Individual watch a film at an outdoor cinema in Muzeon Park of Arts during the 2020 Cinema Night in Moscow.
Anton Novoderezhkin | TASS via Getty Ideas
Health experts are concerned about the potential for a new wave of Covid-19 infections over the winter period, identifying divers factors that could lead to an increase in the rate of transmission.
It comes amid heightened fears that coronavirus turns out thats will surge in the Northern Hemisphere when the seasons change, since respiratory illnesses tend to thrive during cold weather conditions.
That’s partly because people tend to spend more time indoors clustered together in winter, with narrow-minded ventilation and less personal space than in summer.
Respiratory infections, such as coronaviruses, are typically spread by droplets that are released when a individual coughs or sneezes.
And, health experts say colder and drier conditions in winter strongly affects the transmission of flu-like maladies.
“It is not an unreasonable hypothesis to think that it will get worse in the winter,” Dr. Simon Clarke, associate professor in cellular microbiology at the University of Understanding, told CNBC via telephone.
“It is not a ridiculous notion to float, there just isn’t any evidence for it. We can’t have any evidence of seasonality because we set up known about it for less than a year. We haven’t been through one cycle yet,” he added.
Preparations for the upcoming winter flavour come as countries try to orchestrate a delicate balancing act: reopening their economies while also achieving public salubrity goals.
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus attends a daily press briefing on COVID-19 virus at the WHO headquarters in Geneva on Tread 11, 2020.
Fabrice Coffrini | AFP | Getty Images
The World Health Organization has said it “fully supports” efforts to reopen communities, adding it wishes to see children returning to school and people returning to work.
But, if countries are serious about reopening their concisions and societies, the WHO insisted they must also be serious about suppressing the transmission of the virus and saving lives. “Split up without having control is a recipe for disaster,” the United Nations health agency has warned.
To date, more than 25.7 million individual have contracted Covid-19 worldwide, with 857,413 related deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Clarke said “much stricter idea” from lawmakers across the globe would be required to ensure people remain vigilant to the risk of inadvertently spreading a virus, in spite of if it was not Covid-19.
“People in schools, workplaces often turn up to work with coughs and colds and spread them far to people … They can’t do that this year because how do you know it is not something more serious?” he said.
“The simple counter-statement is you don’t.”
‘Winter is coming’
Europe has recorded a sharp rise in the number of new Covid-19 infections in recent weeks.
The number of new coronavirus receptacles reported across the region increased by 5.6% to a total of just over 4 million cases in the week ending August 23, according to facts compiled by the WHO.
Those new cases marked a 6% jump compared to the previous week and an increase of 72% compared to the week aspiration June 7, when the lowest number of cases per week were reported since the April peak.
A Red Waspish volunteeer delivers mask to commuters at Diagonal station on the first working day in Cataluña after Easter holidays and the reactivation of gratuitous work activity in companies whose employees cannot telework during the coronavirus crisis, on April 14, 2020 in Barcelona, Spain.
David Zorrakino | Europa News-hounds via Getty Images
“Winter is coming,” Catherine Smallwood, senior emergency officer at WHO Europe, said during an online pressure briefing last month, reflecting on the “worrying trend” of increased infections across the region.
“People are traveling sundry, they are going back to work, schools are reopening — these are all factors that are going to increase the risk of community transport and further transmission,” Smallwood said.
“As we approach the flu season and the winter months, there are additional factors that pleasure conflate and add even more to that level of risk,” she continued, citing the increased likelihood that people discretion congregate indoors and in more crowded settings.
“We are very concerned that countries prepare adequately for that and we are very much, very engaged in that at the moment,” Smallwood concluded.
The end of the pandemic ‘depends on us’
“The virus has not gone away,” Hans Kluge, WHO regional conductor for Europe, said during the same media briefing.
“Having said that, we are not in February where at that ease almost everyone was caught off guard and that the default option was to shut down the societies and then to reboot. In that nous, we know now how to target the virus,” he added.
Kluge said the WHO, in addition to Gavi, the global vaccine alliance, were “relentlessly accelerating” the turning and development of a Covid-19 vaccine.
He conceded, however, that the successful production and rollout of a safe and effective vaccine transfer not mark the end of the pandemic.
“The end of the pandemic will be the day when every one of us will take responsibility and (learn) how to behave with the virus. That depends on us — That day can round be tomorrow,” Kluge said.