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20 May 2020updated 06 Oct 2020 9:45am

Brace for second wave of coronavirus, urges EU disease chief

By Samuel Horti

A second wave of coronavirus is almost guaranteed in Europe – the question is “when and how big”, according to the head of the European Union’s centre for disease control.

Dr Andrea Ammon, director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, told the Guardian that she did not “want to draw a doomsday picture but I think we have to be realistic”.

She estimated that immunity was anywhere between 2 and 14 per cent in European countries.

“Looking at the characteristics of the virus, looking at what now emerges in from the different countries in terms of population immunity – which isn’t all that exciting between 2 per cent and 14 per cent, that leaves still 85 per cent to 90 per cent of the population susceptible – the virus is around us, circulating much more than January and February.”

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