We’re ‘probably going to have to learn to live with Covid’, leading epidemiologist says

A leading epidemiologist says experts believe the coronavirus is becoming an ‘endemic’ disease.

When asked on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme if people were going to have to ‘learn to live with’ coronavirus, Professor David Heymann, of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, replied: “It certainly seems like that in the shorter term, and probably in the long term as well.

“Most experts believe that this disease is now becoming endemic, but the good thing is that we have many tools including vaccines with which we can deal with this virus.”

He then went on to draw a comparison to the spread of HIV/AIDS, adding: “We’ve learned to live with it, as we’ll learn to live with this infection as well.”

Heymann added that borders ‘cannot stop infectious diseases’.

He said: “We know that borders cannot stop infectious diseases no matter how rigid your controls are, there will always be some that comes through.”

He went onto explain that most nations believe the best strategy to deal with infections is within the country and to ensure a flow of travel and trade.

When asked if he believed there would be an immediate impact after closing borders, he said: “We’ve seen that countries that have closed their borders, such as New Zealand, have kept the virus out, but now their problem is what do they when they begin to open their borders?

“So I think the best way forward is to live understanding that viruses and bacteria, any infection, can cross borders and we have to have the defences in our own countries to deal with them.”

Environment Secretary George Eustice said the new policy for arrivals in the UK which will require two coronavirus tests, one on day two and one on day eight, will mean it is easier to ‘keep track of where people are and for them to report for testing’.

He added that it also makes it ‘easier for us to track the presence of any new variants coming in’.

An academic from the University of Bristol’s School of Clinical Sciences, Professor Adam Finn, said it could take months for new vaccines to be created in response to new variants. 

The member of the Joint Committee on Vaccines and Immunisations told BBC Breakfast: “It will take some time, simply because although the new variants can be adjusted in the vaccines they then have to come through the regulators, and then have to be manufactured at scale in order to be available.

“So it’s not a matter of a month or two, it’s probably more than that.

“But we currently have vaccines that are effective against the strains that are predominating in the UK and that should be clear in everybody’s minds that we’re not in a position where vaccines have suddenly stopped working entirely.”