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Corona Simulator

washingtonpost.com

61–70 of 81 posts

Re: Corona Simulator

#61
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Economically it doesn't make much difference. You can either isolate people now or later. The period of isolation will be roughly the same because you have to wait for the virus to exhaust its pool of hosts (in a household). Definitely politically it makes a big difference.

Now and later make a HUGE difference economically. Time value of money. Business cash flow. Not to mention, if it turns out to be unnecessary later, later becomes never.

The scale of the problem will be so much larger because we aren’t doing a quarantine. In an exponentially growing virus, one single day makes a large difference.

Re: Corona Simulator

#62

>"Recovered person can neither transmit simulitis to a healthy person nor become sick again after coming in contact with a sick person." The assumption is wrong. There are several cases of recovered patients getting coronavirus again. This virus is similar to HIV. https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asia/japan-woman-covid-...

Can you find a more credible source.

There will always be individual examples. But what is the norm.

Re: Corona Simulator

#63
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Economically it doesn't make much difference. You can either isolate people now or later. The period of isolation will be roughly the same because you have to wait for the virus to exhaust its pool of hosts (in a household). Definitely politically it makes a big difference.

Now and later make a HUGE difference economically. Time value of money. Business cash flow. Not to mention, if it turns out to be unnecessary later, later becomes never.

True, there might also be a vaccine in the future.

Another argument is that we just need it to grow slow enough for a vaccine to be ready.

Re: Corona Simulator

#64

The comparison between social distancing and quarantine has 0 sense. In Italy, we tried distancing, but without strict measures, people won't listen and the virus kept spreading. You can't enforce something like that without police action

Yeah, I think you need large numbers of tests, because unless you test people positive they are not likely to respect self isolation.

Re: Corona Simulator

#65

>"Recovered person can neither transmit simulitis to a healthy person nor become sick again after coming in contact with a sick person." The assumption is wrong. There are several cases of recovered patients getting coronavirus again. This virus is similar to HIV. https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asia/japan-woman-covid-...

From the reports I've seen, they have tested positive again which is different than getting it again.

Re: Corona Simulator

#66

The thing is, with these models. Everyone will eventually catch the virus and either dies off or recovers. If this happens in real life, the consequences are dire and catastrophic. Social distancing and avoiding large groups will obviously save lives and we flatten the curve to allow for treatment of individuals that will require hospitalization. But once the novelty of social distancing wears off. Will the number of…

A key notion is that the maximum capacity of the health care system is limited. Yes everyone will get sick, but we want to keep the total sick at any one time within healthcare limits.

https://www.old.reddit.com/r/coolguides/comments/fglwbc/cool...

Re: Corona Simulator

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>uh, except... the one we all just watched be successfully implemented in Wuhan? China have successfully paused the epidemic, but they haven't stopped it. Unless we fully eradicate the disease globally (highly unlikely given the presence of asymptomatic carriers and the spread of the disease to low-income countries), they'll be back to the beginning of the exponential curve as soon as the lockdown is lifted. That's b…

It's not about stopping the pandemic altogether - it's about reducing the number of people in critical condition at a given time. Italy it's already at peak capacity in it's ICUs, and only thorough social distancing it's possible to reduce the number of people at risk getting infected and clogging an health system that is already short on ventilators and hospital beds.

59 million people in Hubei province. 67,000 confirmed cases, 3000 deaths.

Lets assume all cases were identified. 59 million did not get the disease. It kills 4%.

A vaccine will take at least 18 months to develop. Can China keep Hubei locked down at the current rate for 18 months? Could we do that in the West?

If the answer is no, what happens when we reduce the social distancing?

Re: Corona Simulator

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a language problem. Things like self quarantine of infected (and potentially infected) people have a big impact on how fast a disease spreads (meeting the bar for "effective" in my mind). What they don't do is completely stop it.

New cases in China and South Korea have slowed to a crawl.

There were zero cases in Italy 6 weeks ago.

Lets assume China and South Korea manage to stop every single person from having it - even people with mild symptoms, and get 99% of people crossing the borders into quarantine for 14 days.

They then lift the lockdown.

Aren't they simply back to the stage Italy was in 6 weeks ago? A couple of weeks later one or two of the 1% of people avoiding quarantine. They can try the "contain" phase again, but eventually that will fail, so after 4 months from loosening the reigns, they're back into major outbreaks and back with lockdown. Expect that to happen many times over the next 18 months.

Even with a vaccine we haven't managed to eliminate polio or measles, and almost everyone is immune to them and doesn't carry it, we won't be able to eliminate covid either.

Re: Corona Simulator

#69
post #9

This is a great intuitive set of models. It also suggests scenarios where a poorly implemented quarantine could make things worse by intensifying contact and increasing spread between those isolated together, and then releasing everyone while still contagious. It drives home that if people are forcibly kept in close quarters for quarantine, its essential to see the full time period through. If resources might eventua…

I think it illustrates what happened on the 'cruise ship' (i.e. close proximity, clustered) quarantines, but it doesn't very well explain what real, individual quarantine would do.

What was interesting on the cruise ships is how few got it. Of the 3,681 tested, only 696 had it - after a month of close quarters. That's under 20%.

Doesn't that suggest it doesn't spread particularly easily?

All in all, 1% of those that caught it died, and cruise ships skew towards older people.

Re: Corona Simulator

#70
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New cases in China and South Korea have slowed to a crawl.

There were zero cases in Italy 6 weeks ago. Lets assume China and South Korea manage to stop every single person from having it - even people with mild symptoms, and get 99% of people crossing the borders into quarantine for 14 days. They then lift the lockdown. Aren't they simply back to the stage Italy was in 6 weeks ago? A couple of weeks later one or two of the 1% of people avoiding quarantine. They can try the "…

It'll be (at a minimum) months with no new outbreaks in an area before social behavior starts to return to what it was before an outbreak. New outbreaks won't look the same as the first ones.

I think it is still early to say we know, but it also looks like there is a period of immunity after infection. So there's a fair chance that will also slow the spread of each repeated outbreak.

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