Quote:
Originally Posted by petegz28
The 14 day average is about the same as it was a few days before the re-opening. And as I asked are they testing more?
This is my problem with these arguments, Hamas. I am not saying you are making it per say but people want more testing which we know will increase the number of cases. Then when we get the expected increase people wanna go SEE! SEE!
So I have to point out that the average is relatively flat at the moment and if GA is testing more wouldn't you expect an increase in cases regardless?
|
Thought experiment: I give you a pill. You take it with some water. Are you absorbing the drug or getting rid of it? You're actually doing both at the same time, but the rate of absorption compared to the rate of elimination affects the amount of drug in your blood.
If you are absorbing it faster than your are eliminating it, the levels go up. If you've taken the drug for a while and I start giving you a smaller dose, even though you're absorbing the drug, your levels will go down because you're eliminating more than you're absorbing.
The population is doing the same thing.
Let's go back to our old friend R0 and let's assume that the virus goes away after 14 days and people only transmit the virus over five days.
Say I have a virus with 10,000 active cases and I institute a lockdown. It gets the R0 to 0.8. After five days, those 10,000 people infect 8,000 more and those 8,000 infect 6400 more, and those 6400 infect 5120 more and those 5120 infect 4096 more.
Over 20 days, 23616 people have caught the virus who didn't have it before for a total of 33,616 cases.
Is the epidemic getting better or worse? It looks like it's getting worse on the surface because the caseload is higher, but it's actually dying out. I only have 15,616 active cases and in another five days I'll have 3277 more, but 6400 will have recovered.
Day 25: Active cases: 18,893-6400=12,493
Now, let's say that I break the lockdown on that day and the R0 increases to 1.2
After 5 days how many active cases do I have?
Day 30: Active cases 12,493-5120+3932=11,305
I have fewer active cases on Day 30, so my epidemic is getting better right?
It's not.
What I've done with the lockdown is decrease my R0, and I've also decreased the number of infectious people, but by reopening I've increased R0 and increased infections, but the
increase is being hidden by the decrease from the previous cases who are getting better, because it decreases the pool of people who can infect others, but only for a while.
After five iterations of an R0 of 0.8:
10,000 people infect 8,000 who infect 6400 who infect 5120 who infect 4096
After five iterations of R0 of 1.2
4096 infect 4915 who infect 5898 who infect 7077 who infect 8493
Now, if I look at it after two iterations, which is worse?
On the surface the R0 of 0.8, right? 6400 new infections compared to 5898.
But that's not the case.