Winter Effect on COVID-19 Spread
Written by Moses Aisida
About a year after the initial outbreak of COVID-19, there has been a drastic change in peoples' lives around the world. The initial spread rapidly moved across countries, cities, towns, and smaller communities. About 53.5 million people in the world have been infected with the virus, resulting in over 1.3 million deaths. In Canada, close to 300,000 infected persons have led to about 11,000 deaths. Manitoba, currently in Code Red level lockdown due to the rapid increase in cases, has had about 140 deaths and around 10,000 infected persons, making it one of the worst-hit provinces per capita. Early stages of the virus spread had resulted in lockdown or restriction procedures across the country and the world in general. Therefore, this effectively reduced the rate of infection worldwide over the summer periods, and some scientists attributed that drop in infection rates to the high summer temperatures. If this is true, it poses an interesting question - will the infection rates increase over winter, with an increase in cooler weather, making the pandemic worse?
Well, COVID-19 is a disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome, and its symptoms and mode of transmission are similar to influenza (commonly called the flu). The flu typically peaks in infection levels around the colder months of the year. And this can be due to a lot of factors, one of which is the adaptability of the virus. By forming a gel-like membrane around itself, the virus gets protected from the cold. Also, with low humidity in the winter time, the viral droplets stay longer in the air, increasing the risks of infection. The weakening of the immune system, due to low levels of Vitamin D in the winter time, plays a massive role in virus transmission. Due to the similarities between the flu and COVID-19, it is safe to assume that as we approach winter, COVID-19 infection rates will sky-rocket across countries of the world.
Evidence of this increase is becoming more visible daily as many countries and cities across the world are currently experiencing a second wave of COVID-19 infections.
This graph displays the number of active cases in Canada from March, 2020 to November, 2020. It is clear that there was a spike in the number of people infected as we approached fall, and this rapid increase is not slowing down as we hit the early stages of winter. Manitoba has already had to go on ‘Code Red’ in an attempt to control the alarming rate of infections in the province.
COVID-19 is a new and evolving virus that has swept across the world, causing a global pandemic. The behavioral patterns and evolution extent of the virus are still unclear, and scientists are still not able to accurately predict its weaknesses or limitations. However, if the similarities with influenza (flu) – as well as the recent surge in new cases in Canada – are anything to go by, the pandemic is set to get worse in the next few winter months. Can winter be any less inconvenient?