2019 ended well.
The world welcomed 2020 with a grand celebration.
AND THEN THIS HAPPENED...
AND THEN THIS HAPPENED...
No one had the hint of the arrival of a virus that will doom the economies, distance us from our friends, challenge the healthcare systems and retreat us from the public spaces. Like the World Wars, this pandemic has badly shattered the human psyche.
This global epidemic was destined to happen as forecasted by Bill Gates in his TED talk in 2015 and also mentioned in the novel, 'The Eyes of Darkness' by Dean Koontz. In October, Johns Hopkins Center had the question, 'What if the world gets swept away by a new coronavirus?'.
Now the question has been converted from 'What if?' to 'Now what?'
A thought...
Just imagine the fact that babies born during this period will be born into a COVID19 dominated society. Their lives will be altered and determined by the choices made by their parents in the coming days.
The virus is more transmissible than influenza and clever enough to spread from host to host even before triggering symptoms...a stealthy move. The only way to stop this stealthy activity is 'test, test and test' like South Korea, Singapore and Hongkong. It is the call of a country to tackle the rapid spread of the virus to minimize the load on the hospitals. Execution of the pandemic plans will then become easier.
The case of America
The coming months will be very crucial. People who got infected several days back will start showing symptoms now even after they have isolated themselves in the meantime.
Already, Italy and Spain are providing warnings about the dim future. Exponential growth of Covid positive cases is speaking loud and clear of the severe rate of transmissibility of the virus (Read more at Transmission of coronavirus decoded by genomic technology). The U.S has fewer hospital beds per capita than Italy.
If this situation continues without total lockdown being imposed in the U.S, then for every available critical-care bed, there will be an approx. 15 COVID19 patients in need of one. This the worst scenario to happen to any country.
Action-steps to be undertaken at a quicker pace:
1. Priority is to protect the saviours by providing adequate personal protective equipment (PPEs), masks, gloves and also ventilators. In some hospitals, the stock is so low that the doctors and nurses are re-using the masks between patients. Some manufacturers have already risen to the challenge.
Strengthening the logistics and supply chain which calls for the active involvement of the Defense Logistics Agency. They are a team of almost 25,000 who prepares the U.S military for overseas operations and also assisted in public health crisis during the 2014 Ebola outbreak.
2. FDA is now giving accelerated approvals to the private labs for the test kits which generates results in an hour. All hospital workers need to be tested to prevent any chance of infection inside the hospital itself.
The above measures are time consuming during which the pandemic may follow any one of the following courses-
- It may either accelerate beyond the healthcare capacity or
- Slow down
Now the fate of the country depends on the third measure, Social Distancing.
In a particular country, the population is categorized as GROUP-A and GROUP-B.
GROUP-A comprises the team who is directly or indirectly helping in the medical response, like doctors, nurses, lab technicians, ward boys and medical supplies manufacturers.
GROUP-B includes everyone else.
Now, GROUP-B will have to help 'flatten the curve' by practicing social distancing to break the chains of transmission.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases had a straightforward message, "You don't make the timeline, the virus makes the timeline"
Allowing low-risk people to resume work and protecting the elderly and high-risk is a flawed idea. It basically underestimates the fact of how badly the virus can strike the low-risk group.
A recent analysis estimated that even if the social distancing measure has an impact of 95%, almost 950,000 Americans will still need intensive care support. Abandoning social distancing will be foolish but abandoning it now, when tests and PPE are scarce, would be catastrophic.
The only step we can take is to lockdown ourselves in our respective homes and have a quality time with our families (for ideas read The phase of self quarantine- How to have a productive and quality time at home).
Let us all strive to make our Earth covid19-free.
This global epidemic was destined to happen as forecasted by Bill Gates in his TED talk in 2015 and also mentioned in the novel, 'The Eyes of Darkness' by Dean Koontz. In October, Johns Hopkins Center had the question, 'What if the world gets swept away by a new coronavirus?'.
Now the question has been converted from 'What if?' to 'Now what?'
A thought...
Just imagine the fact that babies born during this period will be born into a COVID19 dominated society. Their lives will be altered and determined by the choices made by their parents in the coming days.
The virus is more transmissible than influenza and clever enough to spread from host to host even before triggering symptoms...a stealthy move. The only way to stop this stealthy activity is 'test, test and test' like South Korea, Singapore and Hongkong. It is the call of a country to tackle the rapid spread of the virus to minimize the load on the hospitals. Execution of the pandemic plans will then become easier.
The case of America
The coming months will be very crucial. People who got infected several days back will start showing symptoms now even after they have isolated themselves in the meantime.
Already, Italy and Spain are providing warnings about the dim future. Exponential growth of Covid positive cases is speaking loud and clear of the severe rate of transmissibility of the virus (Read more at Transmission of coronavirus decoded by genomic technology). The U.S has fewer hospital beds per capita than Italy.
If this situation continues without total lockdown being imposed in the U.S, then for every available critical-care bed, there will be an approx. 15 COVID19 patients in need of one. This the worst scenario to happen to any country.
Action-steps to be undertaken at a quicker pace:
1. Priority is to protect the saviours by providing adequate personal protective equipment (PPEs), masks, gloves and also ventilators. In some hospitals, the stock is so low that the doctors and nurses are re-using the masks between patients. Some manufacturers have already risen to the challenge.
Strengthening the logistics and supply chain which calls for the active involvement of the Defense Logistics Agency. They are a team of almost 25,000 who prepares the U.S military for overseas operations and also assisted in public health crisis during the 2014 Ebola outbreak.
2. FDA is now giving accelerated approvals to the private labs for the test kits which generates results in an hour. All hospital workers need to be tested to prevent any chance of infection inside the hospital itself.
The above measures are time consuming during which the pandemic may follow any one of the following courses-
- It may either accelerate beyond the healthcare capacity or
- Slow down
Now the fate of the country depends on the third measure, Social Distancing.
 |
| GROUP-A |
 |
| GROUP-B |
In a particular country, the population is categorized as GROUP-A and GROUP-B.
GROUP-A comprises the team who is directly or indirectly helping in the medical response, like doctors, nurses, lab technicians, ward boys and medical supplies manufacturers.
GROUP-B includes everyone else.
Now, GROUP-B will have to help 'flatten the curve' by practicing social distancing to break the chains of transmission.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases had a straightforward message, "You don't make the timeline, the virus makes the timeline"
Allowing low-risk people to resume work and protecting the elderly and high-risk is a flawed idea. It basically underestimates the fact of how badly the virus can strike the low-risk group.
A recent analysis estimated that even if the social distancing measure has an impact of 95%, almost 950,000 Americans will still need intensive care support. Abandoning social distancing will be foolish but abandoning it now, when tests and PPE are scarce, would be catastrophic.
The only step we can take is to lockdown ourselves in our respective homes and have a quality time with our families (for ideas read The phase of self quarantine- How to have a productive and quality time at home).
Let us all strive to make our Earth covid19-free.
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