New Delhi: Global health experts Wednesday said novel coronavirus is here to stay for more than a year. They called for aggressive testing to prevent its spread. The health experts Ashish Jha and Professor Johan Giesecke said this during an interaction with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. They talked about the COVID-19 pandemic as part of the series being aired on Congress social media channels.
Jha exuded confidence that a vaccine will be available in a year’s time. However, Prof Giesecke said India should practice a lockdown that is as ‘soft’ as possible. He informed a ‘severe lockdown’ will ruin India’s economy very quickly.
“When the economy is opened up after lockdown, you have to create confidence among people. That way the economy will grow,” Harvard health expert Ashish Jha told Rahul. He said coronavirus is a ‘12-18 months’ problem and the world is not going to be free of this till 2021. The expert also called for the need for aggressive testing strategy for high-risk areas.
Rahul, while interacting with the experts, said life is going to change post COVID-19. “If 9/11 was a new chapter, this will be a new book,” he remarked.
Professor Giesecke, is a former chief scientist at the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. He emphasized on the lockdown factor.
“The situation that India is in, I think, you should have a ‘soft’ lockdown, as soft as possible,” said Giesecke. “I think for India, you will ruin your economy very quickly if you have a severe lockdown. It is better, skip the lockdown, take care of the old and the frail. That way you can also control the spread of the pandemic,” he noted.
PTI