A 16-member team established by the United Nations’ World Meteorological Organization maintained that coronavirus will likely be transitioned into a seasonal disease, as per media reports.
The team indicated that respiratory viral infections are often seasonal, “in particular the autumn-winter peak for influenza and cold-causing coronaviruses in temperate climates.”
“This has fueled expectations that, if it persists for many years, Covid-19 will prove to be a strongly seasonal disease,” it added in an official statement.
However, the team also noted that the spread of the illness is so far dependent on government interventions. These include necessitating face masks, social distancing, and travel restrictions.
Hence, the team suggested that weather and climate conditions alone should not be considered for now and the health authorities should continue to maintain strict Covid protocols.
“At this stage, the evidence does not support the use of meteorological and air quality factors as a basis for governments to relax their interventions aimed at reducing transmission,” said task team co-chair Ben Zaitchik of the earth and planetary sciences department at The John Hopkins University in the United States, as cited in media reports.
He further indicated that during the beginning of the pandemic, infections in some places spiked in warm seasons, “and there is no evidence that this couldn’t happen again in the coming year,” he said.