Eliminate the pandemic virus causing COVID-19 or risk an animal reservoir

Wednesday, July 1st, 2020 | tedla55p | No Comments

Prof John Potter*

Elimination has been an effective strategy for New Zealand in the management of the COVID-19 pandemic virus (SARS-CoV-2). Most other countries have not pursued this goal and are ignoring the opportunity even now. SARS-CoV-2 is not manageable by the influenza playbook; its longer incubation period makes tracing and isolation more practicable and puts elimination within reach. There is one additional argument in favour of elimination: the longer the highly infectious SARS-CoV-2 virus circulates in the human population, the greater is the likelihood that it will find a host among other animal species and that these will become a reservoir capable of transmission back to humans.

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