THE POSITIVE PROFESSOR
PROFESSOR KAROL SIKORA CMO of Rutherford Cancer Centres and Former Director of WHO Cancer Programme
SOCIAL media’s voice of calm Karol Sikora has been signed up by the Daily Express. Readers can now enjoy his soothing advice in these troubled times that have won him hundreds of thousands of followers on Twitter. If you need reassuring everything’s going to be all right read Professor Positivity.
THERE is so much data available to analyse, sometimes it’s difficult to know where to look.
NHS 111 queries, hospital admissions, fatalities, but the most important indicator of where we are in this pandemic is the number of reported cases.
It may sound obvious, but forcing that number down is key to getting out of this mess. The seven day rolling average for new cases is now below 1,000, the lowest it has been since the pandemic took hold.
It’s fair to say that this has surprised many scientists and commentators. The amount of times we’ve been told a second wave is coming “in two weeks” is frustrating, the evidence just isn’t there!
We know how infectious this virus is, so despite everything why are we not seeing any rise in infections? For some time I’ve thought, and been widely criticised for it, that there is more at play than we think.
A long time ago I did my PhD in immunology, so have understand how our immune system works and even if I am still often left baffled. But I am sure that T cells – our main system of recognising and rejecting anything they see as foreign – are playing a larger role than many think.
They are the first line of defence against any nasty viruses. And in many people, up to 81 per cent according to a recent pre-print, past exposure to coronaviruses has provided effective residual immunity.
This may go some way to explaining why we are not seeing the exponential growth many feared.
Of course our own behaviour has slowed the virus and I constantly implore people to follow the rules. But I suspect there is more to it than that.
These theories can’t be proven overnight and we need more evidence, but I do think that our T cell responses could be the missing link.
And novel tests to determine whether we have recovered from a recent infection or are protected from getting infected could soon be available.