likely. Especially in the face of the fact that, for the development of a vaccine, we will have to wait more.
The objectives of the WHO
The organization has estimated in particular that in order to develop a vaccine, treatment and conducting new tests are necessary 31.3 billion euros in 12 months. The goal would be to deliver 500 million tests to low and middle income countries, provide treatment to 245 million people by mid 2021, and to produce 2 billion vaccine doses (one billion to be allocated to poor countries) by the end of the same year.
Second wave, how the EU is preparing
And precisely on the possibility of a second wave, the European Commission is preparing a specific communication, to be released in mid-July. At the center, there will be the tools of prevention and, possibly, of response. In this regard, the aim of Brussels is to “ensure that the test strategies” is that health systems are strong enough“To be able to withstand the new wave.
EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides also explained that the alliance between Italy, Germany, France and the Netherlands on the vaccine will be complementary to the European strategy, in which all the Member States participate.
France’s concerns
But beyond the common initiatives carried out at European level, individual countries are also working to avoid the risk of a second wave. In a note dated June 21 sent to the French government, the Scientific Council of Paris states that collective immunity is not yet widespread enough in the population as a whole to prevent a second wave.
French experts believe, in particular, that an “intensification of the circulation of SARS-CoV-2 in the northern hemisphere at a more or less distant expiration (a few months, in particular, as winter approaches) it is extremely likely“. A hypothesis confirmed, also, by the previous ones: other flu pandemics have in fact highlighted two or three waves “before adopting a seasonal rhythm”.
Germany grappling with new cases
As for the Germany, the country has recently had to restore restrictions for over 600,000 people, due to an outbreak discovered in a slaughterhouse in North Rhine-Westphalia, where over 1,500 workers were infected.
Other cases of coronavirus have been discovered in other areas of the country, including the city of Berlin, where an entire block has been quarantined in the Neukoelln neighborhood.
– .
