病例总数突破200！口罩都戴了吗？新冠遇上流感怎么办？我们专门问了传染病专家！
要了解新西兰
“我认为，在目前新冠病毒大流行的情况下，我们会看到更多新西兰人出门戴口罩，新西兰社会对此会更加接受。”
记者在基督城医院采访戴维·默多克教授时，附近大楼的新冠病毒检测实验室正紧张忙碌地检测送检样本。目前，新西兰已出现新冠病毒的社区传播。
关于人类从疫情中汲取的教训，默多克说：“类似疫情还将再次发生……我们可能还会看到另一场类似的传染病大流行。”
New Zealand top infection expert:
Wearing masks is more of a cultural difference than a medical issue
By Li Huizi
“But I think in a situation of a pandemic, we will see more New Zealanders wearing masks,”
-- David Murdoch
Recently there are many Asian people wearing face masks in New Zealand public places. However, wearers have constantly received unfriendly look from Kiwis.
David Murdoch, dean of the University of Otago (Christchurch) and co-leader of The Infection Group, said wearing masks is more of a cultural difference than a medical issue.
“In New Zealand, it is unusual to go out with a mask on… there is a feeling that you must be really unwell if you wear a mask, and if you are unwell you should stay home. So that's the thinking for New Zealanders, but it’s also realised that for many cultures it's quite acceptable to do it,” Prof. Murdoch told NZ Messenger.
A mask is certainly effective at preventing the spread of a respiratory infection, but the debate is how close. Physical distancing should always be effective, he said.
“But I think in a situation of a pandemic, we will see more New Zealanders wearing masks, and there will be a greater acceptance of why people do that,” said Murdoch who is an expert on the Ministry of Health’s advisor group.
COVID-19 corresponds with influenza
“The northern hemisphere is getting warmer and viruses don't tend to like the warmer climate as well. So that would help getting, hopefully resolving the outbreaks,” Murdoch said.
New Zealand is heading the other way. The big worry is the influenza season, he said, adding, “What we don't know is what happens if coronavirus corresponds with influenza and at least it would confuse things which means more people are unwell.”
“I don't know whether there's a risk of somebody who had both infections at once. Getting influenza vaccine this year is very important,” said the professor whose main research interests are the epidemiology, diagnosis and prevention of respiratory tract infections.
Murdoch said he was confident of the New Zealand medical system in handling the pandemic.
“The country has a pandemic plan for quite a few years. So there has been preparation. We all thought influenza was the most likely virus, but a lot of the principles and the pandemic plan apply to other infections, so that the key parts of that can be adapted for this,” he said.
However, this sort of pandemic potentially can overwhelm any system if it was really bad, Murdoch said.
Chinese response “very impressive”
The Chinese medical community’s response to the COVID-19 outbreak has been “very impressive,” Prof. Murdoch said.
“The rigorous and even aggressive response trying to contain the virus, have got the outbreak under control more than we would have thought about, and now many countries are using that experience to fight harder in their own response,” Murdoch said.
Obviously, the economic impact is huge and the right focus now it to resume production, he said, affirming the effort of keeping the surveillance, and the rigorous follow-up of all the cases to prevent “a secondary peak.”
International collaboration
There are “huge opportunities” of China-New Zealand cooperation on epidemic prevention, he said, adding there are already some strong collaborations on noncommunicable diseases between the University of Otago and Chinese research bodies.
“We've seen remarkable collaboration between different institutions worldwide, including identification and discovery of the virus, and then the genetic code of that virus, and the really quick sharing with the world,” he said.
Regarding the lesson the mankind has learned from the outbreak, Murdoch said, “This will happen again…There's a very good chance we will see another epidemic like this.”
Another lesson is to see is how quickly a vaccine can be produced. Traditionally, a vaccine could take 10, 15 or 20 years to get into market, and it is much faster now doing that, he said.
The Ebola outbreak resulted in a quick process of vaccine research. “We'll probably be lucky to have a vaccine before 12 or 18 months, but that's a lot faster than it used to be,” he said.
“Sometimes a crisis like this can move technology on and just like wars do as well,” Murdoch said.