How canceled events and self-quarantines save lives, in one chart

[G_j]

https://www.vox.com/2020/3/10/21171481/coronavirus-us-cases-quarantine-cancellation

This is how we all help slow the spread of coronavirus.
By Eliza Barclay and Dylan Scott Mar 10, 2020,

The main uncertainty in the coronavirus outbreak in the United States now is how big it will get, and how fast. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Nancy Messonnier told reporters on March 9, “many people in the US will at some point, either this year or next, get exposed to this virus.”


According to infectious disease epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch at Harvard, it’s “plausible” that 20 to 60 percent of adults will be infected with Covid-19 disease. So far, 80 percent of cases globally have been mild, but if the case fatality rate is around 1 percent (which several experts say it may be), a scenario is possible of tens or hundreds of thousands of deaths in the US alone.

Yet the speed at which the outbreak plays out matters hugely for its consequences. What epidemiologists fear most is the health care system becoming overwhelmed by a sudden explosion of illness that requires more people to be hospitalized than it can handle. In that scenario, more people will die because there won’t be enough hospital beds or ventilators to keep them alive.

A disastrous inundation of hospitals can likely be averted with protective measures we’re now seeing more of — closing schools, canceling mass gatherings, working from home, self-quarantine, self-isolation, avoiding crowds — to keep the virus from spreading fast.


..more..

(Chart at link)

[crickets]

1. K&R for visibility.

[LizBeth]

2. I have to go to work today. There is a Tools concert. People from Washington and up

from Calif. I don't wanna go. The place is sold out. Lots of bodily fluid. Doesn't help the virus hangs in the air.