Women are the big ones left out of Phase 2. Women left out of committees and task forces. Women who will have to give up work to look after their children without school. Women who have always been cornered (often sadly in a physical and violent way) by a beautiful country but still too dull and patriarchal. A country that finds it hard to remember that two of its absolute excellences, probably the greatest of all, are what they are: women. For the first time together to face the emergency in the world: Capua and Gianotti. Spearheads of an extraordinary but distracted country. So let's pay attention to them.
Two women at the helm of an international team with one goal: to develop collective intelligence, to cross the mountain of data and study new solutions to help science get out of it pandemic. We are talking about virologist Ilaria Capua, director of the One Health Center of Excellence at the University of Florida, and physicist Fabiola Gianotti, general director of CERN in Geneva. They have developed a project that sees different personalities from the scientific world try to take important steps in research. An ambitious project in this moment in which Phase 2 is starting and many doubts remain open.
Capua and Gianotti, two faces known to Italians
A virologist who participates in many television broadcasts and a physicist who is at the helm of one of the most important research centers. Capua and Gianotti promise to take important steps in the field of research against the virus. "We will defeat Covid-19 with collective intelligences" is their motto. Scientists involved in the project will study data on the possible causes and effects of the virus on the planet. The starting point, in fact, is the data. "CERN has an open access archive called Zenodo- explained to the Huffingtonpost, Capua -. Inside, an area dedicated to Covid will be developed where it will be possible to upload any kind of data ". This is the data collected by hospitals and people, or those concerning pollution, rainfall, humidity.
The long-distance meeting between Capua and Gianotti to fight Covid
The two scientists had the opportunity to confront and develop this common project. A synergy that has given life to a space dedicated to Covid, organized and managed by CERN, with the support of groups of Research. "My interdisciplinary team is called Yellow Submarine - added Capua - it came to our minds thinking how we were all compressed but full of energy during a video conference on Covid -. It includes scientists from the University of Florida, CERN, ISI of Turin and from important Italian and foreign research institutes ". It includes mathematicians, physicists, economists, engineers, doctors, veterinarians, agronomists, climate experts. A coordinated action, therefore, a set of collective intelligence with Capua and Gianotti at the helm, to get to the finish line.
The importance of data collection and comparison
The interdisciplinary group, therefore, will deal with comparing the various data collected on the basis of the different sectors. A project open to all research groups interested in studying Covid. Because, as Capua reiterated, Covid affects various areas. The biomedical field above all but also families, businesses, agriculture, workers, nature, culture. A concrete example is the part dedicated to nature, which will see the collaboration of Fai, the Italian Environment Fund. We will try to understand how nature is awakening without pollution. By analyzing the populations of api, butterflies, the species of plants most sensitive to pollution. "The idea - says Capua - is to combine the discourse of health with a resilience of nature, realizing how fundamental the context is".
Vaccine and treatment, where are we?
For Capua, the times for the Covid vaccine are still long. "In September they will have the data to tell if the vaccine works - he says -, that is, if it gives neutralizing immunity. It takes time to get the vaccine. Then it is necessary to carry out the batch checks of harmlessness, efficacy, absence of contaminants. At best, we'll have it in December. Then the problem will be the scaling up of the number of doses. If we assume that all Europeans and all Americans want to vaccinate en masse, that's almost a billion doses. Millions of doses can be made in three months, certainly not enough for everyone ". On therapies, Capua points out that antiviral ones are giving better answers. And here too it is a race between the various studies for a therapeutic protocol that could arrive before the vaccine.
An invitation to common sense for Phase 2
The invitation to the population by the Capua is clear for the Phase 2: find behaviors that allow you to lead a normal social life. Solanto, however, making the individual responsible for the importance of his behavior. "Each of us - he argues - must behave intelligently to protect their health. It is not the problem of the government, it is the problem of the individual. If the individual does not behave in a manner proportionate to his risk factor, or to that of his relatives, it is he who does damage, it is not the government that does damage ”.
featured photo by Ani Kolleshi
