Thoughts on Social Distancing

[indigo girl]

he advantages and disadvantages discussed by the Reveres at Effect Measure. Follow the link for the full commentary.

scienceblogs.com said:

We have examples: canceling school, prohibiting mass gatherings, telecommuting, but the underlying idea is straightforward. With a contagious disease that passes from person to person (details still to be worked out, of course), we decrease transmission by minimizing person to person contacts, I.e., we distance people from each other -- social distancing. Decreasing transmission has benefits, even in the case where the total number of people infected is the same over the long run. If we flatten out the epidemic curve (the graph that shows how many new cases appear each day); and move its peak which is now lower to a later point, we have bought time and stretched out demand, easing the burden on health services. Those are the benefits.

There are also costs. Not only the costs related to lost school days, missed work and all the rest of the obvious consequences. But the loss of social relationships which are key to a community's resilience and ability to get through an event which affects everyone at once. We can see this if we take the objective of social distancing to its logical conclusion: what if we all hid away, each from everyone else. No medical care, no family member caring for a loved one, no worker picking up the slack of a sick colleague. No one at work, no one at school, no one in government offices. Each person hiding under the bed with a month's supply of water and tins of tunafish. Travel on air, sea and land shut down. Individuals traveling in cars couldn't get gas because that might put them in contact with others and supplies couldn't get anywhere either because our supply chains aren't set up to run in a completely automated way, with no human contact anywhere. Anyway, where would they go? And why?

The Editors of Effect Measure are senior public health scientists and practitioners. Paul Revere was a member of the first local Board of Health in the United States (Boston, 1799). The Editors sign their posts "Revere" to recognize the public service of a professional forerunner better known for other things.

Swine flu : thoughts on social distancing