Global Scenarios for SARS-CoV-2 New Variants. Mitigation and Risk in the Future of COVID-19

Since its appearance in the Chinese province of Hubei in November 2019, COVID-19 has hit every corner of the planet with overwhelming consequences. Public health systems worldwide collapsed and the world economy contracted since SARS-CoV-2 forced the vast majority of countries to impose drastic sanitary restrictions, massively disrupting all sectors of economic activity. With the unprecedented development of targeted vaccines, the outlook seemed more encouraging but new doubts now arise due to their unequal coverage globally. The gap between developed and underdeveloped countries still poses a scenario of uncertainty at the global level, with the emergence of new and more contagious viral strains and disparities in vaccination. In our highly globalized world, this possibility raises an overarching problem. We present here an attempt to evaluate control strategies globally, based on contact networks that allow us to anticipate how new variants evading immunity could behave in the face of either a coordinated response of the world's governments or in front of a total lack of a coordinated control strategy. Among the scenarios evaluated, we can highlight that reducing connectivity between countries would again be the most effective containment approach regarding total deaths and infections. We also present scenarios that contemplate a reduction in the efficacy of vaccines globally due to the loss of immunity or the appearance of resistant strains.Funding: No funding to declare.Declaration of Interests: The authors declare no competing interests.