Nearly three years into the global pandemic, the virus is becoming less pathogenic. In response, China’s prevention and control measures have also been adjusted, with local prevention and control measures being scaled back.
In recent days, many places in China have made intensive adjustments to the COVID-19 prevention and control measures, including canceling strict nucleic acid code tests, reducing the frequency of nucleic acid tests, narrowing the high-risk range, and keeping qualified close contacts and confirmed cases under special circumstances at home. Strict Class A epidemic prevention and control measures, which have been in place since early 2020, are being relaxed. According to the requirements of infectious disease prevention and control, the current prevention and control measures are also showing the characteristics of Class B management.
Recently, a number of experts on different occasions to put forward a new understanding of Omicron.
According to the People’s Daily app, Chong Yutian, a professor of infection at the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University and the general manager of Huangpu Makeshift Hospital in Guangzhou, said in an interview that “the academic community has not confirmed the sequelae of COVID-19, at least there is no evidence of sequelae.”
Recently, LAN Ke, director of the State Key Laboratory of Virology at Wu University, said in an interview that the research team he led found that the ability of Omicron variant to infect human lung cells (calu-3) was significantly lower than that of the original strain, and the replication efficiency in cells was more than 10 times lower than that of the original strain. It was also found in the mouse infection model that the original strain required only 25-50 infective dose units to kill mice, while the Omicron strain required more than 2000 infective dose units to kill mice. And the amount of virus in the lungs of mice infected with Omicron was at least 100 times lower than that of the original strain. He said the above experimental results can effectively show that the virulence and virulence of the Omicron variant of the novel coronavirus has been significantly reduced compared with the original coronavirus strain. This suggests that we should not panic too much about Omicron. For the general population, the new coronavirus is not as harmful as it used to be under the protection of the vaccine.
Zhao Yubin, president of Shijiazhuang People’s Hospital and head of the medical treatment team, also said at a recent press conference that although the Omicron strain BA.5.2 has strong infectivity, its pathogenicity and virulence are significantly weakened compared with the previous strain, and its harm to human health is limited. He also said that it is necessary to deal with the novel coronavirus scientifically. With more experience in fighting the virus, more in-depth understanding of the characteristics of the virus and more ways to deal with it, the public need not panic and anxiety.
Vice Premier Sun Chunlan pointed out at a symposium on November 30 that China faces new situations and tasks in epidemic prevention and control as the disease becomes less pathogenic, vaccination becomes more widespread and experience in prevention and control is accumulated. We should focus on the people, make progress while ensuring stability in the prevention and control work, continue to optimize the prevention and control policies, take small steps without stopping, constantly improve diagnosis, testing, admission and quarantine measures, strengthen the immunization of the whole population, especially the elderly, speed up the preparation of therapeutic drugs and medical resources, and fulfill the requirements of preventing the epidemic, stabilizing the economy, and ensuring safe development.
At the symposium on January 1, she once again pointed out that making progress while maintaining stability, taking small steps without stopping, and proactively optimizing the prevention and control policies are an important experience for China’s epidemic prevention and control. After nearly three years of fighting the epidemic, China’s medical, health and disease control systems have stood the test. We have effective diagnosis and treatment technologies and medicines, especially traditional Chinese medicine. The full vaccination rate of the whole population has exceeded 90%, and people’s health awareness and literacy have improved significantly.
Post time: Dec-05-2022