Apologies for being silent on this blog for several days. Firstly, there seem to be so many things to write about that it is hard to make a choice. I will try to pick up the threads soon.
Secondly, I have been busy writing popular science articles elsewhere. In one of them, we say:
(…) we should also be concerned about whether or not we will be living with the virus for a long time. Will we be able to eradicate COVID-19, as we did with Sars? Or will we need to learn to live with it like we do with the common cold?
I have also written a popular article on epidemiological modelling for a weekly Polish magazine, PAUZA, published by the Polish Academy of Learning. If you read Polish, you will be able to access it next week as it goes through the publishing procedure.
Can I encourage all who are in the UK to help with tracing COVID-19 outbreak?
Why is it important? My work is to try to predict how many people are likely to need intensive care in the days and weeks to come. This is essential for health authorities to be able to prepare enough beds, staff and equipment. We also look into the data to see whether the lockdown is indeed helping to slow down the spread, to predict how long we need to be in the isolation, or whether it is OK to relax the constraints on our lives. This is essential – each day of lockdown costs us millions of pounds and possible many livelihoods. On the other hand, if we relax them too early, we can get an even more damaging second wave.
The problem with our work is that we need to have as good information as possible about how many people are and are not infected. At the moment we are seeing only the “tip of an iceberg”. There are wild estimations of how many people are carriers and do not show any symptoms. We have little idea how many people are infectious but show only mild symptoms, and so do not bother with self-isolation. We do not know exactly how many people are starting having symptoms now and so will be coming to A&E in a few days time. Yet, having this information and having it as promptly as possible is vital.
It is also important to know who is still healthy, so if there are large pockets of the population that are not affected by the disease.
Our colleagues at King’s College London, Guys & St Thomas’ Hospitals and the NHS have come up with a simple mobile application that can be used to monitor symptoms. Please follow the link below, download the app and use it daily to tell us how you feel!
I have seen this post on Facebook recently and got permission from the author to republish it here. It comes from the epicentre of the outbreak, in China:
WHAT I AM LEARNING ON LOCK-DOWN: How Long??????
We are entering our 8th week of lock down in China. 2 months. And It feels unreal that most of my children have not left our community for 2 months!
[…] has been the one to go for grocery and needs runs, however went 17 days without going anywhere at one time. We decided at the beginning of things closing down, to limit the amount of trips out of the house. Our reasoning? The main reason is that if someone is diagnosed with the virus, and you shopped at the same store, someone will be knocking on your door here to check and possibly quarantine you. We heard many cases of this. Even a round up of 11,000 people occurred, after a outdoor market vendor was diagnosed.
So part of the “How Long” will depend on others around you, so be encouraging one to another to keep healthy distancing.
From our experience here, we are on our 2nd month and we are entering a new phase. IT is a mixed emotion of RELIEF and hope when we hear the numbers are minimum. Yet there is still high concern that when society ventures out from their houses, will it come back? So after all we have gone through these past 2 months, you get to a point where you are not wanting everyone to RUSH out too early and rebound.
Yet with the economy the way it is, it is critical!
Many of you have asked me How long I think your country will take before this is all over….. if you take serious precautions and practice strong hygiene, maybe 3-4 months hopefully…..but it is variable upon human choices and also medical ability…
Just like America is pointing out that there are consequences for China’s President being late in telling the public, there are also consequences for countries around the world not responding with due diligence and speed as well.
When the government and medical community here said maybe in April things will look better, I cringed and felt dismayed. But after the first 3 weeks, we settled into a new way of thinking and operating. It still feels weird, but once the original HYPE and Shopping rushes, and the new media starts to find everyone is no longer glued to the screens so they start reporting on other topics, it just becomes more of a team spirit way of living!
I hope you will find useful this encouraging message.
