Brigham and Women’s doctor breaks down steps needed to have an ‘almost normal’ summer
“Hope is definitely before us.”
Dr. Abraar Karan says the United States is “so close” to stopping its outbreak of the coronavirus, but the Brigham and Women’s Hospital physician is urging that a number of steps still are needed for the nation to have an “almost normal” summer.
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In a piece published on Elemental, Medium’s health and wellness platform, the global health doctor reminded readers that with variants of the virus continuing to circulate, vigilance is still needed to prevent new infections. While “the same measures” are needed to prevent transmission of the virus, Karan said he would hesitate to say that everyone needs to keep doing exactly what has been done over the last year.
He said that’s because there is now much clearer ways to improve on the earlier messages of the pandemic. At this time last year, Karan noted, very few experts were talking about the importance of ventilation in protecting against the virus spread, but there was an over-focus on cleaning surfaces.
“We didn’t have vaccines, and we knew far less about how the virus spreads,” Karan wrote of the early pandemic.
Now, the doctor and others — including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — are advising to focus on creating cleaner air and safer shared spaces. Rather than wearing just any mask, you can wear “better fitting and filtering” masks, he wrote.
Getting vaccinated, taking advantage as much as possible of being outdoors and avoiding crowded indoor spaces — particularly until you have gotten your shots — are also important steps for ensuring the nation continues along the right path toward ending the pandemic.
“Hope is definitely before us,” Karan wrote. “Data from Israel already suggests a reduction in COVID-19 rates in a real-world setting, likely thanks to vaccinations. We are so close to stopping the epidemic in the U.S. — which makes this the worst time to take our foot off the brake like Texas and Mississippi are doing.”
The doctor wrote that individual responsibility and actions alone won’t end the pandemic; rather, a combination is needed of both people doing their part and the government providing support.
“This includes everything from expanded access to the vaccine to the creation of safer, better-ventilated workspaces to financial protections for people who need to quarantine or isolate to better masks,” he wrote. “The fundamentals of testing, tracing, and isolating are no less important, either.”
While Karan said he hopes the summer of 2021 will be far closer to normal than 2020, how things move forward depends on the actions of the federal government, state officials, and communities to help stop the spread of the virus.
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