Did you know that an estimated 10 nonillion (10 to the 31st power) individual viruses exist on our planet—enough to assign one to every star in the universe 100 million times over, as unbelievable as that sounds?
Whatever the case, that's a lot of viruses. Too many to even contemplate.
What this should tell you this is that we're fighting a losing battle. We can't sanitize the universe. We can't stay in lockdown for the next 20 years, and we can't avoid all social contact. Sure, sheltering in place, mask-wearing, and social distancing to flatten the curve made sense early on so we didn't overwhelm our already overburdened healthcare system. Also, we were in the dark about the virus's R0 (pronounced R naught) or Reproduction Number, which is a mathematical term indicating how contagious an infectious disease is, as well as it's lethality.
I'm still not sure about COVID-19's lethality. However, it does have an R0 of 2.2-4, meaning a person who has the virus will transmit it to an average 2.2-4 other people. Based on COVID-19’s R0, it's two to four times more contagious than seasonal influenza. Compounding matters is that the virus has a relatively long incubation period, ranging anywhere from 2 to 14 days with an average of five. So it seems that people walk around with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, for days without realizing they've been infected. Even worse, some never develop any symptoms at all, or symptoms so mild that they escape notice. This just doesn't happen with the seasonal flu.
But how long do we keep doing this? How much longer should we shelter in place? The virus will still be here when we finally emerge from our caves. As Dr. David L. Katz, founding director of Yale University’s Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center, wrote in a The New York Times op-ed, "If all we do is flatten the curve, we don't prevent deaths. We just change the dates."
So what do we do now? The virus isn't going to disappear. All we're now doing is ensuring that a second wave will be much worse. It will just happen at a later date.
To begin, I'd suggest we identify those at greatest risk, such as the immune-compromised and the elderly, and do all we can, including fast-tracking a vaccine, to keep them protected.
However, people at the lowest risk, such as those folks who test positive for the immunoglobulin G (IgG) and immunoglobulin M (IgM) antibodies, need at some point to re-enter the world. Otherwise, we'll begin having problems that are much greater than COVID-19. Poverty, as an example, is the leading driver of bad health outcomes. Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, and Michael Bloomberg don't need to work another day in their lives. Unemployment disproportionately burdens the people who can least afford to be unemployed, who are at greatest risk of addiction, mental illness, and food insecurity.
We want to minimize disease and deaths from COVID-19 just like we do with seasonal influenza and other highly transmissible illnesses. However, we also want to minimize the health fallout of societal collapse and economic ruin, which is where we're now headed unless we get this turned around.
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