The second-ware of COVID-19 is nothing more than an outbreak since we have yet to settle on the actual incubation period. For some it’s two weeks, some have been 48 hours. We don’t know the effective combating of each person before the virus becomes active and infectious.
Some people have partial immunity, as the person may be able to fight off the virus but never develop total immunity and it may sooner or later overcome the person’s natural resistance. An asymptomatic person is immune but some can still infect others while others don’t.
It is safe to speculate that the COVID-19 virus will be a health concern until the population becomes adequately immune with a preventive vaccination on booster shots yet to be determined. I have seen people in grocery stores shopkeepers using surgical type gloves putting rations in their bags, checking out and even using gloves to load and unload their cars.
What happens after they store them in their cabinets, refrigerators and freezers? They never think about using gloves to get back the groceries for cooking. Many forget to disinfect steering wheels, door handles, gear shifts. Any virus will keep transmitting to different persons as long as targets are remaining and the weather conditions are suitable for its survival in transit.
There are so many ways of being infected most people don’t even think about, especially in apartment buildings. No one can be protected 24/7 because it isn’t in our nature. The second wave of the coronavirus sent shock waves across India. This could be “The Big One” compared to the mild spring wave.
Judging by the sudden surge in the number of cases, this could become very serious. The peak of the wave can be observed with infection control measures (social distancing rules) or sufficient immunity in the community to drive the simulation factor. The epidemic will then start bisecting rather than doubling as time passes. People will relax their guard and a third wave will start.
It will end when a majority of the population are resistant or immune. This may be because they got infected and recovered. This may be because we developed a vaccine and they got vaccinated. Corona won’t go away until a vaccine is found so we have to live with it.
We have no good data. However, SARS-CoV-2 seems to be a relatively stable virus, COVID is in contrast to influenza viruses. It transmits efficiently but unlike SARS-CoV-1 (10 per cent) and MERS seems to have a low case fatality rate of about 0.3 per cent. So, we get more cases but fewer deaths. This results in more people becoming immune but also enables the virus to maintain a presence in the population.
Many countries have gone for some form of lockdown or social distancing to reduce spread. This has the effect of maintaining the pool of susceptible people. So, when the measures are relaxed more cases emerge. Experience with other stable viruses suggests that there will be a cycle of small epidemics until a large population is vaccinated.
The first wave, of this novel coronavirus, causing COVID-19 the deadly disease apparent after, several people were infected, thus creating spreader effects, when many were not aware of it, had no or minimal symptoms, with most politicians, aka governments, failing to respond to what was predictable, and urgent. Governments had failed to implement emergency plans for obtaining stocks of PP kits, masks, and ventilators etc, based on the previous coronavirus epidemic.
The second strain was detected in the UK. The UK shut all of its borders down. However, the second strain did make it over to less than 20 people and a few states in the US. The higher rates were detected in California. The second strain has been detected in Texas, Pennsylvania and a few other US states. From there it reached India too.
In my opinion, all the international travel should have been shut down as well. People would stop being in denial and take this pandemic more seriously. However, a vaccine is a positive sign for the future against COVID-19 and its mutations. Viruses normally mutate to find a host to stay alive.
A second wave happens when a first “wave” begins to slow down making the number of cases to reduce a lot, in these conditions many officials and people start to relax the rules and start meeting with other people, eating outside, partying, and being reckless.
In these situations, the numbers started growing again because people got infected by the carriers. Because the virus growth is exponential very weakly what looked like the end of the pandemic might be the start of the worst part of the pandemic till that point. This is why it is essential to keep the rules in check for a while after the last known case of the disease is found.
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