It was with the allusion to the numbers of the covid-19 outbreak in the Lisbon and Tagus Valley region that Fausto J. Pinto spoke of “some hastiness” in the process of ending lockdown, highlighting the “unclearness of numbers and coordination of strategies”, as well as the “lack of pedagogy” and “excess of optimism”, which he considers to have marked the return to the new normality in the context of a pandemic.
As President of the Council of Portuguese Medical Schools (CEMP), Professor Fausto Pinto was interviewed by Agência Lusa about the current situation in the country, reiterating the importance and urgency of increased collaboration between the political power and the scientific community, to respond more effectively to the health crisis facing the country. “It would be important for politicians to listen more broadly and not just to those they appointed or who are part of a more closed circle. They should also listen to the academies. It would be important to have an alliance and it would be bad to have an antagonism (between politicians and scientists)”, explained the Professor to Lusa, according to news reported by Observador.
According to Fausto Pinto, who brings to the discussion the consequences of a scenario where, in the middle of a pandemic, politicians and the medical and scientific community stand on opposite sides, “there is a need for greater coordination and a better defined strategy, above all, in terms of public health structures, the identification of positive cases and the existence of an adequate network on the ground”, he stressed. In addition, the Professor believes that the “only way to overcome this is if people follow the rules. Nobody wants to go back to lockdown, but if this goes wrong there may be no other solution”.
Citing Albert Einstein, the President of the CEMP explained that Portugal had all the conditions to be a good example in the global framework of pandemic control, but “with all that haste, we are now a bad example. We did not come out well and we need to correct it with the right people. Using a football language, ‘psychological lashes’ are sometimes necessary. Albert Einstein said that the same solutions to the same problems give the same results. Perhaps, there must also be some changes, said Fausto Pinto, referring to a restructuring strategy at the level of those responsible for coordinating health authorities.
To date, Portugal accounts for more than 40,000 cases of infection by the new coronavirus, according to data released by the DGS (Directorate-General of Health), with the country's capital concentrating more than 70% of all cases, as highlighted in the national press.
However, the latest news of the covid-19 outbreak in Greater Lisbon points to a stabilization in the contagion, and to the tendency for the number of cases to decrease. Fausto Pinto guarantees that “control will depend a lot on the capacity that our health authorities and the Government have to be able to face this situation with assertive measures and good organization that allows identifying the chains, carry out of the tests, and use pedagogy with people”, he said. He anticipates that “there is a whole job that, if not done in a coordinated way, can evolve into a more complex situation. You can't let your guard down, ”said the Professor in the interview, which you can read in full here.
