by With the progressive decrease in cases and deaths from covid-19 that is occurring almost uniformly in the world, the concerns of the scientific community and multilateral health entities have also changed.
One of the concerns that has become more relevant in recent years has to do with the large number of patients who continue to have disease burdens after the virus has left their bodies.
This worries the authorities because some people even suffer from symptoms that can affect their daily life and prevent them from carrying out daily activities such as studying or working. The symptoms also They can come and go, which is why medical professionals have also had trouble diagnosing them correctly.
The figures from the studies that have been reviewed by entities such as the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) have shown that between 10% and 20% of patients may present postcovid symptoms after being infected.
“If we base those numbers on a conservative estimated incidence of 10% of people infected, we have millions of people around the world who have had that condition at some point after an acute infection or have symptoms at the present time.”explained Sylvain Aldighieri, head of Incidents for covid-19 at PAHO.
Symptoms can appear between one and three months after getting sick and staying sick, added Marcos Espinal, deputy director of PAHO, office for the Americas of the World Health Organization (WHO). He clarified that they are very diverse: from fatigue to lung, neurological or mental health problems.
“The key to preventing this syndrome is basically to continue vaccinating,” with the recommended doses and boosters, Espinal said. “The important thing is to end the pandemic” and “it is confirmed that if we do not get vaccinated, the risk is much greater to develop post-covid syndrome,” she warned.
As a public health problem, post-covid has aroused concern in the scientific community.
According to Aldighieri, some therapies have been effective for certain conditions and 33 clinical trials on the treatment are currently underway but “more large-scale studies are needed.”
At the same press conference, the director of PAHO, Jarbas Barbosa, warned that the danger persists although the situation is “much better”, with an “incidence of covid-19 between 20 and 30 times lower than that of a year ago.” ”.
On average, PAHO pointed out that the region of the Americas is the second with the highest level of coverage in vaccination against covid-19 in the world, because about 71% of the population is already vaccinated.
However, Jarbas Barbosa pointed out that the pandemic continues. “It is still with us and the virus has yet to settle into a predictable pattern”held.
“We are now out of the most acute phase,” said the PAHO director, but he also acknowledged that “everything can change, for example, if we have a new variant, which is why it is very important to consider that the pandemic has not yet ended.”
In addition, recommended “continue vaccinating to save lives, and maintain surveillance in all countries to identify changes in transmission trends.”
Vaccines “are excellent for preventing severe forms and deaths, but they still do not have the capacity to completely prevent circulation,” stressed the PAHO director, who reported more than 1.5 million new cases and 17,000 deaths during the last month in the American continent.
According to the independent count by Johns Hopkins University, around 676 million cases of covid-19 have been reported worldwide as of March 10. In addition, there have been 6.8 million deaths.
In return, this educational institution has identified that around 13,338 million anticovid doses have been applied worldwide, which means that the number of vaccines applied is greater than the number of inhabitants on the planet (which is around 8 billion). ).
According to Johns Hopkins University, The country with the most cases of covid-19 in the world is the United States, since to date it has accumulated more than 103.8 million cases and close to 1.1 million deaths as a result of the pandemic.
For this reason, public policies to deal with post-covid syndrome require greater attention from the authorities in that country.
Figures from Johns Hopkins University show that Asia is one of the most affected continents in the world, since three of the five countries with the highest number of deaths are located in that region of the planet.
After the United States, Japan is the second national territory where more people have been affected as a result of covid-19, since it accumulates about 33 million infections due to this cause and around 73,000 deaths. On the other hand, South Korea accumulates about 30.3 million infections and adds about 34,000 deaths.
Asia, in addition, was on alert because China presented the last major outbreak of covid-19 in the world between December last year and the beginning of January this year. The peak of infections and deaths, however, was controlled and for now has not caused the appearance of variants of the coronavirus of concern that put global public health at risk.
*With information from AFP
