COVID-19 pandemic-related lockdown: response time is more important than its strictness
Open Access
- 5 November 2020
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Springer Science and Business Media LLC in EMBO Molecular Medicine
- Vol. 12 (11), e13171
- https://doi.org/10.15252/emmm.202013171
Abstract
The rapid spread ofSARS-CoV-2 and its threat to health systems worldwide have led governments to take acute actions to enforce social distancing. Previous studies used complex epidemiological models to quantify the effect of lockdown policies on infection rates. However, these rely on prior assumptions or on official regulations. Here, we use country-specific reports of daily mobility from people cellular usage to model social distancing. Our data-driven model enabled the extraction of lockdown characteristics which were crossed with observed mortality rates to show that: (i) the time at which social distancing was initiated is highly correlated with the number of deaths,r(2) = 0.64, while the lockdown strictness or its duration is not as informative; (ii) a delay of 7.49 days in initiating social distancing would double the number of deaths; and (iii) the immediate response has a prolonged effect onCOVID-19 death toll.Keywords
Funding Information
- Rothschild Caesarea Foundation
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