The first wave says very little about the development of the virus in the coming months. To explain that, we have to start at the beginning.
The coronavirus ‘blew’ over from China and the first people were tested. Also with us, but only if they came from risk area China. Later Italy was added, and more risk areas gradually followed. So if you came home sick from winter sports from Austria, you did not have to be tested. After all, it was not a risk area.
Infection figures say nothing
This approach now means that we cannot do anything with the contamination figures at the beginning of the year. To illustrate: On April 10, 1,327 people were reported with a corona positive test. That is the highest on one day in the first wave. “This figure says almost nothing. The testing policy was very different,” says data journalist Jasper Bunskoek.
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Bunskoek: “There was a shortage of test capacity. On March 31, Hugo de Jonge reported during a press conference that including negative tests 4,000 tests a day were taken, now we test almost 45,000 people every day. Comparing infections from then to now is nonsense. “
Infectious persons
We let go of the infections. But are there things that we can possibly compare with each other? Yes, there are. But first and foremost: the figures that are coming now are also very uncertain and can change just like that.
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Perhaps the most comparable figure is that of the number of contagious individuals. The RIVM employs modellers who develop calculation models and use them to estimate how many people in our country are contagious.
167,000 contagious in first wave
How uncertain this figure is, is evident from the retroactive changes. The RIVM now estimates that 167,795 people were contagious at the peak of the first wave (on March 24). Earlier they said the peak of the spring was 270,000. According to the most recent figures from the RIVM of 8 October, 127,369 people were contagious at that time.
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The rise in infectious people appears in this chart above, and we insist on it: seems to stagnate. “It is especially important that the uncertainty, the gray part, of the graph varies enormously at the end, which means that the estimates become more unreliable,” says Bunskoek.
Stagnation not enough
And then still. If the increase eventually stagnates, a lot of people will still be infected with the corona virus every day. “And that means that every day people are also being added to hospitals and in the ICU. More than 8,000 new positive corona tests have been reported for a few days now. That’s just a lot.”
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If you want to reduce the spread and reduce the pressure on healthcare, stagnation is not enough, says Bunskoek. “Then the figures also have to go down considerably.” We are still a long way from that point.
The effect of the measures will come later
Tighter measures taken last week should contribute to this. “The effect of this will probably not be seen in the contamination figures until the course of next week and again a while later in the occupation of the hospitals.”
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The hospital figures are still rising. Nearly 300 new hospitalizations were reported on October 19. Bunskoek: “In the spring there were only a few days when that number was higher.” And there is little reason for optimism on the ic’s either. The line with recordings is still rising there too.
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