’Scientists can never make statements with 100% certainty’

EPFL professor Jacques Fellay has been selected for a new advisory committee that the government set up recently so policymakers and scientists can continue their joint efforts. Alain Herzog/EPFL - EPFL professor Jacques Fellay, who served on the Swiss National Covid-19 Task Force, has been selected for a new advisory committee that the government set up recently so policymakers and scientists can continue their joint efforts. The pandemic did have a silver lining. At least that was the case in Switzerland, where the public-health crisis opened up the lines of communication between policymakers and scientists like never before. Thanks to the close collaboration between these two groups, albeit after some initial hiccups, "the pandemic didn't go as badly as it could have," says Fellay, who also heads EPFL's Laboratory of Human Genomics of Infection and Immunity. "There were undoubtedly some things we could've done better, but in terms of our community response, we rose to the challenge in a responsible, proactive and effective way." Fellay, an expert in infectious diseases, will serve on the new advisory committee alongside representatives of the Swiss federal government and cantonal governments and over a dozen other experts from a range of scientific fields. The committee will operate until June 2023 and serve as a forum for continuing the joint work and dialogue between policymakers and scientists. We spoke with Fellay about the working relationship between these two groups and what lessons he believes we can learn from the pandemic. As an infectious disease expert, were you worried when Covid-19 first emerged?