Covid-19 ‘biggest health threat in century’

There may be no “acceptable solution” to mitigate and manage the coronavirus pandemic, an expert has warned.

Francois Balloux, professor of computational systems biology and the director of the University College London Genetics Institute, said the outbreak was the most serious global public health threat humanity has faced since the 1918/1919 influenza pandemic.

He said: “There are major differences between the two events but I suspect there will also be similarities that may emerge once we look back.

“After having spent considerable time thinking how to mitigate and manage this pandemic...I failed to identify the best course of action.

“I’m not sure there is such a thing as an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing.

“The Covid-19 pandemic is an extremely challenging problem and there are still many unknowns.

“There is no simple fix, and poorly thoughtout interventions could make the situation even worse, massively so.”

Prof Balloux said it was most plausible that the Covid-19 would wane in the late spring and return in the winter, “which I expect could be even worse than what we’re facing now”, adding a similar pattern was seen in the pandemic a century ago.

However, he warned that it is not known how seasonal the transmission of the virus is or if infection causes long-lasting immunity.

“Predictions from any model are only as good as the data that parametrised it,” Prof Balloux said.