The swan song of the coronavirus is audible in a slow third wave

strange corona virus

It has a variable limit.

dangerous in the way it spreads,

and moves in mysterious ways

In primary schools it remains,

But it dies in grocery stores.

It spreads while buying clothes in malls,

and multiplex cinema halls.

It’s non-alcoholic

Cannot be spread by beer or spirits,

Although it lurks in liquor bars.

While three people are safe in the cars,

Should you dare to add someone else,

This drives Corona very crazy.

Marriages with fifty are kosher,

another is a party popper

There’s this lie on Amazon’s boxes,

At Takeaway Coffee it dies.

Politics also does Kovid sports,

participants in mass rallies turn away,

While it takes mass protests to act,

A leader without a mask is spared.

It flies to play field and gym,

But in bakery shops it dies.

fast food workers and bank tellers

Unlike barbers can’t spread it.

Coach and masseuse Kovid kicked,

TV and fridge not mechanic

Kovid is also knowledgeable of the times

Deadliest from 10 am to 5 am

Businesses can wreak havoc

If they don’t close by 6pm

Clearly no one can escape

Corona’s whimsical embrace

bureaucrats’ rule making skills

Even Corona cannot kill.

It is said that swans sing before they die. The third wave of the pandemic, with the highly contagious but far less lethal Omicron mutants, may well be the swan song of COVID. This is despite the fact that at the peak of its third-wave (around 20 January 2022), daily new cases globally touched 3.8 million. At the height of the deadly second wave (approximately 20 April 2021), these were very few, about 0.9 million. Furthermore, while the peak daily death rate was higher worldwide during the second wave (about 17,000), it was by no means lower (13,000) during the third wave.

That said, if one divides the peak daily deaths by the peak new cases, you only get a peak death rate of 3.4 per 1,000 during the third wave, compared to 190 per 1,000 at the height of the second wave. Therefore, it can be concluded that the third wave has been four times more contagious than the second wave, but it is 56 times less lethal.

The attached table analyzes coronavirus data over six-weekly intervals since the start of the pandemic (bit.ly/3vRvqiO) for 32 major countries, which together account for 69% of the world’s population and nearly all recorded COVID deaths. is 85%. A data analysis reveals three major pandemic trends that are not likely to change much.

First, the global COVID death toll is now over 6 million, with the US death toll at nearly a million, and that of Brazil and India at over half a million each. The other 14 countries have recorded more than 100,000 deaths in all transatlantic countries except Indonesia. However, the mortality figures are likely to be revised later due to low count/reporting.

Second, the pandemic is centered on the transatlantic with 25 countries (including West and Central Asia) bordering two Atlantic Ocean coastlines, accounting for just 22.2% of the world’s population, accounting for 71% of all deaths. In contrast, the global share of the seven South and East Asian countries (including China and India), which account for over 47% of the global population, is just 13%. Out of this, 68% of the recorded deaths are in India. Africa was least affected, except for South Africa and the northern countries near the Mediterranean Sea (part of the Atlantic system).

Third, there have been three major waves of the pandemic so far, the second wave being the deadliest. This is not readily apparent in the global numbers as these peaked at different times in all three regions (as highlighted). There may be more but increasingly gentle waves.

There is much about the virus that remains to be uncovered by science. The debate over whether they are living things is still unresolved. While antibodies can ‘kill’ the virus, many others survive and remain dormant for an unknown period of time, reactivating once conditions are favorable. For this reason, some cosmologists believe that life on Earth and perhaps elsewhere in the universe was generated by viruses, possibly through comets.

So, it’s hard to be completely sure about where we can go from here. A pattern of virus epidemics is nonetheless clear. Highly contagious viruses, such as the common cold, are rarely fatal. Those that are, are rarely very contagious. But every now and then, maybe a century or so, you get a virus that is both highly contagious and deadly, like the Spanish flu in the last century and Covid today.

Viruses mutate at a speed unparalleled in the living world. After initially causing high mortality, subsequent generations of mutants become more and more benign, as the virus and its host learn to coexist peacefully and the host develops new anti-bodies. The same thing happened with the Spanish flu and Kovid is also moving in the same direction.

Worldwide, there has been a sharp decline in infections and third wave deaths after reaching their peak in the second fortnight of January. This marks the end of the most severe phase of the pandemic, although there may be relatively benign subsequent waves, which are indistinguishable from the seasonal flu.

So while we take necessary precautions and follow mandatory protocols including vaccinations, and mourn loved ones lost in the deadliest phase of the pandemic, we can start the year with cautious hope. In fact, with the distance of time that removes emotion from experience, we may begin to look back with a smile on the way we made our way through a deadly virus that everyone, including our Was tasked to protect, seemed oblivious.

Alok Sheel is the former Secretary of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister.