Are Young People Immune to Coronavirus?
As Dr. Pauci in a conversation with Trevor Noah stressed, two strong arguments prove that youngsters are equally vulnerable to Coronavirus as other people. First of all, even if a young person infected with Coronavirus might not die, he quite possibly might reach the intensive care stage where he will have to be hospitalized and given invaluable medical resources, which can instead be used to save another person’s life. Secondly, even though young people may show little or no symptoms, they might act as a vector infecting aged people around them, resulting in a lost life. So if young people around the world think they are impervious to the Coronavirus, they need to think again.
Can Blow-Drying Your Nose Kill Coronavirus?
The dumb questions never end. A county member of the US in a senate meeting said that the Coronavirus breaks apart at 130 degrees Fahrenheit and hence blow-drying your nose will kill the Coronavirus living in your nostrils. I don’t know which part is dumber. Blow drying your nose, which will dry it up and make it more susceptible to Viruses or thinking a blow dryer can reach a temperature of 130 degrees Fahrenheit.
Can Drugs like Chloroquine or Remdisivir help in treating COVID-19?
As has been mentioned many times by WHO and CDC, the use of medicines that are either not approved yet or are approved for a different disease should, in no case, be used to treat COVID-19. The hoarding of Chloroquine and Remdisivir might make them scarce for patients who need it for their actual use, i.e., for treating Malaria or Ebola. Having said that, many drug trials are currently underway in the United States and China to test whether these unorthodox anti-viral drugs can be used to treat patients with Coronavirus. The jury’s still out on these drugs and taking them without physician’s advice might do you more damage than good. I want to stress again that scientists all around the world are trying to find out a cure and/or a vaccine for Coronavirus. Until they do, we need to sit tight and avoid self-medicating.
Why are Big Pharma Companies not interested in Making Vaccines?
Big pharmaceutical companies are naturally dependent on chronic diseases and long-term health conditions for their profit margin. Hence most of the pharma companies don’t consider it viable to create vaccines that can make people immune to a particular disease and essentially make their long-term profit negligible, especially compared to the huge initial investment. This added to the fact that global government agencies and WHO have not been particularly rewarding to vaccine making companies is also a demotivating factor. This is the reason we don’t even have a vaccine of SARS inspite of the fact that the SARS outbreak came in 2002. Of course, this is invariably affecting the development of a vaccine for Coronavirus.
Why is it Taking So Much Time to Make the Vaccine?
Let me tell you what Dr. Anthony Fauci, the US Director of National Institute of Allergy, and a leading world health expert, said in an interview. A vaccine before deploying needs to be safe for human use and to prove that it takes a minimum of 3 months. After that, you need to show through phase two trials that the vaccine actually works, i.e., it builds immunity for viruses like Coronavirus. Given that we would be administering these vaccines to healthy people that don’t have Coronavirus to begin with, we have to be absolutely sure that the vaccines won’t present unique problems or side effects of their own. Hence this process takes from one to one and a half years. Good news is given the WHO and CDC’s efforts, it seems that the time might be cut to half.
Can a 21-Day Nationwide Lockdown Kill Coronavirus?
This is a relative question, and whichever way we pose it, no absolute answer can be given for it. First of all, Coronavirus is a novel virus, which means it is the first of its kind. No one in the world knows how it might play out. Secondly, a virus that took around 4 to 5 months to set its talons in our country will surely not go away magically in 3 weeks. For China, it took more than eight weeks for the growth of the infected population to go from exponential to linear. In India, a 21-day lockdown would, of course, go a long way in stopping the spread of Coronavirus. But it’s too early to tell if it will be enough.
Is U.S. About to Become the Next Italy?
The United States had systematically failed just like Italy in gathering intelligence about the impending pandemic when the initial warning signs arose. Even when it became apparent with China and Italy’s example what is waiting for them in the future, US president Donald Trump, instead of mobilizing medical staff to prepare for the impending pandemic, chose to remain silent. Trump’s indecisiveness in locking down the country when it mattered, and the citizen’s cavalier attitude towards COVID-19 has resulted in more than 160 thousand ongoing cases in the United States of America as of 31st March. I predict this number to go even further up in April. Unless Donald Trump can open his eyes and smell what Coronavirus is cooking, the United States is in for a medical as well as an economic disaster.
Is India Facing an Economic Recession?
Quite possibly, yes. India’s economy was well on its way to an economic downfall before Coronavirus, all thanks to the rising unemployment rates and absence of governmental initiatives to tackle the problem. Coronavirus has undoubtedly acted as a trigger and sped up the process for the economic recession. COVID-19 is going to have a substantially detrimental effect on India’s economy, which will take a long time for us to recover from. Why then are we locking down the country, you ask? Locking down entire India might probably speed up the recession, but I’m equally sure if thousands of people die overnight due to the Coronavirus, the economy won’t be benefited either. There is no right answer here. In essence, the nationwide lockdown is the lesser evil here.
Suburban Wordsmith 