Europe should brace for second wave, says EU
coronavirus chief
Exclusive: ‘The question is how big,’ says Dr Andrea
Ammon, who thinks March skiing breaks were pivotal to spread
Daniel
Boffey in Brussels
Wed 20 May
2020 14.09 BSTLast modified on Wed 20 May 2020 18.25 BST
Andrea Ammon: ‘I don’t want to draw a doomsday picture
but I think we have to be realistic. That it’s not the time now to completely
relax.’
The
prospect of a second wave of coronavirus infection across Europe is no longer a
distant theory, according to the director of the EU agency responsible for
advising governments – including the UK – on disease control.
“The
question is when and how big, that is the question in my view,” said Dr Andrea
Ammon, director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control
(ECDC).
It has been
the unenviable task of scientists to tell it as it is through the coronavirus
pandemic. While politicians have been caught offering empty reassurances, the
epidemiologists, a job title new to many, have emerged as the straight shooters
of the crisis, sometimes to their detriment.
And Ammon,
a former adviser to the German government, speaks frankly in her first
interview with a UK newspaper since the crisis began.
“Looking at
the characteristics of the virus, looking at what now emerges from the
different countries in terms of population immunity – which isn’t all that
exciting, between 2% and 14%, that leaves still 85% to 90% of the population
susceptible – the virus is around us, circulating much more than January and
February … I don’t want to draw a doomsday picture but I think we have to be
realistic. That it’s not the time now to completely relax.”
Earlier
this month the former hospital doctor, who worked through the various levels of
healthcare bureaucracy to be become ECDC director in 2017, announced that, as
of 2 May, Europe as a whole had passed the peak of infections. Only Poland was
technically not yet there, she said.
European
governments have started easing their lockdown restrictions, some to the extent
that bars and restaurants will soon reopen, others rather more tentatively.
Boris Johnson has tweaked his message to Britons from “stay at home” to “stay
alert” and is seeking to send pupils back into schools in a fortnight.
Ammon’s job
is to scrutinise the fallout and catch any rise in infections early. Talking
through Skype from her kitchen at home, from where she has been working
remotely for the last two months, she insists a disastrous second wave is not
inevitable if people stick to the rules and keep their distance.
But she
detects an ominous weakening of the public’s resolve.
“I think
now it’s beginning to strain. What we see is that, on the one hand, the
economic part for small and medium-sized businesses but also the experience of
people not being able to exercise all the freedoms that we normally have: to go
where we like, to be with whom we want to be. And this is a quite fundamental
change to our normal way of life.
“And especially now when it is clear [infections] are
going down, people think it is over. Which it isn’t, which it definitely
isn’t.”
Asked
whether the data was showing any repercussions, Ammon gave a deadpan answer.
“Not yet. I mean, maybe it doesn’t come ever, maybe all the adjustment of these
measures is done in a prudent way. This is something we are really right now
are closely monitoring: what is happening after all these measures.”
As of
Wednesday 158,134 people have died from Covid-19 in the EU and the UK, Norway,
Liechtenstein and Iceland, according to ECDC data for the countries the agency
monitors.
The UK has
the highest level of deaths in Europe, with 35,341, followed by Italy (32,169)
and France (28,022).
A total of
1,324,183 cases of infection have been reported. Among those is a member of
Ammon’s own staff. Only a skeleton group of fewer than 10 now work in the
agency’s office in Stockholm.
“Part of
our crisis team that needs to be there because they need very close
cooperation. But they’re sitting wide apart. Honestly. We have to do what we
preach.”
Ammon
recalls that it was only in late January that it had become clear that a novel
virus causing a cluster of deaths in the Chinese city of Wuhan could be
transmitted human to human, with initial concerns focusing on the possibility
of the disease spreading through imports.
As the
extremely contagious nature of the virus emerged, the ECDC advised governments
on 26 January to strengthen the capacities of their health services. There was
fear of them being overwhelmed, as was shortly to be the case with tragic
results in Lombardy in northern Italy.
“We did
really emphasise that these plans have to be updated. And in particular, the
hospital preparedness needs to be looked at, how to make sure to have a surge
capacity for beds, in general, but also in particular for intensive care unit
beds.
“I think
what turned out is that [the governments] underestimated, in my view, the speed
of how this increase came. Because, I mean, you know, it’s a different
situation if you have to look for an increase capacity of beds within two weeks
or within two days.”
Ammon
believes that when the inevitable inquiries look into the twists and turns of
the crisis, the return of holidaymakers from Alpine skiing breaks in the first
week of March will be seen as a pivotal moment in the spread of Covid-19 into
Europe.
“Because at
that time we saw that new cases all over Europe [and] actually [they] had been
in the skiing places in the Alps, in Italy, Austria. I mean this is a crowded
place, the ski resorts, and then you have these cabins that you go up the
mountain and these are really crammed. Yeah, it’s just perfect for such a
virus. I mean I am pretty sure that this contributed to the wide spread in
Europe.”
Lockdowns
followed – a theoretical possibility in the pandemic planning that few believed
was feasible. “I remember when China put the lockdown to Wuhan, people told me,
‘Look this wouldn’t be possible in Europe.’ Hmm.”
Now the
lockdowns were straining the public’s tolerance, she said, but questioned
whether they still came in too late and whether swifter action could have saved
more lives. “I believe if we would have put in these measures earlier, it might
have been possible, but … these measures are so stark, I mean they are so out
of our experience that it, I think it needed … unfortunately the situation in
northern Italy to make everybody clear that it is necessary.”
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Ammon now
believes the battle with coronavirus will be a long haul. “I don’t know whether
it’s forever but I don’t think it will go away very quickly. It seems to be
very well adapted to humans.”
She is yet
to book a summer holiday and warns those craving a break away to prepare for
some disappointment. “What we are saying is that they should be prepared that
even if there are some holidays and they go somewhere, it will not be
comparable to what they had last year. At this stage we cannot say you can go
out there, wash your hands and everything is fine. You have to keep your
distance. These measures have to be in place.”
But despite
the privations of recent months, Ammon expresses little sympathy for the argument
put forward by some, including the former supreme court judge Jonathan Sumption
that merely shielding the elderly would have been sufficient.
“People who
are perfectly healthy are also getting severe illness and they die. Knowing
what we have seen in Europe with approximately 10% of the population [infected]
I think there is for me not an option to let this go. If the the other 90%
would have come as well, I think we don’t want to think of this.”
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