According to experts, resorting to a rigorous lockdown is not feasible. The approach based on an effective vaccination campaign that reduces the damage of the virus is better
Thirty days: that would have been enough for China for reduce new cases of Sars-Cov-2 Delta variant infection to zero. According to data from the Chinese National Health Commission (the equivalent of our Ministry of Health), reported by both China Daily both from Cnn, for the first time since July in the People’s Republic there are no new cases of Covid-19 transmitted locally. Merit of new, rigorous, government-imposed lockdown. A type of approach followed at the beginning of the pandemic also in other states – such as Singapore, Australia and New Zealand – which, however, are reviewing their policies in the light of the new variants. A type of approach that is difficult to apply in Italy and in Western countries in general explains epidemiologist and professor of Hygiene at the University of Florence for Paolo Bonanni.
Zero Covid approach
Therefore China has taken the path of absolute rigor. The country struggling with spread of the highly contagious variant Delta from 20 July, when a group of Covid-19 infections was detected among airport cleaning staff in the city of Nanjing. Since then, it has turned into the worst epidemic since 2020, spreading to more than half of the country’s 31 provinces and infecting more than 1,200 people. The outbreak also reached Wuhan, the city in central China where the coronavirus was first detected in December 2019 (here the article
).
The other countries that have adopted it are rethinking it
As reported by the Cnn, the increasing cases caused by the Delta variant were seen as the biggest challenge for China’s uncompromising zero tolerance policy. Local authorities responded by asking tens of millions of residents under strict isolation, launching massive test and tracking campaigns, and limiting domestic travel. Other nations have followed or anticipated the Chinese approach, including Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. Authorities have closed borders to nearly all foreigners, imposed strict quarantines for arrivals, and initiated targeted lockdowns and aggressive testing and tracing policies to eliminate all cases that escaped defense. And for more than a year, these measures have been highly successful in keeping cases close to zero. But the new Delta-led outbreaks are driving some of these countries to rethink their approach.
Double edged weapon
Therefore the lockdown road would seem a double-edged sword. Obviously none of us are perhaps able to understand the differences in how these extreme measures are applied in different countries. I suspect that in China the intensity of the lockdown and the measures that are being taken are particularly severe and hardly questionable by the population. So it seems to me that it is a model that is not easily exportable to Western countries. They are quite drastic and impose obligations that would probably be unacceptable with us, says Bonanni.
Learning to live with the virus
According to the epidemiologist, it is one thing to want to reduce the cases of infection to zero; another thing instead to try to learn to live with the virus. China also continued to step up its vaccination campaign. According to the NHC, they were more than 1.94 billion doses of nationally produced Covid-19 vaccines administered. This is more than 135 doses per 100 people, a ratio higher than that of the United Kingdom and the United States. Still, the Delta variant had a relatively easy life. The results of Chinese vaccines in terms of efficacy are not as good, on average, as those developed in the Western world. So there is probably also this aspect to consider in the decision of the Chinese authorities to resort to a new lockdown, reflects Bonanni.
Damage reduction, first
Then there is a crucial question: how would Italians – and other European countries – react to a new closure? In Australia, the population took to the streets to protest the restrictions. So our approach cannot be different from the one we are following – adds the expert -: minimize the damage done by Covid-19 in a first phase, and this we get it if we have a high vaccination coverage especially in the groups with the highest risk of consequences. And here comes the question of the famous 12-13% of the population over 50 who still doubts and does not accept vaccination. This is objectively the biggest problem we have right now, as far as that is concerned harm reduction. The attitude of those who refuse vaccines is absolutely unreasonable as well as irrational. It must be understood that vaccination is an act of responsibility first of all towards oneself and then towards the whole community. If there is an obligation, it will be precisely because there is a social aspect to vaccination that cannot be denied at this moment.
Increase the coverage of the young population
As for the reduction of the circulation of the virus, coexistence with the virus should be followed by its normalization. This should become a seasonal infection such as the flu. Like? To achieve this result, it is therefore also necessary to increase coverage in the young population, because the average age of infected people is getting lower and lower, Bonanni replies.
Reopening of schools, the moment of truth
The first test, in a few weeks, will be the reopening of schools. From how the epidemic curve is moving, what can we deduce? When there are new closer contacts, and the reopening of schools will be the most critical moment in this sense, c
ertamente there will be a possibility of greater restart of the virus. But the real problem is still how much this increase in infections will turn into a significant increase in intensive care hospitalizations and deaths. What we have seen in recent weeks, and also based on the experience of England, it tells us that all in all we can begin to think of living with the infection and therefore with an increase in infections but that in any case it does not turn as it happened last winter, in an equally high increase in serious and fatal cases. All this basically depends on vaccination coverage. For this reason also the vaccination of children is something we are focusing a lot on because if we want to secure the population and above all not have harm we must also vaccinate the student population. Gradually the age in which the vaccines can be used will decrease and gradually we will have to use them more and more even in younger groups.
August 24, 2021 (change August 24, 2021 | 15:53)
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