Editorial Ta Nea: Vaccination, but that is not enough

The first and absolute priority remains the same: Vaccination, vaccination, vaccination

It is of fundamental importance that those who have not been vaccinated do so and for those who got the second jab three months ago or more get the third shot.

The cynical projection of the German health minister – that soon we shall have only people who have been vaccinated, who have fallen ill, or who have died – is confirmed daily.

The extremely rapid spread of the Omicron variant all over the planet has made clear that vaccination is not enough.

The unvaccinated will get sick or die, but the vaccinated can also be infected.

European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control director Andrea Ammon (photo) is clear:

“We must have the return to and bolstering of non-pharmacological interventions, such as the use of masks, tele-work, avoiding crowding in public places, limiting the number of passengers in mass transit vehicles, hand-washing, social distancing, airing out closed spaces, and staying home if ill.

Instead of just monitoring developments, it would be well for the government to thresh out a series of measures to avoid a worst-case scenario.

The opposition, instead of politically exploiting a scientific paper [on deaths of intubated COVID patients in Greece] should contribute with all its might to fending off an enemy that is constantly changing form and renewing its weapons in a vain effort to defeat science.

“We shall exhaust the Greek alphabet and perhaps see an Omega variant this winter,” an American epidemiologist said recently, projecting that in the US by spring one million people will have died of COVID-19.

We know well by know that the virus does not discern countries or borders and spreads extremely rapidly, infecting the more vulnerable, burdening health systems, and testing democracies.

One cannot remain inert, as there is a way to go before normalcy is restored.