Delaying Covid-19 peak by four months in Tamil Nadu through staggered exit from lock down
Posted on: 06/May/2020 10:23:51 AM
According to a study done by the researchers belonging to TN Dr MGR Medical University, it was clear that a staggered exit from the lock down (with social distancing) would help TN to delay the peak atleast by another 4 months and pull down the number of Corona virus cases by nearly half.
It was shocking to note that TN would have had atleast 15,500 Covid-19 positive cases on Tuesday compared to 4058 cases if TN had not introduced 3 phases of lock down with social distancing, compulsory face masks usage and hand hygiene. The RO or Reproductive Number that is the number of people one person would infect would have been 3.69 (every positive person would have infected 3 persons). At present this RO is just 1.09.
The study also revealed that without lock down Covid-19 would have peaked in middle of July month and there would be staggering 3.5 crores cases at the same time. This would have resulted in huge stress to the public health facilities. Important point is the lock down till June end would delay the peak by atleast 4 months to October and there would be 1.5 crore cases. With the lock down, there would be far fewer cases overall and the incidence would also be spread out. The peak would be much lower and the public health authorities would have time to cope.
The vice chancellor of Dr MGR Medical University, Dr. Sudha Seshayyan spoke about how the ideal medical solution would be to extend the lock down till the month of June. By this, the number of infected persons could be kept at 1.3 lakhs. She explained about how the lock down lifting might push the RO to 3.69 from the present 1.09. There would be rise in the number of Corona virus positive cases once again and this study predicts when that would happen.
