"We show that in the UK and US context, suppression will minimally require a combination of social distancing of the entire population, home isolation of cases and household quarantine of their family members. This may need to be supplemented by school and university closures, though it should be recognised that such closures may have negative impacts on health systems due to increased absenteeism. The major challenge of suppression is that this type of intensive intervention package – or something equivalently effective at reducing transmission – will need to be maintained until a vaccine becomes available (potentially 18 months or more) – given that we predict that transmission will quickly rebound if interventions are relaxed. We show that intermittent social distancing – triggered by trends in disease surveillance – may allow interventions to be relaxed temporarily in relative short time windows, but measures will need to be reintroduced if or when case numbers rebound. Last, while experience in China and now South Korea show that suppression is possible in the short term, it remains to be seen whether it is possible long-term, and whether the social and economic costs of the interventions adopted thus far can be reduced."
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/mrc-global-infectious-disease-analysis/news--wuhan-coronavirus/
Good post—this is what we have been saying here for a while.
Notice that no public official dares explain this to the public—yet.
I expect to hear declarations of “victory” in the next month or so followed by relaxed restrictions followed by “oh s^%$”.
Thanks for that excellent Summary excerpt from the
COVID-19 reports by the Imperial College of London. They explain clearly exactly what I've been fearing.
We are doing these two to four week "shutdowns" all over the country now, but the disease will rebound quickly once the shutdowns end. Then then will have to be re-instituted, but for longer periods of time, maybe 4 to 8 weeks. The shutdowns are doomed to fail because eventually people need income (if there are any jobs left) and kids have to go to school.
As the authors say, it is really a race to get to an effective, affordable, and abundant vaccine before the healthcare system gets overwhelmed. It looks like the earliest that mass vaccination could start would be Fall 2021.
When is "normal" going to return? This summer? Summer 2021? Later?
Will the savings of all imminent retirees be decimated by the stock market crash and slow rebound? That bodes poorly for retirements.
Will the communists capitalize on this and we face a communist government starting in 2021? If so, then we will never return to "normal" and COVID will be the least of our worries.