Eight changes the world needs to make to live with #COVID / Christina Pagel

More and more people have been asking for a return to normal, and with #omicron waning, governments are starting to act. The #UK, for example, is removing its remaining public health measures, including mandatory self-isolation of COVID cases and free testing. However, the inescapable truth is that – unless the virus mutates to a milder form – the “normal” life we are returning to will be shorter and sicker on average than before.

We’ve added a new significant disease to our population. COVID is often compared to #flu, as if adding a burden equivalent to flu to a population were fine (it isn’t). In fact, COVID has been and remains worse. COVID’s infection fatality rate – the proportion of people who die once they’ve caught it – was initially about ten times higher than for flu. Treatments, #vaccines and prior infections have since brought the fatality rate down, but it’s still almost twice as high as for flu – and yes, this still holds for omicron.

The impact is then worsened because COVID is so much more transmissible. It also has a similar or worse longer-term impact on the heart, lungs and mental health than other respiratory diseases, and a higher rate of long-term symptoms. Vaccines have been incredibly effective at reducing severe illness and #death, but they’re not perfect. New variants have tested vaccine defences, and protection against infection – and to a lesser extent severe illness – wanes after a few months.

https://theconversation.com/eight-changes-the-world-needs-to-make-to-live-with-covid-177678