We have escaped the worst of this pandemic, but top virologist Peter Piot is far from reassured. “We can still expect an outbreak of the virus”, it sounds. “But patience is clearly not our greatest asset.”
Phasing out in times of a pandemic is very difficult for a world authority in viruses like Peter Piot. But at 72, the co-discoverer of the Ebola virus makes a heroic attempt. In August, he moves to Brussels with his wife, the American anthropologist Heidi Larson, and immediately takes a step back at the prestigious London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, which he has been leading since 2010. Meanwhile, the hustle and bustle surrounding covid-19 dominates the life of Piot, who a year ago became corona advisor to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Piot experienced first-hand what the virus can do to a person. After becoming infected last year, he had to be on oxygen in hospital and feared for his life. He still feels the aftermath of the illness. Fortunately, he could already be vaccinated in London at the beginning of this year. “With Pfizer, but I would say ‘yes’ to any vaccine,” emphasizes the globally acclaimed virologist.
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Phasing out in times of a pandemic is very difficult for a world authority in viruses like Peter Piot. But at 72, the co-discoverer of the Ebola virus makes a heroic attempt. In August, he moves to Brussels with his wife, the American anthropologist Heidi Larson, and immediately takes a step back at the prestigious London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, which he has been leading since 2010. Meanwhile, the hustle and bustle surrounding covid-19 dominates the life of Piot, who a year ago became corona advisor to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Piot experienced first-hand what the virus can do to a person. After becoming infected last year, he had to be on oxygen in hospital and feared for his life. He still feels the aftermath of the illness. Fortunately, he could already be vaccinated in London at the beginning of this year. “With Pfizer, but I would say ‘yes’ to any vaccine,” emphasizes the globally acclaimed virologist.PETER PIOT. “Without vaccines we would indeed not get out of it and I would really not like it. But the fact that they are there and work does not mean that everything will soon be over. We can still expect outbreaks of infections, because not everyone is vaccinated. will or will be and the vaccines are not 100 percent effective. And then there are those variants of the virus, which means that we have to adjust the vaccines every time. We also don’t know how long the vaccines protect. I am perhaps a bit more optimistic about this than some others, who say that we should get a new vaccination every year. But we are still moving into a new era: a society that lives with covid. Some habits will remain, such as wearing masks when one has a cold. That should be part of the etiquette, like in Japan. “PIOT. “We have not completely gotten through the eye of the needle yet. Especially if we have mass gatherings now, while not everyone is vaccinated. That will cause us problems again. Look at Chile, which got the vaccinations off the ground very quickly. and was even one of the front runners in the world. But they started to ease as early as February, and now have a big problem. We have to be a little patient, but that’s clearly not our best feature. “PIOT. “No, and I was very shocked. Those people are not only putting themselves in danger. Most of them may not have been vaccinated, so they can spread the virus. That destroys all progress. I like to party too, but something like that is totally irresponsible. Also. young people can get covid-19. We see that in intensive care. The age of the patients in the hospital has already decreased significantly compared to the previous waves. “PIOT. “It is not easy to deal with that. I fully understand that something like this is difficult to suppress. But in Australia, Singapore or Vietnam it is possible. There are severe penalties for violations. I am not saying we should go that way. but people have to take their responsibility. That is not easy, especially in a country like Belgium. “PIOT. “(hesitating) That depends. There are experiments in the Netherlands, England and Singapore, where people are admitted if they have been vaccinated or tested, or both. We must try to achieve a normal life – in quotation marks – as much as possible. Although it is an illusion to think that that normal is identical to the normal before the crisis, that new normal will be one with many more tests and vaccinations It will be a search for a compromise between what is safe and what is safe. which is fun. “PIOT. “Yes. That’s what viruses do. Compare it to flu. For that you have to get a different vaccine every year. An extreme example is HIV, which causes AIDS. If you are infected with HIV, you can carry hundreds of thousands of different viruses, all variants. Most of them lead to nothing or are biologically irrelevant to us. The question now is how many variants of that virus will be relevant to us. Four? Ten? The industry is following that very closely, because vaccines are already in the making. variants will cover. Scientifically I am not so concerned about that. Of course it means yet another, expensive vaccination campaign. “PIOT. “That mass death in India is even underreported. Officially there are 400,000 infections per day. But because not everyone is tested, it could be that on certain days up to a million people become infected. Per day! Then you automatically get too. many more sick children. The chance of ending up in the hospital with covid is not zero because you are barely ten years old. By the way, even without that variant India would have been in trouble, with all those election meetings, cricket matches and religious festivals. that we cannot rest on our laurels. As long as India and the rest of Asia, Africa and Latin America are not vaccinated, we can never rest assured. These are breeding grounds of variants. That is very high on my agenda. “PIOT. We have to ask whether we should also vaccinate children. The answer is ‘yes’, if we all want to fully protect ourselves. But with the current scarcity of vaccines, that also means that the people in the developing countries, who have a lot of being more vulnerable, not getting the vaccine. Ethically it is difficult. Next year we will have enough vaccines for everyone, but now that is far from the case. “PIOT. “Yes, although I know that the borders cannot continue to be closed, certainly not in Europe. The pressure is too great. I am not only talking about tourism, but also about business travel. For Belgium, which thrives on exports, there is one. limit to what you can do through Zoom or other video conferencing. It must of course be done safely. That’s why it’s so important that the European corona certificate comes in as soon as possible. That will be part of the new normal. And, frankly, if I get to If I want to go to Senegal, I now also need a booklet with my yellow fever vaccination certificate. I expect that the certificate will be there in June. Technically possible, but all EU countries must agree. That is difficult in itself, but moreover, the United Kingdom wants its own pass, just like the United States and China. That’s how we left. It must all be safe and compatible, because for traveling you do not stay in the limited European circle of countries. “PIOT. “Yes, unless we get rid of this virus completely within ten years. But in the near future it will be part of our lives. We can also use it for mass events. There are already countries where that happens.” PIOT. “If we do not yet understand that we need to prepare better, then I do not know what is needed for that. Fortunately, many discussions and measures are already underway to better arm ourselves against the next epidemic. This week (May 21, ed.) the G20 and the EU are holding a virtual Global Health Summit, which is about the lessons we can learn from our failures and our successes, and about how to better prepare ourselves, and we must respond to that as soon as possible, because once this crisis there will be no more front-page news, there will be no more money going to it. “PIOT. “It is not self-evident. An enormous amount of money has already been spent, also in Belgium, to more or less absorb the social shock of the pandemic. As a result, we will all be left with incredibly large amounts of debt after the crisis. should be more preventive. “PIOT. “I don’t think we will suddenly have enough vaccines. I am also quite cynical about the US announcement to support that idea. Suppose we do indeed lift the patents. That is why we will certainly not produce any extra vaccines this year,” and maybe not even next year. It would have an immediate effect if the US lifted its ban on exporting ingredients for vaccines, microfilters, etc. They have now selectively dropped that for India, but not generally yet. the reasons why vaccines cannot be made everywhere It is ironic that it is precisely the developing country of India that makes the most vaccines in the world, so patent is clearly not the problem there Also very important but now impossible is the production of vaccines in Africa. I did not expect vaccine nationalism. Not only Donald Trump but now also Joe Biden says that the US must first vaccinate its own people and not get a vaccine out of the country. g. India has also closed its borders, while all of Africa depends on those Indian vaccines. Europe is the exception: it exports about half of its vaccines, but mostly to England. “PIOT.” No. Such a decision is not taken by one person or the Commission, but by a committee comprising all Member States. The scientific advisers meet every fortnight. I chair that meeting and Steven Van Gucht is in it for Belgium. For example, we are talking about the next generation of vaccines because we do not know how long the immunity will last in this generation. But we do not intervene in negotiations with producers. I wouldn’t want that either. I wouldn’t be good at it. “PIOT.” It is certainly the case in Europe that the mRNA vaccines from Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna, and soon CureVac, can deliver well. MRNA is now the basis of the vaccine strategy in Europe. There were troubles with AstraZeneca, which had not produced any vaccines before. We have seen that J&J also had problems with a contractor, which meant that 15 million vaccines had to be thrown away. But that vaccine will also have its place in vaccine policy. Although J&J is plagued by that export ban in the US. That’s all political. I stay out of that. And then there are the so-called protein vaccines, such as those from Novavax and possibly later from Sanofi and GSK. We have to keep betting on those diverse approaches, because we don’t really know what will happen to the variants of the virus. “PIOT.” I never worried about it. When people ask me which vaccine to take, I say take what they offer you because it will save your life. Pfizer gives slightly better results with its mRNA technology, but also protects AstraZeneca and J&J against hospitalization and death. “PIOT.” It will certainly happen, but we are scientifically better prepared for it. Unfortunately, there are also political aspects, such as export bans, which have nothing to do with science. “PIOT.” Right. But we are also learning to manage it better, and thanks to the vaccines it will be feasible. Especially for us, because we are very privileged here. Vaccines are not yet available in many parts of the world. That worries me the most. We need those vaccines now, not in a year or so. That keeps me awake at night. “PIOT.” We can learn something from England in vaccination. There they were already planning in June-July last year, and the army was called in. But keep in mind that over 127,000 people have died of covid here too, and the real number is probably more than 200,000. Anyway, at the end of last year, Belgium was one of the worst students in Europe. That is quite different now. It is going in the right direction. ”
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