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5 years on from Covid: has Spain closed the door on the pandemic too soon?
March 11 marks five years since the WHO declared that Covid had reached pandemic status
On March 11, 2020, the entire world came to a standstill when the WHO, “deeply concerned by the alarming levels of the spread of the disease and its severity,” declared the Covid-19 pandemic. Five years on, some of the leading experts reflect on the current place coronavirus has in our society and the future of Covid.
The days of empty streets, packed hospitals and improvised morgues have taken on a dream-like quality, and while most specialists agree there’s little chance of another deadly coronavirus variant appearing, many believe we should remain on guard.
Dr. Óscar Zurriaga was the president of the Spanish Society of Epidemiology between 2020 and 2024, the very height of the pandemic in Spain. In his opinion, “we are much better than five years ago, but not as good as we should be because probably, despite everything we have experienced, I think we have forgotten too quickly and turned the page too soon.”
He’s not referring to the virus itself, but rather the response of the powers that be to the pandemic and any future threats. Despite the enormous death toll in Spain, spending on public health has only increased by a meagre amount and plans to develop pioneering systems to anticipate possible pandemics are still in their infancy.
However, he is confident that Covid is unlikely to make any real comeback to pandemic levels, since “viruses that remain very lethal” don’t tend to survive for very long. This is because they kill their host, essentially wiping themselves out in the process.
According to the latest data from the Carlos III Health Institute, relating to the week of February 24 to March 2, 2025, the infection rate in Spain is 4.1 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, while the previous week it was 5.1 cases. Since October 2024, Covid has caused the hospitalisation of 310 patients, 22 of whom have died.
While even one preventable death is too many, it’s important to remember that at the worst of the pandemic, the virus claimed 900 people in Spain in just one day.
Worldwide, the disease has affected more than 777 million people and killed more than seven million - 7,083,769, according to the WHO report of January 5.
For the spokesperson of the Spanish Society of Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology (SEIMC), María del Mar Tomás, Covid is here to stay, but while we should expect it to keep on mutating, the variants will be generally mild and easily controlled with vaccines.
She feels confident that, for the general and healthy population, “each wave will probably be less and less severe” with infections that “will not be detected or diagnosed because they are so mild.”
What have we learned from 5 years of Covid?
Epidemiologist Joan Caylà, who has studied the effectiveness of different mitigation strategies, says that the “zero Covid” approach used in countries like China and Australia was more effective in reducing mortality and had less impact on the economy than more lenient nations like Spain.
The importance of being prepared and having adequate resources is a key takeaway from the pandemic.
Public health surveillance, including contact tracing, is still an area that needs improvement. Nursing homes remain a vulnerable sector and more needs to be done to protect residents and staff. Healthcare personnel are better trained but also more exhausted, which could impact their ability to respond to future pandemics.
Ms Tomás added that “a pandemic can occur at any time due to an infectious agent, so we must continue to be prepared with rapid diagnostic techniques.”
But what about the next five years? Looking ahead, while it's impossible to predict the future, experts agree that we need to be prepared for potential pandemics.
Ms Caylà notes that viruses like bird flu, arboviruses and monkeypox pose significant threats and we should be vigilant and proactive in our response.
The next five years may bring new challenges, but by learning from our experiences with Covid, we can work towards creating a more resilient and prepared healthcare system.
In other news: Spain introduces national registry for pets
Image: Archive
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