Living with the current COVID-19 restrictions in Ireland is 'as good as it gets' until a vaccine is found if the country's strategy doesn't change, an expert has warned.
Dr Tómas Ryan, Associate Professor at the School of Biochemistry and Immunology in Trinity College, says authorities now need to decide whether to continue along the current path or shift their approach.
He suggested the best case scenario is 'essentially what we're living in now' if we don't aim for elimination of the virus.
He also argued that the local lockdowns have been a success, and that approach now needs to be a central strategy as the pandemic continues.
Speaking on The Pat Kenny Show, Dr Ryan said: "Ostensibly, the Government goal has been suppression - and suppression means living with the virus and restrictions, but hopefully not having surges that require heavy restrictions or lockdowns.
"Unfortunately, we've slipped backwards: we're now in a mitigation state. Mitigation means dealing with the virus reactively, and increasing restrictions whenever you need to: all the way to localised lockdowns and potentially full lockdowns."
He explained it will be another few days before we know if the latest restrictions have worked, while the reopening of schools is also likely to impact transmission.
He said: "The reality is so far we have failed to suppress the virus in the population, and we need to change what we're doing.
"The alternative strategy is if we don't want to live with the virus, we could try to live without the virus: and that means elimination.
"That means removing community transmission. You're still going to get it coming in from other countries at some level, but if you have effectively zero community transmission - at a national or regional level - then you can live with less and less restrictions.
"I think we've been one-trick ponies for a while now with how we deal with COVID-19, and our tool has been lockdown. Our test, trace, isolation infrastructure is not yet fast enough to contain transmission - hopefully that will change."
Regional approach
Dr Ryan says he believes the success the country has had with a regional approach in recent weeks has been 'overlooked'.
He said it's unfortunate that the three county lockdowns were needed, and that they were preventable - but stressed that they were successful, and are much more effective than a national one.
He said: "Laois and Offaly were under control after just two weeks of a regional lockdown - I think the Government deserves a good degree of praise for that... hopefully Kildare [will follow] in another week or two."
In terms of a zero-COVID approach, Dr Ryan says it's been "misrepresented" in many discussions, and hasn't been given a fair comparative analysis.
He noted it would mean restrictions and closures on a regional and targeted basis, with 'green zones' for where the virus has been eliminated from the community.
He said: "The zones of counties makes sense because everyone knows what they mean... but when you're dealing with bigger counties or urban to rural areas, of course it makes sense to maybe define more localised regions.
"It also allows local communities to work together to achieve a green zone status.
"When you have a green zone status it means your pubs can open, your schools are open, everything's open and you're at 100% capacity. That's a much better way of living, I think, than what we're facing right now."
'As good as it gets'
Dr Ryan acknowledged there are challenges to such a zero COVID approach, and it will never be perfect.
However, he argued: "The alternative is living with the current restrictions for the next year and a half, and that's as good as it gets if schools are to open.
"I don't think we've really discussed the economic details and realities of living like this - or worse if we slip back into reactionary lockdowns.
"No-one wants to be alarmist, but we've had an R-number of above one for nearly a month. If this continues, we're going to end up back where we were, so something has to change.
"Many people are frustrated because they can't see an end goal - stage four and stage five were torn up, rightly, because our containment measures are not able to deliver that."
Dr Ryan said Ireland now needs to make a decision on whether we continue with our current path, or move forward with a different strategy.
He pointed to the example of New Zealand - saying they've suffered a 'setback' with a recent spike in cases, but that the localised lockdown in Auckland means they should be 'back on their feet' within weeks.
