Salvador Peiró
Epidemiologist, researcher in the Health Services and Pharmacoepidemiology Research Area of the Foundation for the Promotion of Health and Biomedical Research of the Valencian Community (FISABIO) and Director of Gaceta Sanitaria, the scientific journal of the Spanish Society of Public Health and Health Administration (SESPAS)
Ending PHEIC by covid-19 is more than reasonable and, from a transmission point of view, could have been done long ago. PHEIC has other effects (e.g. on the distribution of WHO-approved vaccines based on the emergency declaration) that have probably also reasonably delayed this decision.
The end of PHEIC does not imply that covid-19 has been definitively overcome, but rather that we are in a different situation in which the approach mechanisms are different, similar to those used for other communicable respiratory diseases such as influenza or bronchiolitis. Although SARS-CoV-2 is not showing, at least so far, a seasonal behaviour, it is very likely that we will have several spikes per year ("wavelets" rather than "waves") as we move away in time from the variants that caused previous infections and booster doses.
Protection of the elderly and some patient groups at higher risk of developing severe covid-19 will continue to be important (as it is with influenza or respiratory syncytial virus).