Time and again, experts dare to make predictions about when the corona pandemic will finally end. But one decisive factor could ensure that the end is a long way off.
Dortmund – When does it all finally end? Many people are currently worried about these questions. But when the pandemic state of emergency ends, when the coronavirus could finally be considered defeated and when something like normality will return, obviously depends primarily on one factor. As RUHR24 * reports, a look at the global vaccination campaign is necessary – and it reveals something sobering.
| virus | Coronavirus (Sars-CoV-2) |
| Incidence Germany | 77.9 (September 15) |
| New cases worldwide | 451,361 (September 14) |
End of the corona pandemic: Unvaccinated people face hard times
Like the one, it was good news among many bad news: at the end of August, epidemiologist Klaus Stöhr dared to make a corona forecast *, according to which the horrors of the corona pandemic could already be a thing of the past in summer 2022. The expert put a damper on the good news and warned that the unvaccinated in particular would be hit hard at the end of the pandemic. Ultimately, however, the situation can be expected to ease from next summer.
But one factor could seriously shake the occurrence of the experts’ predictions. Especially when it comes to the final, global end of the pandemic. The decisive number why it could still take before Corona can be considered defeated is the international vaccination rate. The assessment that the pandemic will be over in spring reveals a “very German-centered view,” explains epidemiologist Hajo Zeeb from the Leibniz Institute for Prevention Research and Epidemiology, according to dpa .
The end of the corona pandemic depends on the global vaccination rate
Because while in Germany, according to the RKI, 62.4 percent of the population is already fully vaccinated, it looks completely different in other countries. In Africa in particular, the vaccination quota is far behind the quota in Germany or the EU – and clearly: In the countries of the southern continent, the proportion of people fully vaccinated against the coronavirus * is currently well below ten, according to the figures from Johns Hopkins University Percent.
According to the WHO, more than 5.7 billion vaccine doses have now been administered worldwide. But only two percent of them were vaccinated in Africa. As ZDF explains, the slow vaccination rate in African countries is mainly due to the still lack of availability of vaccination doses. But prejudices and skepticism in large parts of the population about the corona vaccination * still have to be overcome.
The WHO had already called on several occasions to ensure fairer vaccine distribution. Also because the low vaccination rate in Africa harms not only the people in Africa, but everyone, according to WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a report by the RND.
Low vaccination rate: the end of the corona pandemic is a long way off
An end to the pandemic is therefore a long way off. Because the longer the “inequality in the vaccines persists, the more the virus will continue to circulate and change,” says Tedros. The pandemic could only end if there was real global cooperation in the supply of and access to the vaccines.
Because it now seems clear that Africa could become a breeding ground for new Corona variants due to the low vaccination rate – which could then also endanger people who have been vaccinated again, for example in Germany and Europe. According to Ärzteblatt, experts even predict that Europe would probably be the first target of new, worrying variants that have the potential to spread globally.
End of the pandemic heralded? Not as long as the virus continues to circulate
The fact that the current falling incidence in Germany (RKI: 77.9, as of September 15; a decrease of 3.2 percentage points on the previous day) heralds the end of the pandemic is a fallacy in two respects. As long as the vaccination quota is not pushed up further internationally, epidemiologists expect the virus to continue to circulate.
And according to a report by the FAZ , experts also believe that the corona numbers may jump again in the autumn and winter months at a national level. Just as it was observed last year. The reason for this, according to Zeebs, is also here: There are still a few million people who are not protected and of whom thousands can still get really sick. * RUHR24 is part of the IPPEN.MEDIA editorial network.
List of rubric lists: © Hannah Mckay / dpa
