Covid-19 not something to worry about, most of us don’t need vaccine: Oxford professor

Sunetra Gupta, Oxford University professor and an epidemiologist, the coronavirus is not life-threatening for people who are not elderly and do not have any co-morbidities, as per the Hindustan Times report.

Gupta, who has been given the tag of ‘Professor Reopen’ for her counterviews on imposing the lockdown, said to HT: “What we’ve seen is that in normal, healthy people, who are not elderly or frail or don’t have comorbidities, this virus is not something to worry about no more than how we worry about flu.”

She said that the vaccine, when it will come into existence, will be used to support the vulnerable, “most of us don’t need to worry about coronavirus,” she said.

Gupta believes that the virus will become a part of our lives just like influenza. Eventually, it will end naturally.

“Hopefully with a lower death toll than influenza. I think it is fairly easy to make a vaccine for coronavirus. By the end of this summer, we should have proof that the vaccine works,” she added.

The professor sees the lockdown as a required measure but not feasible in the long run.

“A lockdown is a noble and a sensible idea to keep the virus out but is very difficult to put in place without non-pharmaceutical interventions,” she stated.

Gupta said what has been deemed as the second wave of the pandemic is essentially the first wave reaching a different geographical region.

“However, there have been countries that have successfully managed to implement the lockdown and are now facing a resurgence of the virus,” she noted.