The initial wave of coronavirus infection causes panic, many dead cases, social distancing…
Many infectious disease experts worry about a coronavirus comeback that could be harder and strike more quickly than the initial wave of infection. We will update you about all the next predictions in our healthy living blog
Here are some of the predictions about the next coronavirus comeback
Michael Mina, assistant professor of epidemiology
Michael Mina, assistant professor of epidemiology on a press conference from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, stated
“What do I think is going to happen in the future? I do believe that we’re going to see coronavirus comeback cases for the same reason. I think we will find that some places have been struck, and we might actually know that they have formed some level of protective shield from herd immunity to a certain extent. Of course, there’s been a lot of talk about not knowing precisely whether this virus causes lifelong immunity. We do think, though, that this virus will create some immunity and some level of protection in most people. The kinetics of the virus act and behave similarly with our immune system, as we see with a lot of acute viruses. So, we don’t expect this will be an extraordinary virus in that way. But even with some immunity being developed, we don’t know if it will block transmission And if you have 5 or 8 or 10% of the population infected, you know 10% is still 30 million people, which is a lot of people.
If we were up there, and I don’t think we are as a country, but if we were, that still isn’t enough to stop this virus from growing back, and we can look at 1918 as a warning sign, where the second comeback was really massive and killed a lot of people. And that could happen here because we know that even once we start opening things back up, we’re going to have a lot of individual cases that are still brewing under the surface. And so rather than having a few importations or even, you know, tens of importations or hundreds, when, at the beginning of this epidemic, which spurred the whole pandemic across the country, we are now potentially going to drive cases all the way down. And if we’re not careful when we open things back up again, we have possibly thousands and thousands of little cases starting new transmission chains across the country that could explode if we’re not careful.
And so we have to be very very cautious when we start opening up and, you know, one of the other things that were also predictable, I think, and I remember saying it – one of the messaging points that really should have been made to people early on in this epidemic, or early on into social distancing, was that you know, we’re entering into a period of social distancing. You will start to see things become calm, and you’ll begin to see hospitals not be as overwhelmed. And that shouldn’t be perceived as a reason to go outside and say that your part is done. That should actually be a reason to tell your part is just, is being successful. And I wish that that messaging was really in loud and clear with policymakers pressing social distancing efforts”
You can hear the whole interview here with Michael Mina,
Author, world health policy analyst, and former Harvard Chan School fellow Laurie Garrett
According to her COVID-19 will remain a crisis for about 36 months.
“I’ve been telling everybody that my event horizon is about 36 months, and that’s my best-case scenario,
I’m quite certain that this is going to go in waves,” she added. “It won’t be a tsunami that comes across America all at once and then retreats all at once. It will be micro-waves that shoot up in Des Moines and then in New Orleans and then in Houston and so on, and it’s going to affect how people think about all kinds of things.”
The team of pandemic experts
Kristine A. Moore, MD, MPH
Marc Lipsitch, DPhil
John M. Barry, MA
Michael T. Osterholm, PhD, MPH
In the report released on 04/30 predicted that coronavirus (Covid-19), can keep spreading until 60% to 70% of the population get the coronavirus for at least another 18 months to two years.
They think that the second coronavirus comeback will be in the fall and winter. According to them, people will continue to die.
No one has immunity on coronavirus Because Covid-19 is a new virus. That is why pandemic will likely be 18 to 24 months until herd immunity develops in the human population.
Because of its long incubation period, higher R0 and more asymptomatic spread COVID-19 appears to spread more quickly than flu – they noticed in the report. R0 is the average number of people infected by each patient. When the RO is higher, more people will get coronavirus and become immune before the end of the pandemic.
In their report, they recommend that government officials could prepare citizens for a long haul where 3 scenarios are possible:
Scenario 1: The first wave of COVID-19 in spring 2020 is followed by a series of repetitive smaller waves that occur through the summer and then consistently over a 1- to 2-year period, gradually diminishing sometime in 2021. The occurrence of these waves may vary geographically and may depend on what mitigation measures are in place and how they are eased. Depending on the height of the wave peaks, this scenario could require periodic reinstitution and subsequent relaxation of mitigation measures over the next 1 to 2 years.
Scenario 2: The first wave of COVID-19 in spring 2020 is followed by a larger wave in the fall or winter of 2020 and one or smaller subsequent waves in 2021. This pattern will require the reinstitution of mitigation measures in the fall in an attempt to drive down the spread of infection and prevent healthcare systems from being overwhelmed. This pattern is similar to what was seen with the 1918-19 pandemic (CDC, 2018). During that pandemic, a small coronavirus comeback began in March 1918 and subsided during the summer months. A much larger peak then occurred in the fall of 1918. A third peak occurred during the winter and spring of 1919; that wave subsided in the summer of 1919, signaling the end of the pandemic. The 1957-58 pandemic followed a similar pattern, with a smaller spring wave followed by a much larger fall wave (Saunders-Hastings 2016). Successive smaller waves continued to occur for several years (Miller 2009). The 2009-10 pandemic also followed a pattern of a spring wave followed by a larger fall wave (Saunders-Hastings 2016).
Scenario 3: The first wave of COVID-19 in spring 2020 is followed by a “slow burn” of ongoing transmission and case occurrence but without a clear coronavirus comeback pattern. Again, this pattern may vary somewhat geographically and may be influenced by the degree of mitigation measures in place in various areas. While this third pattern was not seen with past influenza pandemics, it remains a possibility for COVID-19. This third scenario likely would not require the reinstitution of mitigation measures, although cases and deaths will continue to occur.
Whichever scenario the pandemic follows (assuming at least some level of ongoing mitigation measures), we must be prepared for at least another 18 to 24 months of significant COVID-19 activity, with hot spots popping up periodically in diverse geographic areas. As the pandemic wanes, it is likely that SARS-CoV-2 will continue to circulate in the human population and will synchronize to a seasonal pattern with diminished severity over time, as with other less pathogenic coronaviruses, such as the beta coronaviruses OC43 and HKU1, (Kissler 2020) and past pandemic influenza viruses have done.
A vaccine could help, the report said, but not quickly. “The course of the pandemic also could be influenced by a vaccine; however, a vaccine will likely not be available until at least some time in 2021,” they wrote.
“And we don’t know what kinds of challenges could arise during vaccine development that could delay the timeline.”
