What can you do to reduce the risk of a virus spreading?
Interview with Marion Koopmans
What can YOU do to reduce the risk of a virus spreading? We need to start thinking about what we have learned from the pandemic. What is our contribution in the creation of these kinds of problems? Actueel Nieuws interviewed Marion Koopmans, professor in Virology and Scientific Director of the PDPC, about her appearances in the media during the height of the pandemic, the book she wrote with her son and her view of our future in virology.
‘I think we need to look more fundamentally at the origin of viruses like Covid-19. The world is evolving, and with that, the likelihood of outbreaks is increasing. The population is growing. We are crammed with animals. We are mining nature where wild animals live, where infections originate. Secondly, because of globalization, if something jumps over somewhere, it can immediately spread worldwide. That will not change, so we must ask ourselves how to deal with it. We need to think much more structurally about the fact that viruses surround us, that that sometimes causes major problems, and that we are, in part, spreaders ourselves. So we really need to discuss together: what can you do yourself to reduce those risks?.’
