More (Less?) on COVID-19

 The more the information that we get about COVID-19, the less we seem to know about it. This is strange, but this is what makes the disease very challenging.

Any disease can be fully defined or understood only if there are unambiguous details about its symptoms, prevention and cure. There are people who imagine they have a disease though they do not have any symptoms and clinically they are disease-free. We call them hypochondriacs. Asymptomatic carriers of SARS-CoV-2 (as the virus causing COVID-19 is called) may be called the reverse hypochondriacs. They deny the existence of COVID-19 in their case, but doctors assert they are diseased.

The whole world seems to be cheering the sighting of vaccines with 90 -plus % efficacy. This is despite Merck, a large pharma company that has been a pioneer in introduction of many vaccines, throwing cold water on the cheering billions. Merck wonders how it is possible to engineer a vaccine against a virus whose behaviour remains largely enigmatic now. Merck ought to know!

Pfizer and Moderna have designed a gene-modifying m-RNA based vaccine. The long term effects of GM products are mostly unknown. Vaccines are to be administered to the entire global population. Is  humanity becoming a global guinea pig?

About the cure, the less said the better. EUA (Emergency Use Authorisation), repurposed medicine and immunity boosters are bandied about as if we have caught the virus by the scruff of its neck. The virus continues to hold us as its hostage.

COVID-19 travails

 The world has been literally on edge ever since the novel coronavirus-SARS-CoV-2 emerged from China. The panic started in December,2019 and the end is nowhere in sight. With every new development, we are becoming more perplexed. Recently it was reported that this virus can stay on many surfaces including stainless steel, glass and paper currency for as long as 28 days.

No one can remain unconcerned about the virus. It is recommended by health authorities that those with symptoms like cold, cough, fever, diarrhoea, breathlessness and fatigue need to get tested for COVID-19. It is commonly known that it can also be asymptomatic. So, whether one has symptoms or not, testing is indicated. This is only the start of a series of dilemmas.

If one decides to get tested, one needs to be wise to the fact that many test results are false-positive and a few false-negative. If COVID-19 is confirmed by a test that is anyway unreliable, the next stage in the puzzle revolves around quarantine. The purpose of isolation is to protect others from infection. This is another quandary because the virus is even more contagious before onset of symptoms. Thus, by the time one is quarantined, the virus has already performed its dharmic duty of invading other hosts.

What medicine to take? It is admitted that there is no medicine and the virus itself has to decide when to leave a host. Yet, medical aggressiveness and patient's anxiety result in use of drugs. Hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malarial and anti-autoimmune disorder drug, dexamethasone, a steroid used for asthma, cancer and rheumatoid arthritis, azithromycin, convalescent plasma and vitamin D are used depending on the situation in a hit or miss fashion. Depending on one's luck, the patient may get cured or the condition may aggravate.

Recovery will be signalled by a few negative results from further tests. The reliability of these tests is again subject to question.

No disease has flummoxed patients, doctors, epidemiologists and pharma companies alike like COVID-19. (Some pharma companies are , however, making money while the sun shines and the disease remains enigmatic by proferring false claims on efficacy of their drugs.)  In sum, combined absence of vaccine, fool-proof test and medicine makes COVID-19 a horrific gift from China for which the world is pathetically unable to make the donor accountable.