Apr 14, 2020 12:30:00

In order to prevent the spread of virus infection, a diagram that is easy to understand is released 'It is necessary to refrain from meeting one friend'

With the spread of new coronavirus infection, measures are being taken around the world to maintain 'social distance' from others. However, there are many people who feel stressed by reducing contact with others, and some think that 'it would be no problem if I met one-on-one with my friend.' Meanwhile, a group of epidemiologists at the University of Washington has published a visually clear picture that 'meeting with just one friend can put many at risk.'

Can't I please just visit one friend?

http://statnet.org/COVID-JustOneFriend/

Most people who take the problem of the new coronavirus seriously are helping to reduce 'contact with others.' In this case, 'contact with others' means contact that does not carefully follow the rules of social distance, specifically 'contacting someone with a distance of less than 6 feet' and 'washing hands.' Sharing the same item without doing it 'corresponds to contacting another person.

However, some people, especially children, think that 'meeting with one friend would not do much harm.' If there are no older people in your family living with you, or no one with a weakened immune system, meeting young friends of your age is often considered okay. Also, in some industries, such as healthcare professionals, the restaurant industry, and retail stores, interaction with others is still possible, so it is difficult to understand the danger of meeting friends. .

So the group of epidemiologists created a visually comprehensible figure to inform 'how many people meeting one friend puts people at risk'.

The following image shows the social connection at the time when the social distance strategy was not taken before the spread of the new coronavirus. In this example, we assume that the average household makes 15 regular contacts with other households, showing a total of 200 households interconnected. Green dots represent one household and gray lines represent contact with other households. In the figure below, 200 households included in the group are all connected within 3 lines. Such close interrelationships can spread large-scale infections throughout the population.

Next, the figure below shows how people fully execute their social distance strategies and there is no dangerous contact between households. In this case, even if the virus is brought into one household, it will not spread to other households, and at most domestic infections will occur.

However, it is difficult for each household to maintain a perfect social distance, epidemiologists said. This is because there are workers required to maintain society, such as medical workers, retail store salespeople, delivery companies such as drivers and warehouse workers, infrastructure workers, and various civil servants. .

Therefore, 'one in ten households is engaged in work that requires maintaining social connection' 'while taking actions such as hand washing to reduce the risk of infection, one worker is on average I have no choice but to make contact with four people. ' Although some workers have only one household to come into contact with, it can be seen that large groups occur in some places. In this example, a total of 53 households are connected, and infection may spread within this group. However, it is not possible to completely reduce the number of essential workers, so some danger is accepted as a trade-off with social maintenance. In addition, more than half of the households remain unconnected to other households, keeping the overall risk of infection low.

On the other hand, this figure is based on the assumption that 'on average, two people in one household contact one friend in another household.' Since the average number of people who make contact with friends is “2 people per household,” some households do not have contact with other households, but quite a few are closely connected. The amount of connections is obviously higher than when only essential workers maintain contact, and people who began to get bored of taking social distance relaxed and thought that `` one person will be fine '' You can see that making contact with friends by doing so can pose a great risk to the entire group.

Then, suppose 'on average, one person in one household contacts one friend in another household'. In this case, too, there is still a large population compared to the case of only essential workers, and it can be said that the infection may spread to many people.

Humans are social animals, and sometimes we just want to meet friends. However, as you can see from this example, if the individual slightly increases contact with other people, the whole society will be jeopardized at once. By spreading the infection of the new coronavirus, I am 'a father of a patient treated by my friend's mother' 'a medical worker treating my sister's friend's family' 'a daughter of a clerk of a store where my friend's parents go' The possibility of someone dying in an unknown location has already become a reality.

'Deferring one contact until COVID-19 is controlled can potentially save more than one life,' said the group of epidemiologists. A person who can save by refraining from meeting one friend may not necessarily be someone who has direct contact with himself. It's difficult to realize that someone's life was saved by their actions, but it is said that those who continue living with a social distance still save someone's life in this world. thing.

Note that the diagram presented this time simplifies social interaction, and in reality, there are various cases such as people living in a group life such as nursing homes and dormitories, people living in two-family houses, people who are homeless, etc. Will be done. But intentionally simplifying the world is the best way to convey to people the basic principles that are easy to understand, the group of epidemiologists said.