Spain bets on treating Covid-19 as an endemic virus

European Union Foreign and Health Ministers met today in the French city of Lyon to define a common strategy to deal with future pandemics.

At the meeting, the Spanish Minister of Health, Carolina Darias, has opted for an endemic surveillance model of the coronavirus. ” The pandemic has more and more endemic characteristics and therefore we have to go to a new model of surveillance”, she said.

She also called for the joint coordination of the Community block on health: “We have learned many things, including that joint and coordinated action has allowed us to respond. Progress must be made in the construction of the EU health and in the extension of universal health coverage as a differentiating element” of the European welfare state.

Darias has also shown optimism for the vaccine developed in Spain, Hipra. “We must vaccinate everyone, but also facilitate the manufacture of vaccines in the corners where it is most difficult, and there Spain has a leading role with the new vaccine Hipra that we are hopeful is the European vaccine that we were all waiting for”.

The European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, Stella Kyriakides, has been more cautious and has acknowledged that, although the rate of hospitalizations and deaths from coronavirus is stabilizing, caution has yet to be maintained.

“The biggest challenges we face in health are common and can only be addressed and overcome by working shoulder to shoulder. Europe is committed to playing its part in strengthening the health security architecture”, recalled Kyriakides.