A COVID-19 vaccine no matter how safe and effective won't end the raging global pandemic on its own, said the World Health Organization (WHO).
What's also needed to successfully control the pandemic is for people worldwide to make permanent adjustments to their daily lives, such as constant hand washing and social distancing. Governments must also keep testing, testing and testing. It's also time for people to finally admit the world as they once knew it is dead.
"At the same time, we will not, we cannot go back to the way things were (because of the disease)," argued WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. He said every single person can make a difference in controlling the spread of the pandemic.
SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2), is the virus that causes COVID-19.
Learning how to live with SARS-CoV-2 will help people worldwide continue to suppress transmission and identify cases and clusters that arise. This vigilance will allow public health professionals to quickly prevent the disease's spread and minimize as many deaths as possible. Lockdowns might be necessary from time to time.
Dr. Tedros emphasized world leaders and the public must learn to manage SARS-CoV-2, and make the difficult but permanent adjustments to their daily lives needed to bring the virus down to low and manageable levels. In the meantime, everyone has to learn to live with the virus.
Dr. Tedros, however, affirmed a safe and effective vaccine is a vital tool in the global fight against this highly infectious disease. On the other hand, there's no guarantee scientists will even develop this vaccine, or that any of the vaccines now under development will be safe and effective. WHO said there are at least 30 potential vaccines currently in clinical trials while more than 150 are being developed.
Dr. Tedros previously said there is no "silver bullet" against SARS-CoV-2 and "there might never be." What world governments can do in the meantime is to keep implementing the basics of public health and disease control.
"Testing, isolating and treating patients and tracing and quarantining their contacts," said Dr. Tedros. "Do it all. Inform, empower and listen to communities. Do it all."
As for individuals, every person and family has a responsibility to know the level of COVID-19 transmission locally and to understand what they must do to protect themselves and others from contracting or spreading the disease.
Earlier this month, WHO described the pandemic as "one big wave" and not a seasonal affliction. Worse, it said COVID-19 will be with us until the end of time and will never be eradicated.
WHO spokesperson Dr. Margaret Harris also said the disease doesn't share flu's tendency to follow seasons because this virus is behaving differently from the seasonal flu.
