For PAHO, “the threat of the virus is still real”: what is the situation of the pandemic in the Americas

“Although it seems to us that it has already happened and that the danger has passed, we would like to affirm that the The COVID-19 pandemic is not over”. With this energetic sentence, Dr. Jarbas Barbosa, director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) opened the seminarThree years of COVID-19 and other health issues in the Americas”.

Barbosa led the meeting of PAHO experts who took stock of the coronavirus situation in the Americas region, while leaving signs for the future of how will SARS-CoV-2 behave and what are the best tools to get out of the current pandemic.

“The Americas has been one of the regions of the world hardest hit by the coronavirus. We have had 190 million positive cases, which is 25% of the global total. But we suffered 2.9 million deathswhich represents 43% of the total of the planet in three years”, assured the medical specialist during the conference which he attended Infobase. Furthermore, he clarified that it has been a very difficult time for the region and that no country is prepared for the arrival of the new virus.

“We are in a totally different situation today than we were in three years ago. The incidence of COVID today is 20 or 30 times lower than last year and, in this sense, PAHO has managed to carry out very important work regarding the information needed to deal with the pandemic and access to tools to fight it, such as vaccinessaid Barbosa, who pointed out that America is the region with the second highest level of vaccination coverage in the world, with 71% of people vaccinated.

For this reason, the director of PAHO has asked the countries that make up the American continent to maintain vigilance and observation of the pathogen. “The threat of the virus is still real,” warned Barbosa, who praised PAHO’s work in terms of articulating the regional variant sequencing network, which contributed more than 580,000 SARS-CoV-2 sequences to the Global COVID Pandemic Surveillance Network.

The PAHO Director also highlighted the Organization’s role in the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, “mobilizing more than 160 million doses through COVAX and helping countries in Latin America and the Caribbean distribute more than 1 .3 billion doses in less than two years”. Despite these achievements, Dr Barbosa warned that “COVID-19 is still with us and the virus has not yet established itself in a predictable pattern.” “In the last month we have seen over 1.5 million new cases and 17,000 deaths,” he said. “We cannot let our guard down.

Dr. Ciro Ugarte, Director of Health Emergencies at PAHO, also spoke during the virtual meeting and stressed that we must continue to maintain immunization as a priority for all, while creating more and better access. to continue with the high rates of protection against new variants of COVID concern.

“We have learned a lot in the last three years about the health sector, technology, new ways of organizing ourselves, protecting ourselves, personal hygiene habits, the use of a face mask and gel, the way to greet each other and new ways of coexistence.We should continue to take care of ourselves and focus on learning how to prevent the emergence of new pathogens.Many countries are still looking for the origin of COVID. Previous research on the occurrence of other pandemics can help us in this backward research so that we can later prevent future diseases,” Ugarte said.

One of the most expressed concerns at the seminar was about recorded cases of protracted COVID or long covid, which are the manifestations of coronavirus disease when more than three months have passed since the original infection. PAHO deputy director Dr Marcos Espinal said the main symptoms people are experiencing today are fatigue and mental health issues.

“These are the main conditions of prolonged COVID. And to avoid them in the future, a series of treatments are being studied. It is also important to continue to be vaccinated against COVID, with the necessary reinforcements. We know that 10% of people who have had a coronavirus can develop post-COVID syndromes. And if you don’t get vaccinated, the risk is greater. Although it appears that COVID has passed and prolonged COVID is the primary public health hazard, it is actually the coronavirus pandemic,” Espinal said.

Meanwhile, Dr. Sylvain Aldighieri, PAHO Incident Manager for COVID-19, clarified that “certain therapies have been effective for certain COVID conditions in the long term. OPS has developed a quick exam with an updated platform to answer all doubts. There are many new and repurposed drugs to test their effectiveness against the prolonged symptoms of this disease,” he said.

And he highlighted the diagnostic methods being developed: “Laboratory tests, imaging tests to detect clots and arrhythmia detection tests are some of the tools we have.”

Finally, Barbosa said the lessons we can learn from COVID are very important in dealing with other recent health threats, such as avian flu. “Duty build and strengthen existing surveillance systems to identify a change in a known disease or when a new one emerges. And have all the tools to act immediately,” he stressed.

“Over the past decades, when we look at emergencies like SARS, MERS, influenza, COVID-19, we have to remember that we always have to refine the spectrum of surveillance. Today we know we have to change it and make it more efficient. We must look for ways to have a better system for monitoring and preventing diseases so that they pass the biological barrier and can jump to humans. This is one of the most pressing challenges we face,” the expert said.

And he added: “In primary health care, it is necessary to strengthen all measures. Work with communities to inform people, monitor patients, communicate with health authorities. And regarding COVID, identify new variants to continue the trend of fewer cases and fewer deaths. And keep vaccinating despite ongoing smear campaigns and fake news about vaccine effectiveness. In this way, we will be better prepared for a future emergency, he stressed.

“Reaching the 30% of people who have not yet received the primary round of the COVID-19 vaccine is also essential to prepare for any new wave of the virus or new variant of concern,” Barbosa concluded.

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