Responsible for "Global Health": Life will not return to what it was before 2022

Soumya Swaminathan.

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It is unlikely that life will return to normal as it was before the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic, before 2022, said the Deputy Director-General of the World Health Organization for Program Affairs, Soumiya Swaminathan.

"The way people imagine is that in January, we will have vaccines for the whole world and things will start to return to normal," Swaminathan told the South China Morning Post, stressing that this thinking is just a fantasy and not a reality.

She indicated that the most realistic schedule places the launch of the Corona vaccine during the middle of 2021, and that vaccination will not happen overnight, and wearing face coverings and social distancing will remain necessary for a period of time after that.

"We need 60% to 70% of the population to have immunity to the virus before we start to see a significant reduction in the transmission of this virus," Swaminathan said in a virtual meeting hosted by the United Nations Foundation.

And she continued, "Also, even if we get the vaccine, we do not know to what degree these vaccines will protect, and there is another big question mark, how many months will the immunity last?"

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