Will we avoid traffic stops, economics, restrictions on movement, etc.?
Our scientific group thinks that the sooner the lockdown comes, the shorter it will be and the less it will hit the economy. It is inevitable now, so we recommend doing it as soon as possible.
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Why is it inevitable?
Because the data clearly show that there will be overload of hospitals in the horizon of days in small hospitals and in the horizon of weeks in large hospitals. The number of hospitalizations is growing exponentially throughout September and October, and at the same time the number of critical hospitalizations is growing. At the same time, the number of infected doctors and nurses is growing exponentially.
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We have several independent models and all of them will overload hospitals. Sometimes I say that today we are crashing a car against a wall and now we need to step on the brakes. However, we will already be slowing down the impact that will probably occur with a probability bordering on certainty.
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One of the cheapest things is for the population to really start using veils. All.
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Even in the most optimistic scenario?
The most optimistic scenario is that someone invents a miracle cure, but it is almost impossible.
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However, some hospitals already have serious problems, and we are only at the beginning, because the largest increase in new positives took place on Wednesday, so patients from these waves of infected patients will not reach hospitals in two or three weeks. So we have the hardest weeks ahead of us, and hospitals are already in trouble.
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At the same time, we say that one of the cheapest things is for the population to really start using veils. All. We have data from states and cities which, when the veils were introduced compulsorily, were able to significantly suppress the epidemic. But they also need to be used by those who are not yet responsible, even outdoors, whenever there is a risk of meeting a person at a distance of less than two meters.
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Is it not clear to me how it could happen that the reproductive number R, which expresses how many other people infect a positive individual on average, could continue to grow? We have closed schools, restaurants, limited gatherings. According to the government, R is now around 1.5, and if it falls by 2 November, it may begin to loosen…
We would also recommend ordering the wearing of veils in cities and town centers. The speed of the drop depends on how intensively we step on the brake.
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At the same time, we have reports from all over the Czech Republic that the percentage of people who really comply with the measures is not large. So, in fact, people’s irresponsibility means that much tougher action will be needed. That is the main problem. In the first wave, people were disciplined, so we ended up as one of the best states in the world. But now a lot of conspiracy theories are spreading, misinformation and people’s irresponsibility is alarming in this.
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Back to the number R. So you don’t think it’s 1.5?
Our expert estimate is that it is somewhere at 1.8 to just around 2. The number R is calculated from the positively tested and we think that there are significantly more infected than the number of tests detected. We have 25 percent tested positive in the sample here, which means that we don’t catch a lot of people, so our estimate of R is significantly higher than 1.5, and therefore still alarming.
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In the long run, little has been tested here, significantly less than in other countries. We had half a year to set it up, but it didn’t happen. We recommended that we do 30,000 tests, which is not happening much now (This limit was crossed for the first time on Tuesday – editor’s note).
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And how did you come to the conclusion that our numbers are worse than during the first wave in Italy or New York, when there was no testing like that at the time?
We mainly compare hospitalizations, because they are conclusive. The most significant are critical hospitalizations. You can’t even say that people lie there unnecessarily, because if someone is intubated, they probably won’t be there just like that. The conversion per million inhabitants is alarming.
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What can the impact look like?
Given that we have a lot of busy doctors and nurses today, in fact, every patient who does not get to the hospital will relieve the system a bit. The responsibility of each of us can then have an impact.
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If hospitals are overcrowded, people who have entered hospitals due to completely trivial things, such as appendicitis, will also receive less care.
For us, the scenario is that something almost was approaching that was in Italy, where doctors will decide, for example, the age of patients who receive care, who do not. Far more beds will be needed, so we have already called for military hospitals to be built and for halls and, for example, underground car parks to be converted into makeshift hospitals.
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Your estimates range between 5,000 and 15,000 victims by the end of the year. The second option is in case it is still delaying the tightening of measures?
It is so. With exponential growth, the days make a huge difference. In a matter of days, the difference can manifest itself in the horizon of hundreds of deaths. That is why we have written a call to shout very loudly that the situation is really serious and now we all need to come together.
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Every irresponsible person indirectly threatens the health system, the whole economy and people will return it like a boomerang to higher unemployment and the overall impoverishment of the population. He who does not observe this harms himself and others.
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As for the victims – are they people who will die with the covid, or will they be the direct cause of the covid, or are there people who are not infected but have not received care?
Take the long-term average mortality, for example over five years, and how much the total number of deaths in the months of the epidemic will increase. For example, in New York, a thousand people normally die every day, and at that time six thousand people died every day. This cannot be explained by anything other than either a covid or, secondarily, an overload of the system. As a result, it almost doesn’t matter if it’s caused by the covid or the secondary effects. The important thing is that these are people who would not normally die, but who will die.
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