AS THE Omicron variant takes grip, Wokingham’s World Health Organisation covid expert is offering hope for the future.
Professor Ben Cowling, honoured by the Queen for his ground-breaking and life-saving Covid-19 work, has been speaking exclusively to Wokingham Today.
He thinks a major wave of Omicron in January cannot be prevented, but added: “It can be slowed down by the re-introduction of public health measures.”
Professor Cowling, from Sonning, has further hopes. With millions seeking booster shots this week, he said that waves of the pandemic may not lead to swathes of hospitalisations.
He said: “It will depend on the virus, but hopefully with the immunity that’s been built up in the past two years we won’t see any further large waves of hospitalisations and severe cases.”
However the professor has doubts about a more normal Christmas.
“Omicron has come out of the blue,” he said. “I think many of us thought that the pandemic was coming to an end.
“I think with increasing case numbers, many Christmas celebrations will be postponed or cancelled.”
Looking to the future of Covid-19, Professor Cowling said: “Viruses can change in various ways, not necessarily becoming weaker, but over time population immunity will improve so that infections become milder on average because of better immunity rather than any change in the virus.”
Professor Cowling went to Sonning Primary School and then Reading School. His family still live in the area.
The epidemiologist, a disease spread expert, was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire this year for his services to public health and to research on Covid-19.
Director of the World Health Organisation Centre for Disease Control in Hong Kong, he went with colleagues to China to work on a study which gave the first official estimates of how easily Covid-19 was passed on. This was urgently needed information when Covid-19 was taking off to eventually become a pandemic
Soon after the study’s publication on January 29, 2020, Professor Cowling, speaking to Wokingham.Today, made, what seemed then, astounding predictions.
When there were just two Covid-19 cases in the UK, he predicted the possible start of a coronavirus epidemic in the UK by early March. He also warned the new virus was “a real risk to global health.” He was proved right on both. His work on face mask effectiveness has also saved many lives world wide.
