The course of COVID-19 over the coming half year was reported by Johns Hopkins professor Panagis Galiatsatos as he estimated when the pandemic is expected to end.
In particular, Galiatsatos stressed when speaking to MEGA that the pandemic has lasted so far two years and after several mutations, we reached the deadly Delta and Omicron which can and is transmitted more easily.
"Omicron disturbed us," said the professor, adding: "In the hospitals it sucked. We lost patients, we saved others, we sent them home, but we are still fighting."
"More people went to hospitals with Omicron. Last month we made more beds to help patients, but now we are seeing the numbers fall," he added.
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The professor hopes that we will see what happened last month, that is, the outbreak of cases, and that this will give us the motivation to end the pandemic once and for all.
"We know how not to infect each other and keep the virus as a cold. We have masks, tests and vaccines," he said.
"If we have the antibodies from the vaccines we will keep the coronavirus like a cold and we will not need hospitals. We have the tools and it is our choice to stop it."
"With the tools we have, the pandemic can leave us in 6 or 8 months.
"I believe that the pandemic will be over by August 15.
"This will happen if everyone is vaccinated, not only in Greece or Cyprus, but all over the world, and we wear masks and do tests."
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Meanwhile, Greece confirmed 18,640 new COVID-19 infections in the last 24 hours, with 68 of these identified at entry points to the country, the National Public Health Organisation (EODY) said on Friday.
Since the pandemic began, Greece has confirmed 2,020,846 infections (daily change: +0.9 pct). In the confirmed cases of the last 7 days, 402 infections are related to travel from abroad and 2,678 to other confirmed cases.
There are also 88 deaths recorded in the last 24 hours, bringing the total of pandemic victims to 23,927. Of these, 95.1 pct had an underlying condition and/or were aged 70 or over.
A total of 564 patients are on ventilators in hospitals. Their median age is 66 years and 83.9 pct have an underlying condition and/or are aged 70 or over. Of the total, 439 (77.84 pct) are unvaccinated or partly vaccinated and 125 (22.16 pct) are fully vaccinated.
Another 4,079 have been discharged from ICUs since the pandemic began.
In addition, 496 Covid-19 patients were admitted to hospital in the last 24 hours (daily change: -9.32 pct). The average daily admission of patients with Covid-19 to hospitals over the last 7 days was 476.
The median age of new infections is 35 years (range: 0.2 to 106 years), while the median age of the deceased is 78 (range: 0.2 to 106 years).
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