The UK should change its COVID-19 strategy to try to eliminate COVID-19 even without a vaccine rather than simply managing the disease. New Zealand has effectively managed to eliminate the virus, but can states with much larger, denser populations that have experienced much bigger outbreaks hope to do the same? Or is it more realistic to accept that the disease is likely to continue to circulate at some level and plan for that? Lakshmi Manoharan, Medical Epidemiologist with ERGO, tells us we should focus on reducing the amount of community transmission first before allowing economic and social activity to resume as normal.