Opinion – Pedro Hallal: Is the pandemic over?

The planet has been living with Covid-19 for 27 months. In Brazil alone, it’s been two years of a pandemic. And yet it seems that we still haven’t learned some basic things. Perhaps the main one is that, unlike the political stupidity that today builds a wall between people in Brazil, the pandemic does not live on definitive answers, which do not change over time. This mania of treating everything like 8 or 80 continues to get in the way.

Take, for example, the controversy over the use of masks. Discussing the withdrawal of mandatory use of masks in open environments is relevant now, but it was not opportune in the first months of the pandemic. Why the change? At the beginning, we were still unraveling the forms of contagion, the curve of cases and deaths was ascending and we needed, for pedagogical reasons, to accustom the population to the use of masks. Today, we live in a new moment and I don’t see the removal of mandatory outdoor environments as absurd: in California, where I lived for 6 months, there is no mandatory use of masks in open environments for a long time.

When we talk about vaccines, it’s more or less the same thing. With the exception of a few lunatics who keep calling the vaccine experimental and hoping that people vaccinated will have adverse effects, there is no longer any controversy over the importance of the vaccine. However, it is in the details that we are going wrong. The insistence on counting doses facilitates the spread of the false discourse that the vaccine is not working. In addition, the false perception that the pandemic is already over causes some people to let their guard down and fail to take the necessary doses to maintain protection against Covid-19.

So the title of today’s pandemic is: “Is the pandemic over?”

Initially, I have to say that, personally, I would love to say yes. All the people I know and love are tired, wanting to get back to their normal lives. However, professionally, I have an obligation to tell the truth. And the truth is that the pandemic is not over, not in Brazil and much less in the world. Some countries still face barriers to widespread vaccination of the population and the recurrent emergence of new variants often delays the end of the pandemic.

The pandemic will not end because politicians want it to do so to feed their power projects. And, unfortunately, we have already discovered that we cannot count on them to protect us at this time when the priority is the 2022 elections. Therefore, it is up to us to maintain responsibility to prevent the situation from getting worse and for the end of the pandemic to come soon .

Over the weekend, I was at Bento Freitas stadium watching my Xavante beat Ypiranga in the semifinals of the Rio Grande do Sul football championship. I was very proud to see that the vaccination passport was being charged, guaranteeing more security to the thousands of fans who were looking forward to the opportunity to see their team again in the semifinals of the state championship. The correct measure, combined with the use of the mask, made me feel safe to the point of going to the stadium at that moment, unlike other moments of the pandemic. This reinforces the argument that there are no definitive answers to all the questions brought about by the pandemic: it is necessary to maintain care, but it is also necessary to gradually return to activities.

We need to tear down the walls and speak responsibly about the current stage of the pandemic. At this stage, the recommendation is not for people to stay at home. The recommendation is for people to keep up to date with vaccinations, maintain the use of masks indoors and maintain their hygiene measures – especially keeping their hands clean.