Everyone knows by now the Pandemic started . What no one knows yet is how the pandemic will end. This coronavirus is unprecedented in the combination of its easy transmissibility , a range of symptoms going from none at all to deadly, and the extent that it has disrupted the world. A highly susceptible population led to near exponential growth in cases. But past pandemics do offer hints of the future. While there is no one historical example to follow, humanity has gone through several large epidemics in the past 100 or so years that eventually stopped ravaging society. The ways they came to a halt offer guidance to a world looking for ways to restore health and some sense of normalcy. Three of those experiences, suggest that what happens next depends on both the evolution of the pathogen and of the human response to it, both biological and social. Projections about how COVID-19 will play out are speculative, but the end game will most likely involve a mix of everything that checked past pandemics: Continued social-control measures to buy time, new antiviral medications to ease symptoms, and a vaccine. The exact formula—how long control measures such as social distancing must stay in place, for instance—depends in large part on how strictly people obey restrictions and how effectively governments respond. The other 50 percent will probably come from science. Researchers have banded together like never before and are working on multiple fronts to develop remedies. If any of the several antiviral medications currently in development prove effective, they will improve treatment options and lower the numbers who get seriously ill or die. Previously used only in local epidemics, these new serological assays won’t end the pandemic, but they could make it possible to spot and use antibody-rich blood as a treatment for critically ill patients; more certainly, the tests will also get people back to work faster if those who fought off the virus and are immune can be identified. It will take a vaccine to stop transmission. That will take time—probably a year from now. Still, there is reason to think a vaccine could work effectively. Compared with flu viruses, coronaviruses don’t have as many ways to interact with host cells. Unless a vaccine is administered to all of the world’s eight billion inhabitants who are not currently sick or recovered, COVID-19 is likely to become endemic. The combination of vaccination and natural immunity will protect many of us. The coronavirus, like most viruses, will live on—but not as a planetary plague.
It is not clear yet, however good practice hygiene and maintaining the social distance will prevent further spread.
Agree with Zena A.M. Aljawadi . there is no noe know how the pandemic will end.
Maybe we should live in peace with this virus, because there is a possibility of a second wave. When this condition occurs (living peacefully with a virus) it is known as the new normal
This is not a question but a small lecture.
The conclusion is given in the last sentences:
The coronavirus, like most viruses, will live on—but not as a planetary plague.
The virus may become less virulent/avirulent due to mutations, the spike protein may misfit with ACE2 due to mutations resulting in an inability to enter into the cells, herd immunity due to natural infections, and or vaccinations. Single or combinations of the said events might result at an end of the pandemic.
Please have a look at the following link:
https://health.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/industry/when-will-the-covid-19-pandemic-end-and-how/75674711
We know how the COVID-19 pandemic began: Bats near Wuhan, China, hold a mix of coronavirus strains, and sometime last fall one of the strains, opportunistic enough to cross species lines, left its host or hosts and ended up in a person. Then it was on the loose.
What no one knows yet is how the pandemic will end. This coronavirus is unprecedented in the combination of its easy transmissibility, a range of symptoms going from none at all to deadly, and the extent that it has disrupted the world. A highly susceptible population led to near exponential growth in cases. For more details:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-the-covid-19-pandemic-could-end1/
One of the most important questions that people want the answer to right now is ‘when will the COVID-19 pandemic end?’ While scientists have not (and cannot) promise a date, there are certain speculations that mass vaccination would stop the spread of the infection and help bring back society to normal or as normal as possible in a post-COVID-19 world.
https://www.firstpost.com/health/when-will-covid-19-pandemic-end-for-answers-look-no-further-than-eradication-of-smallpox-8631151.html
https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-06-24/coronavirus-covid-19-pandemic-how-will-it-end
Dear Ijaz Durrani, please look through the link below:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02278-5
"The short answer is that the latest developments serve mainly to reduce the uncertainty of the timeline . The positive readouts from the vaccine trials mean that the United States will most likely reach an epidemiological end to the pandemic (herd immunity) in Q3 or Q4 2021. An earlier timeline to reach herd immunity—for example, Q1/Q2 of 2021—is now less likely, as is a later timeline (2022). If we are able to pair these vaccines with more effective implementation of public-health measures and effective scale-up of new treatments and diagnostics, alongside the benefits of seasonality, we may also be able to reduce mortality enough in Q2 to enable the United States to transition toward normalcy. "For a closer look please take a looks at :
https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/healthcare-systems-and-services/our-insights/when-will-the-covid-19-pandemic-end#
Viral quasispecies and lethal mutagenesis theory as virus extinction strategy
(Basis for Discussion)
Background: Viruses mutate as they replicate. The speed is influenced by genetic algorithms and other variables. Currently, people are overwhelmed by the speed of mutagenesis of SARS-COV2.
Some mutations modfy the spike protein. It allows estimating virus fitness based on molecular modeling and statistical calculations.
The more a virus mutates, the higher the probability of lethal mutagenesis (see references below).
Idea: When a virus is "attacked," for example, by a vaccine, a drug, or antibodies, only the fittest viruses "survive" in the long run. If these mutations occur frequently the virus's actual purpose, is no longer guaranteed. It turns into "quasispecies" that ultimately ends as lethal mutagenesis, the extinction of harmful variants.
What can we do to manage mutations?
Strategy:
- Vigorous search for alternative treatment methods (antiviral, antibacterial, polyphenols, dietary changes, etc.)
- Promoting Low fitness antibody-escape mutants
- Vaccines and vaccinations (non-pathogenic variants, NPV)
- Search for other elements that increase or decrease SARSCOV2´s fitness
- Suppression of drug-resistant and harmful viral mutants during antiviral drug therapy
I suggest to at least estimate the probability of lethal mutagenesis occurring, it should be feasible to compute with Big Data and AI methods.
Disclaimer: This is in no way meant to be a criticism of the current lockdown strategy, as I am a chemist and computer scientist, not a virologist.
References:
https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1008271
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F82_2015_463
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