As the rest of the world reopens its economies, it seems that other experts are getting complacent about the coronavirus, starting with Italy. However, The World Health Organization (WHO) still views the coronavirus as a “killer virus.”
While the race for a vaccine still wages on and markets try to decipher with what’s going to happen for the next couple of months, it looks like the coronavirus pandemic isn’t getting any better.
As of this writing, the COVID-19 cases worldwide are now at 6.3 million, according to the latest data from Johns Hopkins University.
Some Italian doctors had suggested that the virus was weakening when they noticed the number of cases declined. However, public-health authorities, along with the WHO, have questioned the claims, and it seems that the world is going into a debate.
New coronavirus losing its strength Italian doctors observe
As per Reuters, medical experts in Italy have claimed that the virus “clinically no longer exists”—this was according to Alberto Zangrillo, the head of the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan. In addition, Zangrillo said on an RAI television interview to support his claim:
“The swabs that were performed over the last 10 days showed a viral load in quantitative terms that was absolutely infinitesimal compared to the ones carried out a month or two months ago.”
He also said that some experts were too alarmed about the possibility of a second wave of coronavirus infections.
Also, the Italian government interfered with Zagrillo’s argument on June 1.
Sandra Zampa, an undersecretary at the health ministry, stated that those experts who want to claim that the coronavirus has weakened should support it with scientific evidence to avoid confusion.
She also invites the Italians to be extremely careful, especially when they are about to open travel between regions and return to a normal life.
Matteo Bassetti, the director of the infectious disease clinic of the San Martino hospital in Genoa, also said that the virus is no longer the same, claiming that “the firepower it had two months ago is not the same firepower it has today,” per a report from ANSA.
Italy currently has one of the highest death tolls in the world, recording over 33,000 deaths, at the time of writing.
WHO: Coronavirus transmission and severity has not changed
Even though Italy is claiming that the coronavirus is losing its potency, the WHO disagrees.
During the WHO press briefing, Maria Van Kerkhove, a technical lead of WHO, says the virus still has the ability to super spread across people, with the potential to be an epidemic.
She also emphasized the way COVID-19 reproduces in close contact, which is still felt by countries that are still carrying the virus. Furthermore, she also insisted that testing, tracing, and isolating remained to be the action plan for the WHO.
In addition, WHO executive director Michael Ryan still views this as a “killer virus” and that people still need to be careful.
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