Despite a resurgence of “cyclical” cases, the Covid-19 pandemic is slowly weakening around the world. Citizens are less and less afraid of Covid-19, a virus with which we will have to learn to live and not overdo it, estimates Pr. Jaâfar Heikel, epidemiologist, infectiologist and health economist.
To explain his point of view, Pr. Jaâfar Heikel puts forward tuberculosis as an example. ” In Morocco, tuberculosis is endemic with 30,000 new cases each year. We have tens of thousands of cases of hepatitis with which we live each year, and we do not count the number of cases of hepatitis or tuberculosis, which are infectious and transmissible diseases, and which occur every day. We don’t spend our time counting them“, explains to MoroccoLatestNews UKProf. Heikel .
What is important in the eyes of the epidemiologist is that citizens have better control of the phenomenon today. How ? ” That is to say, if a person is sick, coughs or has a fever, they stay at home. If she absolutely has to go shopping, wear a mask. It’s called good citizenship and healthy behavior“, he argues.
It is also a question, according to the Health Economist, of having healthy habits, such as washing your hands frequently, having hydroalcoholic solutions in your bag. ” But we don’t all have to wear masks and stay home. We have to get back to our normal life“, he recommends.
For the specialist, our reactions will have to be adapted to epidemiological situations. If at any given moment, there are rules to be respected, they must be respected. During a pandemic phenomenon that becomes endemic, we must be careful, but we are not going to close beaches and hotels and stop tourism every time there is monkey pox, and tomorrow it will be cockroach“, he says.
On the other hand, Pr. Heikel explains that today, there are microbial ecosystems with which we will learn to live, but which will from time to time create problems for us, he says. Why ?
” We have impacted our environment ourselves. Climate change, the way we live. Now, more and more people are adopting wild animals. Before it was the dog and the cat. We have also changed our microbial ecosystems by impacting them (deforestation, climate change, the many trips, we have forgotten the rules of hygiene, etc.). Today, in Morocco, we can continue to be close, but we don’t have to kiss each other five times a day.“, explains Prof. Heikel, before concluding that the most important thing during this phase is to adopt a healthy lifestyle and healthy hygiene rules.
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