Europe 1 11:15 am, January 08, 2022

While more than 300,000 cases of contamination have been identified in the past 24 hours and the Omicron wave has still not fallen, some scientists are hoping for an upcoming release.

Others even foresee the end of the pandemic by 2023, with some reservations.  

Currently, nearly 20,000 people are hospitalized, as the Omicron wave hits hard.

However, for Denis Malvy, infectious disease specialist at Bordeaux University Hospital and member of the scientific council, the end of the pandemic may be closer than we think.

"A severe respiratory virus pandemic, historically, is three years. We are almost two years old."

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A year and a half, two years, two and a half years?

For the scientist, we are currently "under an epidemic within an epidemic" due to the spread of the Omicron variant. But elsewhere than in France, the wave has already (or almost) dried up. "We see the United Kingdom which is on a downward plateau, South Africa which has now completely crossed the Omicron wave. We can bet that Omicron will not let go of our country and the neighboring countries and that he will help, alongside vaccination, to ensure that in a year and a half, two years, two and a half years, we will be as much of our society as possible to be carriers of antibodies. , and then against bad luck, by illness. " 

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The end of the tunnel"

Still, this does not mean that new variants cannot appear in the meantime.

"We cannot say that we will not have other waves (...) but in the current context, these waves should be less important", presses the infectious disease specialist.

But if since the beginning of 2022, "we see the exit of the tunnel", there are still uncertainties, in terms of chronology, on the end of the pandemic.

"What we have a hard time estimating is the distance between where we are today and the exit of the tunnel."