MOSCOW, May 7. /TASS/. There might be no obvious coronavirus spread peak in Russia, it might be flattened, says Vasiliy Akimkin, head of the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing (Rospotrebnadoz) Central Research Institute of Epidemiology.
"The measures, taken by the Russian government, by the Rospotrebnadzor officials, have had a significant impact, we saw it in Moscow. If we had not done it, the incidence growth and its curve would have been completely different. This gave us two to three weeks before the peak growth, and therefore there might be no peak that everybody expects. It will be very flattened, and we will pass this phase of heightened incidence much smoother," he said.
According to the scientist, the epidemiologic situation will stabilize in late June - early July, while the second wave is possible during the autumn-winter season, Akimkin believes.
"There will certainly be interest to this virus this autumn. We will also see certain carrier volumes," he continued. "By that time, we will already know the results of the population immunity study; we will know the share of people who have already met the virus, who has the antibodies. Maybe, by that time we will have test systems that would allow us to estimate the virus quantitatively, which is also very important."
According to the expert, the vaccine will not destroy the virus completely.
"Simply because the virus will most likely mutate, we will need to create [new vaccines] or correct these [existing] vaccines. We have no definitive answer on what category must be vaccinated, when do we get an immune response, so that we can guarantee that a vaccinated person or a group of people will not contract the coronavirus disease," Akimkin explained.
To date, a total of 177,160 coronavirus cases have been confirmed in Russia, with 23,803 patients having recovered from the virus. Russia’s latest data indicates 1,625 fatalities nationwide.