Question

Why is it important to ‘flatten the pandemic curve? Briefly describe the two public health strategies of Mitigation and Suppression for controlling the contagion. How might these approaches differ in both flattening the pandemic curve and flattening the ‘recession curve’? Explain clearly and briefly. Use a hand-sketched diagram to support your explanation. Which approach would you support? Provide a brief justification.

Answer 1

Please give positive rating your feedback is valuable to me.

In case any problem please leave a comment.

The term 'flattening the curve' comes from a chart depicting two curves that demonstrates the outcome of social distancing. The key message of the chart is that it is essential to delay the spread of the virus from person to person, even if it is an impossible task to halt the spread. Social distancing is a term applied to specific non- pharmaceutical infection control actions taken by public health officials to stop or slow down the spread of a highly contagious disease. The objective of social distancing is to reduce the probability of contact between persons carrying an infection, and others who are not infected, to minimize disease transmission, morbidity, and ultimately, mortality. Experts estimate that anywhere from 20% to 60% of the world's adult population could catch coronavirus disease or COVID-19. This means 40 million cases, at a conservative estimate, in the US alone! Considering that there is no vaccine or specific drugs for this disease, this might make you feel hopeless. However, this is not what healthcare professionals are saying. They want everyone to cooperate in 'flattening the curve.'

The curve simply stands for the number of people who catch the virus and develop COVID-19, the disease. The first curve is a sharp, steeply rising one, while the second is a smooth low curve. The first shoots up to peak well above a dotted line representing healthcare system capacity, or the number of cases the healthcare system is equipped to undertake. The second peaks below this line. The message is clear, and experts now recognize the innovative graphic as the key to containing the mortality rate of this pandemic. It also answers a lot of questions as to the formulation of plans intended to contain the virus. The chart is deservedly acclaimed as providing a concise and understandable summary of the importance of personal precautions to be taken by individuals, apart from government measures. The mitigation strategy was recently highlighted by researchers from Imperial College where this strategy was initially taken by UK government. The aim of mitigation was o use other strategies to help individuals so that not to interrupt transmission completely, but to reduce the health impacts of an epidemic. In this cases, population immunity built up through the epidemic, leading to an eventual rapid decline in case numbers and transmission dropping to low levels. Thus, we simulated the situation of the UK by taking mitigation strategy with dif-ferent level of strengths.

Recent outbreaks of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has led a global pandemic cross the world. Most countries took two main interventions: suppression like immediate lockdown cities at epicenter or mitigation that slows down but not stopping epidemic for reducing peak healthcare demand. Both strategies have their apparent merits and limitations; it becomes extremely hard to conduct one intervention as the most feasible way to all countries. Targeting at this problem, this paper conducted a feasibility study by defining a mathematical model named SEMCR, it extended traditional SEIR (Susceptible-Exposed-Infectious- Recovered) model by adding two key features: a direct connection between Exposed and Recovered populations, and separating infections into mild and critical cases. It defined parameters to classify two stages of COVID-19 control: active contain by isolation of cases and contacts, passive contain by suppression or mitigation. Asian countries attempted to reduce the infectivity of the COVID19 pandemic to RO (R naught) by enforcing suppression. An RO less than 1 indicates that each infected person transmits SARS-CoV-2 to less than one other person. Successful suppression requires early widespread testing of many people, even those without symptoms. People testing positive are isolated, so they cannot infect others.

The failure of the United States to implement early testing, caused it to rely on mitigation, rather than suppression, to slow the spread of disease. Mitigation efforts include handwashing, school and business closings, travel limitations and social distancing. The latter keeps people further apart, which decreases the likelihood of person to person transmission. The most vulnerable populations should be completely separated. Mitigation focuses on protecting the most vulnerable from the effects of a disease that is already widespread throughout the community. By reducing the number of active cases at any given time, health care providers are better able to respond, without becoming overwhelmed. Reducing the intensity of the pandemic has been called "flattening the curve". Models published by the Imperial College COVID19 Response Team on March 26, 2020, estimate that a completely unmitigated COVID19 epidemic would peak in mid-June and result in 326 million infections and 2.9 million deaths in North America Let's assume that health authorities do the right thing, so we are on the flattened (blue) infection curve. What are the macroeconomic implications? I will argue that, in the short run, flattening the

infection curve inevitably steepens the macroeconomic recession curve. Consider China, or Italy: increasing social distances has required closing schools, universities, most non-essential businesses, and asking most of the working-age population to stay at home. While some people may be able to work from home, this remains a small fraction of the overall labour force. Even if working from home is an option, the short-term disruption to work and family routines is major and likely to affect productivity. In short, the appropriate - public health policy plunges the economy into a sudden stop. To wit, all indicators coming out of China, for instance, indicate a dramatic plunge in production and trade.

In a perfect world, people would self-isolate until infection rates decline sufficiently and public health authorities give the all-clear. At that point, the economic engines would re-start: workers would go back to work, factories would turn back on, ships would load their cargo and planes would take off. New cases New cases without containment policies New cases with containment policies Medical containment measures: Make the medical crises less bad Make the economic crisis worse Time Recession without containment policies Recession with containment policies Severity of recession As a number of economists have pointed out, most of this lost GDP will not be coming back, so it is reasonable to assume a return to the baseline, rather than a later surge in activity -although one could expect a post-recession surge in spending on postponed durable goods purchases. As a point of comparison, the decline in output growth in the U.S. during the 2008-09 'Great Recession' was around 4.5%. We are about to witness a downturn that could dwarf the Great Recession.'

Why are the numbers so much larger now? The short answer is that -even at the peak of the financial crisis when the U.S. economy was shedding jobs at the rate of 800 thousand workers per month, the vast majority of people were still employed and working. The unemployment rate in the U.S. peaked at just' 10%. By contrast, the coronavirus is creating a situation where -for a brief amount of time-50% or more of people may not be able to work. The impact on economic activity is comparatively that much larger. Yet, this is the 'optimistic' scenario. We do not live in the 'perfect world' described above. Instead, a downturn of this magnitude will send shock waves through the economy that could do serious damage. Improperly managed, the economic cost could be much larger and longer lasting.