COVID-19 Deaths Before A Vaccine?

By Joseph ChamieNEW YORK, May 4 2020 (IPS) How many COVID-19 deaths will occur before a vaccine becomes available worldwide? As with many seemingly simple questions about an uncertain future, the proper answer to that important query is: “it depends”. The total worldwide number of deaths from COVID-19 before a vaccine, reported to be nearly a quarter-million at the end of April and amounting to a five-fold increase since the start of April, is hard to predict. It depends on a host of critical factors, many of which are not well understood and are changing rapidly. In the absence of a vaccine and limited success in limiting the spread of COVID-19, the percent of the world’s population becoming infected could reach 70 percent, the level roughly estimated to reach herd immunity. With an infection level of 70 percent and a 1 percent fatality rate, the resulting number of deaths from COVID-19 is 55 million, or about 0.7 percent of the world’s population Among those factors are the pandemic’s duration, the dissemination of the disease, the contagiousness and fatality of the virus, the virus’ basic reproductive rate (R0), human bodily responses, access to and quality of health care, available treatments for the illness, immunity after the illness, population susceptibility and the effectiveness of mitigation policies to reduce the virus’ spread. The true number of deaths due to Covid-19 deaths will likely never be known precisely for several reasons. Many COVID-19 dea...
Source: IPS Inter Press Service - Health - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: Featured Global Headlines Health TerraViva United Nations Source Type: news