As Vecernji list writes on the 4th of June, 2020, Dr Gordan Lauc took to Facebook to explain just why the new coronavirus spread as quickly as it did.
''The good side of this knowledge is that we now know that the vast majority of people who become infected will overcome the disease without any major problems. This is also great news for our tourist season, because even if a certain number of infected people do show up, there will probably not be many seriously ill people,'' wrote Gordan Lauc.
Gordan Lauc also posted a link to a scientific paper on Facebook which he considers important for understanding the new coronavirus.
Namely, Gordan Lauc points out that research shows that at least 40 percent, and in some cases even more than 80 percent, of people infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus either don't develop any symptoms or only mild ones. That explains, he believes, why the virus initially seemed to spread very quickly.
''The path to the truth is not easy an easy one, especially when you're researching something new and unknown. But what distinguishes science from pseudoscience is that in science, we're constantly questioning the current knowledge, looking for new evidence and making new hypotheses based on it.
Scientists know this and are accustomed to this form of re-examination, but unfortunately, in the flood of information about the coronavirus during this pandemic, sometimes in public and in the media, the difference between what is considered scientific truth and what is yet to be proven gets lost. An unusual feature of the SARS-CoV-2 virus is that it causes almost no symptoms in some people, while in others it causes a severe disease that can often be fatal.These asymptomatic cases have significantly contributed to the spread of the virus, while confusing scientists who couldn't understand how the virus spreads so fast and jumps from person to person in such vague ways.
A significant scientific paper was published today that should close one of these unknown chapters. The link to the work is below, and here I'm going to convey only some of the most significant conclusions: At least 40 percent (and even more than 80 percent in some cases) of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 virus (i.e. positive on a PCR test) will either not develop symptoms, or the symptoms they do develop will be mild. These people will not even know they're infected and will be able to transmit the virus to others. This explains why, at first, it seemed to us that the virus was spreading very quickly. It actually didn’t spread so quickly, but we tested more and more people and found more positive cases that had been infected previously, only no one knew that.
The good side of this realisation is that we now know that the vast majority of people who become infected will overcome the disease without any major problems. This is also great news for our tourist season, because even if a certain number of infected people do show up, there probably won't be many seriously ill people (something similar to what we saw recently on Brač).
The downside is that if/when the virus returns to Europe, it will be very difficult to control the epidemic by targeted testing and the isolation of the contacts of infected people. That way, we'll be able to find, at most, only half of the potential vectors of the disease. In fact, the only thing we'll have left at our disposal will be the so-called Japanese model in which we will all have to try to be as responsible as possible and try not to spread the virus,'' Gordan Lauc wrote in a statement.
For more on coronavirus in relation to Croatia, follow our dedicated section.
