The corona virus is less likely to spread among the population. The reproduction number (R) was reduced from 1.14 to 1.04 on Friday, the RIVM reports. The reproduction number is a measure of how quickly a virus spreads.
At the figure of 1.04, a group of 100 corona patients infected an average of 104 others. When the reproduction number is below 1, fewer and fewer people become infected and a corona outbreak is extinguished. If the reproduction number is above 1, then more and more cases are added. With a number below 1, the outbreak can slowly extinguish. The latter is therefore not yet the case.
It takes a few weeks before the figure can be calculated, Friday’s figure refers to February 18. On February 13, the reproduction number was 1.16, the highest level since early December.
From now on, the RIVM will issue the reproduction number twice a week, so that the situation can be monitored more easily. Every Tuesday and Friday, the figure is posted on the government’s corona dashboard.
From now on, the RIVM will also report twice a week how many people in the Netherlands have corona and can infect others. That’s probably about 93,000 now. In the first wave in March last year, there were probably about 160,000, just like in mid-October and the end of December.
On Monday we will explain on NU.nl how the reproduction number of the corona virus is calculated.
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