Harvard study shows that social distancing might toggle between on and off for as long as 2022 to prevent the spread of Coronavirus.
The novel coronavirus that has engulfed the world isn’t something that will stop by one single lockdown. A recent modeling study by Harvard scientists shows that people might have to go for recurring lockdowns to prevent hospitals from getting swamped.
This comes as a result of the United States entering the crest of the number of positive cases and looking for measures to ease the lockdown shortly.
The computer simulation run by the Harvard team was published in a paper in the journal, Science which has assumptions of this disease becoming seasonal.
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But there are still things that are not known, which includes questions like how long a recovered patient is safe before getting infected again.
The lead author of the research paper, Stephen Kissler stressed the fact that one-time social distancing might just be insufficient to contain the virus.
And with the absence of any other available treatments, periodic social distancing becomes necessary.
Also, there will be a need for widespread viral testing to determine when to restart a period of lockdown.
If the vaccines and treatments become available then relaxations in the whole lockdown activity can be seen, but until then repeated on-off distancing has to be maintained.
This is to ensure that the hospitals get ample time to increase the critical care capacity to meet the increasing demands post lockdown.
Marc Lipsitch, a co-author of the above-mentioned paper said,
“By permitting periods of transmission that reach higher prevalence than otherwise would be possible, they allow an accelerated acquisition of herd immunity.”
On the other hand, social distancing without any intervals can have adverse effects on the population not being able to build any immunity.
Thus, the intermittent approach is the best alternative we have.
However, the authors said that the major drawback of their model was the unavailability of information about immunity building of recovered patient.
Presently, this duration is estimated for one year. Also, chances of cross-immunity against coronavirus are possible if a person gets infected by cold-causing betacoronavirus.
But something that the scientists are completely sure about is that the virus isn’t going to leave us anytime soon.
That it is highly unlikely that the virus will fade out after an initial wave.
Also, various factors like recently introduced antibody vaccines will give us more clear ideas regarding the effects of the coronavirus.
Whereas, a vaccine remains the ultimate solution.
This study has been appreciated by experts all over, despite acknowledging the fact that considerable things remain unknown.
One such expert, Mark Woolhouse, an epidemiologist at the University of Edinburgh, said,
“This is an excellent study that uses mathematical models to explore the dynamics of COVID-19 for several years, in contrast to previously published studies that have focused on the coming weeks or months.”
Although the model is consistent with the present scenario but the assumptions made about acquired immunity are yet to be confirmed.
