the worrying alert from the epidemiologist who anticipated a pandemic

Michael Osterholm published the book “The Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs” in 2017. There the epidemiologist wrote: “A lot of people will die although we have the technology to save them. “

The expert, in a way, anticipated the pandemic. “Health systems and hospitals will suffer severely. As long as the cases do not exceed the capacity of the intensive care units, these units will be able to help patients with severe flu symptoms, ”he said.

And he continued, “If a business in China suddenly cannot operate because 30% or 40% of the workforce is sick, we will not have any stock of products until the reopening. factory. crisis of this style in different places at the same time, and factories do not receive supplies from other factories, we will see a domino effect in which the market and exports suffer with the savings that will start to fail“, he predicted.

And he continued, “But what if the number of cases exceeds 30%? We must protect health professionals with respirators and with protective masks and chin straps “.

Michael Osterholm’s catastrophic warning

Today, almost four years after his prediction, Osterholm once again raised his voice. And, this time he spoke of the complications in the United States that the new British strain might have.

“I think, in a way, we are almost in a new pandemic”Osterholm warns in an interview with Fox News on Sunday. However, one positive aspect of the current coronavirus vaccines stands out: they are effective against this dominant variant, which is none other than the British (says B.1.1.7).

Besides its most contagious characteristic, the expert assures that it is also possible that it affects children, an age group which during the pandemic was not compromised by the coronavirus. “Unlike previous strains of the virus, we didn’t see children under eighth grade were frequently infected or weren’t sick very often,” says Osterholm, who “very important role in transmission. In Minnesota alone, in the last two weeks we’ve had 749 schools with cases. “

Due to the greater predominance of the British variant, the epidemiologist urges more stringent measures, as have other countries when presenting more and more cases of this variant. “There isn’t a country in the world right now that has seen a huge increase in B.1.1.7 that’s not closing.. We are the exception. The message from these countries is that we could not control this virus until we shut down. “

In this way, it makes sure that action needs to be taken to “help the public understand that it is short term. All we are trying to do is get over it. this increase in cases that will occur over the next six to eight or ten weeks by this variant. We’re just at the start of this wave, we haven’t even started to see it yet. “

In this sense, Osterholm likened the situation to a freak of nature: “I see this category five or more hurricane 450 miles from the coast. And it will be hard to tell people to evacuate on this beautiful sky day. blue. But also I can tell you that the hurricane is coming“, He said.

The steps to follow, according to Michael Osterholm

How to act in the face of such a catastrophic panorama? Osterholm – who is also director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy (CIDRAP) – made this clear.

“We want to give everyone two doses, but I think at the moment, given this scenario of increasing infections, we need to administer the same. first doses in as many people over 65 as you can, ”he said.

According to the expert, the main objective is to try “reduce the most severe cases disease and death.

One hundred million adults In the United States, they are already fully vaccinated against Covid-19, White House coronavirus response director Jeff Zients announced on Friday.

“There are 100 million Americans with a sense of relief and tranquility knowing that after a long and difficult year they are protected from the virus,” Zients told reporters at a White House briefing. on Covid-19.

Although the total number of deaths from the pandemic in the United States has exceeded 575,000, the death rate has fallen to an average of 670 per day, well down from the high of 3,400 in mid-January.

In total, more than 237 million doses of some of the available vaccines: Moderna and BioNTech / Pfizer, which require two injections, and Johnson & Johnson as a single dose, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).