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Shutdowns prevented 60M coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Shutdowns prevented 60M coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

#12
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"So far" meaning "might save more later" or "only postponed, not prevented"?

The latter. That's always what "flattening the curve" has meant. The total area under the curve (i.e. total unique infected individuals) stays about the same.

"Flattening the curve" is not the only possible outcome.

A cure, an inoculation, or segmenting geographic regions until localized herd immunity (like New Zealand just did) are all examples of cutting the curve short.

Re: Shutdowns prevented 60M coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

#13
post #8

"Received: 22 March 2020" - direct from the study cover page at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2404-8_reference.... States imposed lockdowns between March 21 and early April. Someone want to explain to me how a study submitted before the lockdowns were issued (nevermind had time to actually have an impact) "found" those results?

It must be a typo. March 22nd was a Sunday, where May 22nd was a Friday. It seems unlikely that it would take over 2 months to accept it, considering so many other articles are being rushed to publication in fractions of that time.

ETA: also, charts in that publication also show data collected from April, so unlikely they had data from the future.

Re: Shutdowns prevented 60M coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

#14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latter. That's always what "flattening the curve" has meant. The total area under the curve (i.e. total unique infected individuals) stays about the same.

"Flattening the curve" is not the only possible outcome. A cure, an inoculation, or segmenting geographic regions until localized herd immunity (like New Zealand just did) are all examples of cutting the curve short.

Vaccines are far away from approval for widespread use, and New Zealand's situation as an island nation is not applicable to something like 98% of the World's population and quite frankly, irrelevant to the discussion.
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