A virus that has already spread globally cannot be contained. No measures such as locking down cities or closing borders will prevent the ongoing spread. Within an isolated city with time most inhabitants will become infected. This poses the question for how long such a lock down should last. Each infection will prolong the necessary time for another two weeks. Thus, this doesn’t make sense and will lead to fear and frustration and to a decline of local economy and society.
Would it be helpful if everyone just stayed at home for two weeks?
The principle answer is yes, but this is not realistic since parts of the society cannot stay at home (f.e. to keep up the infrastructure or for emergency and medical care), while a number of people depend on help from others. The only way to deal with this is personal hygiene and behavior.
Is it useful to monitor body temperature in places of entry such as airports?
- An infected person may not have any symptoms in the first days of contraction. The virus, however, is on board and may be spread several days later.
- In the case of early symptoms patients may be tempted to take drugs that reduce a fever. Thus, a symptomatic person may be undetected in such screenings. Therefore, such measures are useless.
- Should you feel sick, and seriously suspect a coronavirus infection, please stay at home. If the symptoms become more severe, please call your local health department’s hotline or your family physician.
- Do not visit a hospital or your doctor’s office, since you might infect others.
- These are the current advices of the health authorities.
In the US, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have already issued a warning of an epidemic, although only 60 coronavirus cases have been confirmed. The US government has earmarked $ 2.5 billion to combat the coronavirus epidemic. We would be interested in what amount of money the European Union and the German Government is providing to fight this pandemic? To this day the German authorities have dealt responsibly with the single coronavirus cases. However, the health system is facing a challenge. Once the chain of infections can no longer be traced, a largescale epidemic is to be expected. Then, hospitals will face an overwhelming load of patients since capacities for isolation and intensive care are limited for numerous reasons.
Hospitals should start routine tests for the new coronavirus in patients suffering from a respiratory disease even if many cases will turn out to be negative. This way infected people will be identified early and may be subject to the proper treatment. The costs of such a test are negligible, an RT-PCR is available for a couple of Euros.
In any case, there is no reason to panic.
Stay tuned, and take care,
Sabine and Joerg