Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), popularly known as mad cow disease, likely represents the most paradigmatic example of adoption of the principle of precaution (POP). Whenever coping, in fact, with any public health emergency characterized (like BSE) by significant knowledge gaps, adequate, POP-inspired measures should be rapidly put into force to minimize human exposure. The newly identified 2019-nCoV, the seventh human coronavirus, which has been renamed SARS-CoV-2 by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses, and which had been previously classified as a global emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO), is no exception to the rule. As a matter of fact, at the date of February 14, 2020, over 1,500 deaths and almost 50,000 laboratory confirmed cases of COVID-19 (Coronavirus Disease 2019, the official denomination of the illness caused by SARS-CoV-2) have been recorded in patients from China. Viral interhuman transmission, reported in China and elsewhere in Asia and Europe, has pushed the Chinese Health Authorities to adopt a number of POP-inspired, "draconian" measures, with special reference to Hubei Province, where 80% of the COVID-2019 cases in that Country have been ascertained. This is largely justified by the knowledge gaps existing, among others, on the animal reservoir(s) from which SARS-CoV-2 jumped into humans and on the pathogen-human/ animal host interaction dynamics, including the development of a long-lasting and protective immunity to the virus. The aforementioned and other SARS-CoV-2- and host-related uncertainties make extremely hard, if not impossible, to draw reliable forecasts on the epidemic's evolutionary pathways at this stage. Within such context, a safe and effective vaccine could not be ready for use before 18, if not even 24 months. Nevertheless, anti-Measles Virus (MV) immunization should be strongly recommended and widely implemented on a global scale, since measles-affected patients are known to experience a prominent immune memory loss towards previously encountered pathogens. To this aim, every possible effort should be made in achieving and maintaining an adequate "herd immunity" to measles (which is globally responsible for a dramatic death toll per year), thus preventing that the immunity gained - either from natural infection or vaccination - towards SARS-CoV-2 could be abolished by MV-induced immune memory loss. In few words, a virtuous process still sharing POP as the common denominator!
COVID-19, A Principle of Precaution-Based Approach
Di Guardo G
2020-01-01
Abstract
Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), popularly known as mad cow disease, likely represents the most paradigmatic example of adoption of the principle of precaution (POP). Whenever coping, in fact, with any public health emergency characterized (like BSE) by significant knowledge gaps, adequate, POP-inspired measures should be rapidly put into force to minimize human exposure. The newly identified 2019-nCoV, the seventh human coronavirus, which has been renamed SARS-CoV-2 by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses, and which had been previously classified as a global emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO), is no exception to the rule. As a matter of fact, at the date of February 14, 2020, over 1,500 deaths and almost 50,000 laboratory confirmed cases of COVID-19 (Coronavirus Disease 2019, the official denomination of the illness caused by SARS-CoV-2) have been recorded in patients from China. Viral interhuman transmission, reported in China and elsewhere in Asia and Europe, has pushed the Chinese Health Authorities to adopt a number of POP-inspired, "draconian" measures, with special reference to Hubei Province, where 80% of the COVID-2019 cases in that Country have been ascertained. This is largely justified by the knowledge gaps existing, among others, on the animal reservoir(s) from which SARS-CoV-2 jumped into humans and on the pathogen-human/ animal host interaction dynamics, including the development of a long-lasting and protective immunity to the virus. The aforementioned and other SARS-CoV-2- and host-related uncertainties make extremely hard, if not impossible, to draw reliable forecasts on the epidemic's evolutionary pathways at this stage. Within such context, a safe and effective vaccine could not be ready for use before 18, if not even 24 months. Nevertheless, anti-Measles Virus (MV) immunization should be strongly recommended and widely implemented on a global scale, since measles-affected patients are known to experience a prominent immune memory loss towards previously encountered pathogens. To this aim, every possible effort should be made in achieving and maintaining an adequate "herd immunity" to measles (which is globally responsible for a dramatic death toll per year), thus preventing that the immunity gained - either from natural infection or vaccination - towards SARS-CoV-2 could be abolished by MV-induced immune memory loss. In few words, a virtuous process still sharing POP as the common denominator!I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
