Almost three years after its appearance, Covid-19 continues to circulate globallycausing new infections, deaths and representing a heavy burden on national health systems. In order for the emergency to be over, concerted efforts are needed that involve all sectors of society, from an international and multidisciplinary perspective. This is what emerges from a new study coordinated by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health and published in the journal Nature who collected the opinions of 386 experts in different disciplines from 112 countries around the world with the aim of finding solutions to end the Covid-19 health threat. The result was 41 consensus statements and 57 recommendations addressed to governments, national health systems, industry and all other actors involved in the emergency.
A threat still present
630 million cases and beyond 6.5 million deaths: these are the numbers of the Covid-19 emergency since Sars-cov-2 began to circulate, at the end of 2019, until today. Despite vaccines, new antiviral therapies and infection prevention strategies have played a fundamental role to limit the effects of the pandemicthe problems related to it are certainly not over: in addition to the infections, which continue to occur all over the world, millions of people cured of the infection continue to deal with the symptoms of long covid, while many patients with tumors and diseases chronic have suffered delays in health care potentially dangerous. In addition, as it continues to spread, Sars-cov-2 accumulates mutations in its genome that can lead to the onset of new ones variants more infectious and able to escape the immune system of people vaccinated and cured of the infection. In addition to these problems, despite scientific advances, the reply global to pandemic is hampered by numerous factors of a political, social and behavioral nature (such as the spread of fake news, vaccination hesitancy, global unequal distribution of equipment, vaccines and treatments). For all these reasons, the authors of this study point out, Covid-19 continues to be a threat to global health, that needs solutions.
To develop a global consensus on how to address these issues, the authors conducted a Delphi study, a consolidated research methodology which aims to involve experts independent of one or more sectors for collect shared answers to complex questions, in which each of them, based on the level of consensus it receives from the experts involved in the study, receives a more or less high score. In particular, the authors have convened a multidisciplinary panel of 386 experts from 112 countries around the worldor from public institutions, academia, non-governmental organizations and other sectors involved in the response to health emergencies, where specific actions to end the threat posed by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The results
From the study they emerged 41 statements and 57 recommendations in six areas related to pandemic management: communication, national health systems, vaccinations, prevention strategies, treatments and therapies, social inequalities. The recommendations that have accumulated the most consensus concern the adoption of pandemic response approaches that involve all actors in society and the governments of all countriesin order not to fragment actions and disperse efforts, as well as maintaining adequate prevention continuing to use vaccination strategies, but through an approach “vaccine plus”, Ie combining vaccinations with financial support and public health measures. Other recommendations concern the improvement of communication between companies, health institutions and people involved in scientific research, aimed at rebuild public trust And involve communities in managing pandemic responses. Finally, the authors highlighted the need for put an end to inequalities (like the unfair distribution of vaccines) really put an end to the pandemic.
“Our study echoes some previous recommendations, the World Health Organization’s 2022 plan on strategic epidemic preparedness“says Jeffrey Lazarus, coordinator of the study.”But what makes this work unique is the huge number of consulted experts, the geographical breadth of the representation and the design of the study, which emphasizes consensus building and identifies areas of disagreement. It could prove to be a good model for developing responses to future global health emergencies“.
