ENGLISH PROJECT

LESSONS LEARNT FROM

THE PANDEMIC -COVID 19

PREPARED BY SHAHID AHMED 12-E

 INDEX
SR.NO PARTICULARS
1. INTRODUCTION

2. POLICY OPTION AND IMPLICATIONS

2.1 Global Response
2.2 Source Identification
2.3 Control Strategies

3. ACTIONABLE RECOMMENDATIONS

4. PAY ATTENTION TO CHILD PROYECTIONS ISSUES

5. FLEXIBILTY AND ADAPTABILITY

6. TRAINING TO PREVENT HEALTHCARE PROVIDERS FROM

CONTRACTING THE DISEASE

7. CONCLUSIONS
 INTRODUCTION

In late-December 2019, pneumonia of unknown etiology (PUE) was reported

from a cluster of patients who were initially linked epidemiologically to the
Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan, China. These cases of PUE were reported
to the WHO China Country Office on December 31, 2019, and the Chinese
Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CCDC) sent an investigative team
to Wuhan on the same day. The first batch of samples was dispatched to
three organizations (China CDC, Wuhan Institute of Virology under Chinese
Academy of Sciences and Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences) for virus
genome sequencing and virus isolation. Parallel experiments from these
organizations were carried out with coordination of the National Health
Commission to make sure the results were comparable. The novel SARS-
related coronavirus was identified when several PUE samples tested positive
with a pan-coronavirus RT-PCR covering all SARS-related coronaviruses, and
the pan-PCR product was sequenced. As of January 7, 2020, Chinese health
officials had confirmed that the PUE was caused by a novel coronavirus.
Hence, it took China just about a week to inform the world about the
etiology of the PUE, which is indeed efficient for identifying a novel
pathogen causing an emerging infectious disease, demonstrating China's
improved ability to manage new outbreaks. Concurrent to the virus
identification, NGS-sequencing was also carried out and on 10 January,
2020, the CCDC shared the whole genome sequences through the Global
Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID; Accession numbers
EPI_ISL_402119 and EPI_ISL_402121),and reported these data to the WHO.
Prior to the work in early January 2020, the Wuhan Institute of Virology had
sequenced similar bat-derived coronaviruses, but did not have SARS-CoV-2
in the lab suggesting a laboratory-origin as being unlikely, a finding
supported by a recent WHO report. Specifically, the Wuhan Institute of
Virology got the partial sequences of the RdRp gene by pan-coronavirus RT-
PCR from a bat fecal swab collected in 2013 (sample ID 4991) and later
named RaTG13 following the bat species, samples location and year. The
institute ignored this sequence when they found it is distantly related to
SARS-CoV. In 2018, they decided to sequence as much as possible of the full-
length genome from their stock samples which are positive for SARS-related
coronavirus. They completed the nearly full-length genome sequence of
RaTG13 but didn't publish it. In 2020, after they received the SARS-CoV-2
sequence, the institute compared it with all of their unpublished sequences
and found its closest relative RaTG13 (96.2% nucleotide identity), and they
then completed the whole genome sequence. As of current date, the
RaTG13 strain has never been isolated and has not been the focus of further
studies, except with regard to ACE2 interaction using pseudovirus and
binding affinity assays. The current data indicate that the TG13 spike has low
binding affinity to human ACE2 compared to SARS-CoV-1, SARS-CoV-2,
Pangolin CoV and bat SARS-related CoV WIV1.

Policy Options and Implications

Global Response
It is clear that both China and the WHO demonstrated dramatically
improved responses to COVID-19 with the lessons learned from previous
epidemics. For example, in the case of the SARS-CoV epidemic (2002-2003),
initial cases were identified in mid-November 2002 but it was only on 10
February 2003 that the developing epidemic was confirmed and the first
report to WHO was made. In stark contrast, as highlighted above, Chinese
officials informed WHO of a potential epidemic within a week of the first
cases being identified in Wuhan. The WHO also acted quickly and formally
alerted the world of a public health emergency of international concern
(PHEIC) by end of January, well before pandemic spread had started. Indeed,
at the time the PHEIC was declared only 25 countries/regions outside
mainland China had reported any cases of the disease, and of these only 6
(i.e., Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand) had
reported over 10 cases. Unfortunately, the rest of the world did not seem to
pay too much attention to these alerts, and it was not until mid-March—
when WHO Director-General announced COVID-19 as a global pandemic—
that the rest of the world “woke up” and started to accept that a pandemic
was developing.
Source Identification
While identifying the origin of COVID-19 is essential to prevent the next
pandemic, the actual origin of SARS-CoV-2 remains enigmatic. Viruses that
are phylogenetically related to SARS-CoV-2 have been identified in several
wildlife species (e.g., horseshoe bats and pangolins), but as of now no
wildlife species has tested positive SARS-CoV-2 across China. It is currently
proposed that the entry of the virus into the human population could have
been facilitated by cross-species transmission through one or multiple
intermediate host species. However, this hypothesis is primarily based on
our understanding of SARS MERS, and/or avian flu, and may need to be
revisited and assessed as more data come to light. Initially it was also
suspected that the coronavirus had entered the human population through
the Huanan Seafood Market, a live animal market in Wuhan, China.
However, the early report for COVID-19 did not find direct epidemiological
links for many patients with the market. Thus, it is possible that the live
animal markets might have served as an amplifier due to large numbers of
people in close proximity to each other in the cold environment—just like
the after-ski bar in Kitzloch, Austria .

Control Strategies
Different strategies have been implemented to combat the pandemic in
different countries. Some countries (e.g., Sweden) initially tried so-called
herd immunity by natural infections and some used mitigation or
suppression, but in general these approaches had minimal effects on
stopping the spread of the disease within and between countries. Generally,
most countries across the globe tried to limit the spread of the pathogen
through various non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), including the
implementation of lockdowns of varying intensity and geographic scope.
However, it has been noted that the inadequate (e.g., United States and
India) or delayed (e.g., Russia, United Kingdom, and France) implementation
of lockdowns could have reduced their efficacy in impeding the spread of
infections in many countries . Just as delays in implementing lockdowns
have increased pathogen spread, the premature lifting of these restrictions
can also cause a resurgence in case numbers as has been observed recently
in India . One of the most effective implementations of NPIs was undertaken
by China, which took immediate and stringent measures to prevent
pathogen spread, including the lock-down of the city of Wuhan, where the
virus was first identified, and suppression measures for the rest of the
country . The WHO-China Joint Mission on COVID-19 revealed that the
immediate prevention and control measures that China took to curtail the
epidemic were implemented in three main phases. The first stage focused
primarily on preventing cases from being exported from Wuhan in
conjunction with closing wet markets and enhanced surveillance to try to
identify the zoonotic source. The second stage focused on controlling the
impacts of the epidemic through medical intervention, improved diagnostics
for rapid identification of infected individuals, and critically on reducing the
rate of spread by curtailing the movement of people, restriction of mass
gatherings, contact tracing, increased quarantine measures, and enhanced
border security. Finally, in the third stage the focus shifted to controlling
isolated and/or sporadic case clusters. In this stage there was a critical effort
to strike a balance between effective disease control and sustainable
economic/social development. The effective implementation of these
policies made China one of the most successful countries in terms of COVID-
19 control. The effectiveness of China's control measures is evidenced in
terms of the per-capita cases reported. Thus, as of May 6, 2021, the global
infection rate was about 20,022/million persons, with considerable variation
amongst various countries (e.g., 98,503 and 15,573 cases/million persons in
USA and India, respectively). However, China's cumulative infection rates
remained one of the lowest globally (71 cases/million persons). It is
important to note that after Wuhan outbreak which was cleared on April 8,
2020 , China has experienced many small waves of outbreak with local
transmission due to imported cases, but all the viruses are “stable” strains
(with single imported case of both 501Y.V1 and 501Y.V2 but no local spread)
and there are no new variants arising from China, indicating the successful
suppression of virus circulation. For both containment and suppression
strategies, lock-down of the city/region (the areas could be very small), lock-
down of the household and isolation/quarantine are the three important
factors for the success. Looking to the future, with no recurrent outbreaks in
China even in the winter season (as of Feb 23, 2021), we might consider
such a mitigation strategy to ensure meeting public health goals, while
keeping the society socially active and economically strong. It is also
important to recognize the need for better international coordination in
terms of reducing transmission (e.g., restriction of social gatherings and
mask ordinances) and the timely identification of potential spread (e.g.,
contact tracing). Early in the pandemic these measures, in conjunction with
stricter limitations of international travel, would have helped reduce the
initial global spread of the virus. However, in these late stages of the
pandemic, localized lockdowns (e.g., at city or county scale) are likely to be
more effective than large-scale lockdowns at national or regional levels.
Actionable Recommendations

We have learnt many critical lessons from the ongoing coronavirus

pandemic with respect to the requirements for rapid response and large-
scale surveillance, as well as the needs for effective and coordinated
strategies to control novel pathogens. While there remain many unknowns
and uncertainties relating to the control of future pandemics, based on what
we learnt from SARS-CoV-2 we make the following recommendations:

1. While pandemics are unpredictable by nature, proper preparation and

prior planning can help manage them better. For a long time,
coronaviruses have been identified as pathogens with high pandemic
potential, and have thus been high on the prioritized preparedness list.
Yet the globe was still unprepared to effectively deal with COVID-19.
There is no doubt that many of the science-based requirements for
pandemic control—rapid identification of the causative agent, genome
sequence and determination of the key epidemiological parameters
related to transmission—were met, but the global management of the
pandemic still failed in many respects. Clearly, science alone cannot
control a pandemic. In the long run, active science outreach to the
public and policy makers are fundamental to achieving a coordinated
implementation of intervention across scales, sectors and population
groups . There is no doubt that a unifying science-based strategy,
public involvement, and informed decision-making are the three key
steps to improve the control of such public health emergencies in the
future.
2. Both China and international communities outside China have learnt
the vital need for improved preparedness to rapidly identify and limit
 the spread of emerging pathogens. Stockpiling of emergency supplies
and the logistics of meeting rapidly ramped-up demand was a major
bottleneck in the response to COVID-19. From the very beginning
medical and public health workers were faced with the shortage of
many essential items, including equipment for oxygenation support
(e.g., oxygen masks, respirators, and ECMO/extracorporeal membrane
oxygenation) and even personal protection equipment (e.g., face
masks and gloves). Despite the lesson learnt, there seems to be no
practical way to address this issue because there is no easy way to
store such supplies in bulk for logistic and economic reasons.
Additionally, the next pandemic may be characterized by other
symptomatology (e.g., hemorrhagic fever) rather than respiratory
failure. Thus, there is a need to think of creative solutions to address
our ability to meet such sudden supply-demand dynamics in the future,
and we would like to leave this as an open question to the readers.
3. The WHO has to be given a much stronger role in the coordination of
the implementation of the various control-measures. Given the
exponential nature of pathogen spread it is imperative that we ensure
the rapid mobilization of mitigation and control strategies at
international scales before local epidemics can progress to pandemics.
The authority of the WHO for global coordination of pandemic
responses must be strengthened.
4. There is also an urgent need to address several open questions related
to COVID-19, particularly the possible reservoir or intermediate host(s),
the role of live-animal markets in introducing or maintaining the virus
in the human population. China-WHO Joint Study Group recently spent
a month (January-February, 2021) in Wuhan to investigate the origins
of the virus, but with no definitive answers yet. For the whole year of
2020, scientists and public health professionals in China and across the
globe have been trying to answer this critical question, but with limited
success. For example, it still remains unclear if SARS-CoV-2 differs
fundamentally from other coronaviruses (e.g., SARS-CoV and MERS-
 CoV) in terms of its epidemiology and entry into the human population.
Given the lack of information there is a necessity to keep an open mind
and follow an objective scientific agenda to address the outstanding
questions.
5. It is encouraging that shortly after the genome was made publicly
available identification of potential vaccine candidates was initiated,
with NIH joining up with Moderna Inc. in mid-January. Potential vaccine
candidates were rapidly screened, with Moderna publishing their
preliminary report on the mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine on 14 July
2020, and BioNTech and Pfizer publishing safety and immunogenicity
data from Phase 1 clinical trials of two RNA vaccine candidates on
October 14, 2020. Given that several vaccines have now been approved
for human use, it is clear that vaccine development for COVID-19 has
progressed at an extremely rapid rate, with less than a year elapsing
from initial pathogen discovery to vaccine deployment. There is no
doubt that the rapid development of the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine was only
possible because it was able to leverage a large body of basic research
on other coronaviruses, such as MERS-CoV . Such an approach to
preparedness using prototype pathogens could also be started for the
other 23 virus families known to infect humans (e.g., Flaviviridae and
Filoviridae), thus dramatically improving our ability to manage future
pandemics .
6. While vaccines are a key component of control, the recent pandemic
has also highlighted the fundamental importance of NPIs given their
efficacy in reducing viral spread. While the effectiveness of these NPIs
is highly variable (e.g., depending on community-level infection rates),
several specific NPIs have been shown to consistently reduce the
transmission of SARS-CoV-2. These interventions include the closure of
schools and workplaces, bans on public events and gatherings of more
than 10 people, as well as limiting human movement. The continued
use of such NPIs needs to be enforced especially at the very early
stages of vaccination.
 7. Most importantly, an international scientific conference should be
convened, as soon as possible, to discuss not only the biomedical issues
related to the pandemic, but also other issues related to pandemic
control, such as the effectiveness of the various interventions adopted
in different countries and the need for improved policy coordination.
Such large international conferences have been very effective in the
past. A historic example includes the international sanitary conference
held in February 1897 at Venice to discuss the spread of plague, and
the international conference following the Manchurian plague of 1910-
1911 in Shenyang (then Fengtian), China. These examples can serve as
portfolios that can be effectively adopted to better evaluate the
strengths and weaknesses of country-specific and international
responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and to improve pandemic
response in the future.

Pay attention to child protection issues

Disease outbreak affects children directly (infection) and indirectly (risk of

losing parents, family, homes, etc). It is therefore important to mainstream
child protection across the project activities to reduce the risk of harm to
children. Training and sensitising health workers, community leaders,
community health workers, and other partners on child protection issues is
critical.

Flexibility and adaptability

Disease outbreak trends change rapidly on the ground, so having the
flexibility to modify and adapt project activities is important. For instance,
when cases of Ebola were confirmed in a target city of one project, mass
household WaSH kit distribution became impossible. As a result, the
implementing agency had to adapt their activities, providing handwashing
stations at key public places (market, entry points/ports) instead. Similarly,
during project implementation, one of the cities lost its water supply,
affecting the medical teams’ ability to respond to the outbreak.
Subsequently, water trucking, emergency latrines and showers in health
clinics and hospitals were provided to maintain medical operations.

Training to prevent healthcare providers from

contracting the disease

Protecting healthcare workers for their own safety and that of the affected
community should be central to disease response strategy. Urgent provision
of practical safeguards, particularly personal protective equipment and
knowledge of how to use it, are key to safeguarding healthcare workers. For
most of the Start Network disease response programmes, this was a priority.
As a result, the knowledge and capacity of the Ministry of Health (MOH)
team involved in the outbreak significantly improved, especially in terms of
prevention and ensuring safe health facilities for the patients.
For the COVID-19 pandemic, where the available scientific knowledge and
information is still quite limited and is evolving almost every day, national
health professionals may have very limited knowledge and information.
Therefore, prioritising their training and support needs to be central to any
response plan. Also, it is worth noting that the response to a disease
outbreak is multi-fold and includes many services to effectively prevent,
contain the spread, and manage cases—medical care, surveillance, Infection
Prevention and Control (IPC), communication, logistic, psycho-social
support, safe and dignified burials, vaccination, etc. Facilitating strong
coordination between different response pillars is highly recommended.

Conclusions

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 has brought to the

fore the devastating societal and economic consequences associated with
emerging infectious diseases. Human history has been punctuated by many
such global pandemics including the bubonic plague (14th century), the flu
(20th century) and HIV/AIDS (20th and 21st century), and it is unlikely that
COVID-19 will be the last one. Indeed, the risk of emergence of novel
diseases in human populations is increasing at an alarming rate due to
numerous factors including the rapid range expansion of disease vectors,
destabilization of natural ecosystems, as well as the rapid increase in
agriculture and urbanization. By critically comparing the 2002–2003 SARS
outbreak and COVID-19 pandemic, we identified that significant strides have
been made in terms of rapid pathogen identification and expedited initial
outbreak reporting by China, as well as the PHEIC declaration by WHO.
However, one of the major failures was the delayed international response
to the PHEIC declaration by the WHO, a delay which allowed for the
exponential spread of the pandemic. We recommend that these are the
critical areas that the international public health community must focus on
to better control future pandemics in a highly connected global population.
In the end we feel that the most essential lesson we can learn from COVID-
19 is that pandemic control hinges on rapid, effective, coordinated and
sustained pandemic response at local, national and international levels.
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