A scientist who made a career for fighting Ebola and HIV was recently infected with the novel coronavirus, putting him on the edge of death.
Virologist Peter Piot, director of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, recently told Science magazine that he faced death from the coronavirus after being infected in March.
Piot spent a week in a hospital before heading home.
Piot has made a career from virology. He was one of the first to discover Ebola in 1976 and spent his career battle HIV/AIDS from 1995 to 2008, according to Science magazine.
“Finally, a virus got me,” he said.
Piot told Science magazine he knew he had the virus when he had a high fever and a harsh headache. He tested positive for COVID-19. He went into isolation. He had severe pneumonia and bacterial pneumonia. He felt not “just fatigue, but complete exhaustion.”
He said, “Now that I have felt the compelling presence of a virus in my body myself, I look at viruses differently. I realize this one will change my life, despite the confrontational experiences I’ve had with viruses before. I feel more vulnerable.”
According to Piot, there are lingering effects to the coronavirus that will hang with him for the foreseeable future.
Indeed, public health experts have suggested there are aftereffects to the virus. Some of the infected will never be the same again, suffering lung and kidney damage. The virus may also leave people with mental health issues like post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression.
“The more we learn about the coronavirus, the more questions arise,” he told Science magazine. “We are learning while we are sailing. That’s why I get so annoyed by the many commentators on the sidelines who, without much insight, criticize the scientists and policymakers trying hard to get the epidemic under control. That’s very unfair.”
Piot’s interview has made headlines across the world. One reason surrounds his suggestion that the world will never be the same without a vaccine for the virus, according to Fox News.
In the Science magazine interview, he said a vaccine is the only real exit strategy.
“That means producing billions of doses of it, which, in itself, is a huge challenge in terms of manufacturing logistics,” he said. “And despite the efforts, it is still not even certain that developing a COVID-19 vaccine is possible.”