Pandemic: Beginning of the End?

By Shlomo Maital    

Average New Cases Per Day, Global  (NYT Feb 25)

  Today’s New York Times (international edition) brings a hopeful graph.  Globally, new cases of COVID-19 are declining.

  It is as if the virus has run out of steam – gotten tired of causing death, sickness and mischief.  Not clear why the decline!   It’s not vaccination – the rates are not high enough to do this.  Many places, e.g. the European Union, are very slow to vaccinate.  And there are mutant variant – UK, South Africa, Brazil, and now Uganda —  that are more virulent.

     The global peak seems to have been on Jan 11.  And it seems to have been a peak that occurred pretty much at the same time everywhere  !   Why?  Does the virus have some sort of WiFi?  Very strange!

    But – we’ll take it.  This could be the beginning of the end of the pandemic – but far from the end.  We still do not know with great certainty, whether those who have been vaccinated can still spread the virus (they may be immune, the virus can’t make them ill, but still have virus in their noses, and hence spreadable).  This is because the three-stage clinical trials of all the vaccines focused solely on whether the vaccine prevented people from getting ill – not from having the virus in their bodies.  (That would have taken far far longer, and time was of the essence). 

      So let’s keep masking (we’re getting used to it, right?   When you go out, you kind of grab that mask automatically).  Keep distancing.   And hope that crucial curve keeps going down.

      Thanks, New York Times.  Finally, some good news.