【明報專訊】THE GOVERNMENT has made frantic and clumsy attempts to deal with the third wave of COVID-19 outbreaks. Not only do they reflect a lack of logistic preparations, but they also highlight that the authorities did not have a well-thought-out plan in the medium to long term. All this has led to a last-minute rush and the authorities have only been able to handle it with temporary palliatives. COVID-19 is here to stay. Even if vaccines are available, their efficacy will remain unknown. In days to come, there will be outbreaks from time to time, and inevitably we will have to coexist with the virus. Anti-pandemic strategies must be relatively efficient in two ways. Firstly, they must be relatively efficient in curbing outbreaks. Secondly, they should be relatively efficient in keeping the economy moving. Merely tightening or loosening the social gathering ban will not achieve this dual purpose. The authorities must build a highly stable and resilient system that allows the implementation of strategies including prevention, tracking, containment, isolation and treatment.