Coronavirus is back. Within a week, the disease rate in primary care rose from 75 to 88 cases per 100,000 inhabitants. That’s 13 percentage points. A month ago, the number was 29. There were 150 cases among children under the age of five. The hospitalization rate rose from 0.75 to 2.04.
On the other hand, other respiratory illnesses (flu, VRS, etc.) were at normal levels. So, yes, COVID-19 is back, but the truth is that its impact has been minimal. At least, if we’re talking about public health.
As for it doesn’t matter? Of course this is important. COVID-19 is the most important disease of the past decade. within the globe. Of course this is important. Most importantly, it’s critical for new hospitalizations and patient rebound.
It is for this reason that the Carlos III Institute continues to include it in its latest primary care (ARI) and nosocomial (SARI) sentinel surveillance report for acute respiratory infections, from which we derived these data.
It doesn’t make any sense to keep talking about SARS-CoV-2 as if nothing happened in recent years; as if we are still in 2020 or 2021. But we’re doing it, just do a little search on the internet and you’ll see dozens of media outlets talking about’Irisa new descendant variant of XBB.1.9.2 is in the air.
...but the World Health Organization has said so. Yes, this is correct. The World Health Organization has said loud and clear that this variant must be behind the backlash affecting us (but this also affects countries like France and Germany). Still, the “global health emergency” ended a few months ago.
However, this is a ‘threat’ and’Iris‘ is the “interesting” variant. In fact, as I said in the last block, there are some things to watch. Medicine, technology and epidemiology. The same goes for new variants of the flu or any other disease.
Two major assets have been lost to COVID-19. Aside from the eternal discussion about whether the new coronavirus is dangerous, the fact is that the main problem with this disease that emerged in late 2019 is that we do not have cross-immunity.
Lots of things protect us from other “known” diseases, but mostly an epidemiological wall that prevents disease from spreading (and partially protects us). Corona virus didn’t happen, and on the back of extremely high transmissibility (and a flawed international surveillance system), it spread like crazy and caused the world to collapse.
Such a scenario does not exist. And it hasn’t been that way for a long time. People will continue to die from COVID-19, but its ability to paralyze all modern societies is a thing of the past.
Another trick is fear. When Italy entered crisis in late February 2022, the epidemic entered a new phase. It left China and emerged in the heartland of Western Europe. Concern about Asia turned into fear. Almost everything to do with the public reaction to the disease is due to fear.
But the fear is gone. Between February 28 and March 6, 2022, the flu “started knocking on emergency room doors” from a two-year low-key background. And it keeps growing. This proves that the pandemic is over: we Spaniards did not follow the advice of social distancing and the flu slipped through this loophole. We have lost our fear.
No, we don’t appear to be reverting to it, despite many small improvements and many changes that continue to occur.
at shataca | The flu is back: Here’s clear evidence we’re over the pandemic
picture| Adeline Prada