Scientist who helped discover Ebola and nearly got killed by COVID-19 says the pandemic is ‘still at the beginning’
We’re only at the start of the coronavirus pandemic although the second wave may take a different form to the first one. Prof. Peter Piot, who helped discover Ebola at age 27 and has led the fight against HIV and AIDS, contracted coronavirus earlier this year. The director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the UK, and a special advisor on coronavirus to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spoke to Horizon about how having Covid-19 changed his perspective on the illness, why we need a vaccine and the long-term impacts of the pandemic. But it gave me new insight. Now I know the virus from the inside – not just studying or fighting it. It’s a very different perspective. How so? First of all, this (crisis) is about people. A lot of the official Covid-19 communication is about flattening the curve and barely about people. Secondly, in terms of insight, the fact that this is not a ‘flu or intensive care’ type of thing. There are going to be a lot of peop...
