With the arrival of fine weather, will the coronavirus disappear? Infectiologist Didier Raoult notably declared, on Tuesday, that it was possible “that the epidemic will disappear in the spring”. A hypothesis also supported by Alain Fisch, epidemiologist and doctor specializing in tropical diseases.
“By April, or during the month of April, heat in general kills this kind of virus,” said Donald Trump on February 10 of the new coronavirus. A hypothesis confirmed this Tuesday by the infectious disease specialist Didier Raoult. He said in particular that the epidemic was “gradually disappearing”, and that it was possible “that the epidemic would disappear in the spring”.
As the flu goes to sleep in the summer, will the coronavirus really do the same? “Yes”, according to Alain Fisch, epidemiologist and doctor specializing in tropical diseases. “But it must be explained that this virus does not depend on the temperature outside directly but on related behavior. The weather has nothing to do with it,” explains the practitioner.
In fact, he said, the fact that it’s cold outside causes people to voluntarily confine themselves to their homes, and “that’s how flu spikes happen.”
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Dry cold conditions
The virus then spreads to places where several people are confined, where there is crowding. “You don’t have to look for specifics of the coronavirus all the time, it is certainly more resistant but the mode of contamination is the same as the flu,” said the doctor.
Mohammad Sajadi, virologist at the University of Maryland, explains in “Science and Life” that “with regard to respiratory infections, the latest work shows that they are clearly favored in conditions of dry cold”.
A study published in 2013 in PlosOne suggests that dry air in winter (outside or inside) alters the effectiveness of nasal mucus which filters foreign bodies such as viruses or bacteria.
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“He may reappear”
Logically, with the deconfinement and the arrival of the beautiful days, “the coronavirus will disappear, put to sleep since people will come out”. But conversely, next winter, if we follow this reasoning, “like the flu, it risks reappearing, it works like that for all respiratory viruses”.
Moreover, Alain Fisch, specialist in tropical diseases, goes a little further: for him “the return to normal life, outside would be a positive point to fight against the coronavirus. It is interesting to recall that the coronavirus does not survive more than 48 hours outdoors. ” A surprising remark that goes against current recommendations. “But the authorities were right to confine the population during the winter period, this limited the number of severe cases and people affected.”
For Mohammad Sajadi, “as for the H1N1 flu in 2009 or whooping cough in the 15th century, epidemics of emerging viruses, against which the population is not immune, act in unpredictable ways: in addition to the seasonal peak, other peaks linked to this particular dynamic “.
How to explain the impression concerning the spread, it seems slower, of the virus in the southern hemisphere than in the North? “Here again, the same reasoning, in Africa, for example, people are very little at home, the dwellings are permanently ventilated and open, which slows down the contamination”, further explains Alain Fisch.
“We do not know”
“The assumption is classic, seasonal viruses can be sensitive to temperature and disappear,” said Wednesday on BFMTV Christophe Rapp, infectious disease specialist at the American hospital in Paris. But “for this new coronavirus we do not know” if the heat will affect its functioning “and it also circulates in Africa and Asia where the climate is different so there are still uncertainties,” he recalls.
Alain Fisch also wishes to emphasize that even if on certain points the coronavirus seems to follow the trace of the influenza virus, “we do not yet know everything about this coronavirus”.
The scientific community also keeps an eye on the progression of the epidemic in the southern hemisphere since, in turn, they will enter the winter season.
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