But 2020 has also shown health experts were locked into an expectation this pandemic would be a flu bug – another species-jumping variant of the influenza virus that has already produced recent close shaves like 2005’s bird flu, and 2009’s swine flu. And instead the world got hit by a mutated coronavirus. Sars-CoV-2, to name the strain. Covid-19, to name the disease. A relative of the common cold. From there, all kinds of medical and scientific confusion has ensued.
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Professor Michael Baker: Switch in strategy from pandemic mitigation to elimination still feels desperately last minute. University of Otago public health researcher, Professor Michael Baker – a member of the Ministry of Health s Covid-19 Technical Advisory Group – says if the international response to the pandemic has seemed indecisive or uncertain, this is a big part of the reason.