He enjoys writing most about space, geoscience and the mysteries of the universe. Flattening the curve was a public health strategy to slow down the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Two weeks to flatten the curve turned into months of restrictions, which have turned into nearly 365 days of mask-wearing, hand-washing and worries about whether there will ever be a return. At that point, there were more than 3,000 confirmed cases of the virus, and more than 60 deaths. Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images It was the battle cry of the early days of the pandemic: 14 days to flatten the curve. States that appear in shades of green have seen declines in cases over the same period of time. about 20%. [17] Edlin called for an activation of the Defense Production Act to order manufacturing companies to produce the needed sanitizers, personal protective equipment, ventilators, and set up hundreds thousands to millions required hospital beds. "It's just exhausting," he said. Two days later, China puts Wuhan under strict lockdown. "There's just an unimaginable range of experiences and it's so difficult," Robertson-James said. Federal guidelines advise that states wait until they experience a downward trajectory of documented cases within a 14-day period before proceeding to a phased opening. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, comments on the "multifaceted approach" to flattening the curve of the coronavirus outbreak. Efforts to completely contain the new coronavirus the pandemic responsible for infecting hundreds of thousands of people in 130 countries with the disease, called COVID-19 have failed. Trump and Defense Secretary Mark Esper watch as the hospital ship USNS Comfort departs Naval Base Norfolk on Saturday for New York City. Meanwhile, scientists across the globe are in a race to understand the disease, find treatments and solutions, and develop vaccines. But eight days after the plan came out, the US continues to witness dramatic daily spikes in coronavirus cases. We want to get rid of it.". The White House gave the country a 15-day window to flatten the soaring curve of infection, but some disease modelers see a trajectory that could create a crisis, similar to Italy, that would . She added that early on, officials should have acted more swiftly when cases were detected to prevent spread through the closure of businesses. "I don't think there's a chance of that.". As cases grow, hospitals become overwhelmed, and there is a nationwide shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE). Ofcourse even the young ones with infection can call helpline an hour before dying to tell them the curve is flattened. how did 2 weeks to flatten the curve turn into 3 years? On March 12, 2020, time seemed to stand still. California also becomes the first state to order all residents to stay home with the exceptions of going to an essential job or shopping for essential needs. To comply, many states have temporarily closed public schools, and many businesses have advised employees to work from home if possible. Ethics of Digital Contact Tracing: Principles. March:The WHO characterizes COVID-19 as a pandemic. We need a complete curve to get the best answer. For everything. Tuesday marked one year since President Donald Trump announced his administration's "15 days to slow the spread" campaign, asking Americans to stay home for about two weeks in an effort to. Ultimately, about 16,000 people from the city died in six months. "Within 48, 72 hours, thousands of people around the Philadelphia region started to die," Harris said. Cases were surging in bordering states like New York, overwhelming hospitals in New York City and leaving temporary morgues overflowing. So, while there may be hope that the end is in sight for the pandemic, its highly probable that we will still be wearing masks and taking other precautions for some time to come. "I said, 'How about Nebraska? "COVID-19 is a dangerous virus that continues to challenge us, even one year after the first cases were reported in Pennsylvania. Medical workers are seen outside Elmhurst Hospital Center in the Queens borough of New York City on Thursday. The White House Covid task force aggressively promoted this line, as did the news media and much of the epidemiology . hide caption. "There should've been earlier shutdowns," Barbot said. It was a new virus. No one knew how it would spread, other than easily, or how sick it would make people. "When I look back in hindsight from a purely global decision-making perspective, I think that decisions were made with the information that was had," Rice said. After a year of almost exclusively virtual schooling she estimates that her second-grader and kindergartner attended in-person classes for maybe one month in the past year she can't wait until their weekend trips to the National Aviary or Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh can resume. As there is currently no vaccine or specific medication to treat COVID-19, and because testing is so limited in the U.S., the only way to flatten the curve is through collective action. Editor. I said, 'Are you serious about this?' In fact, top U.S. health officials were urging Americans not to buy masks at the end of February in a bid to preserve supply for health-care providers. "At the end of the 15 day period, we will make a decision as to which way we want to go.". Within hours, President Trump was saying the very same thing. Within two days of the first reported cases, the city quickly moved to social isolation strategies, according to a 2007 analysis. NY 10036. The city instead moved forward with a massive parade that gathered hundreds of thousands of people together, Harris said. On a broader scale, COVID-19 is now the third leading cause of death in the U.S. (after heart disease and cancer). Together, these setbacks could lengthen the amount of time that Americans are told to stay at home. AT THE END OF THE 15 DAY PERIOD, WE WILL MAKE A DECISION AS TO WHICH WAY WE WANT TO GO! Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, listens as Trump speaks at a briefing on March 27. October: President Trump tests positive for COVID-19 after a gathering in the White House Rose Garden where multiple people were also thought to have been infected. Top editors give you the stories you want delivered right to your inbox each weekday. Hospitals can only treat so many people at once, and if they're short on resources (like ventilators), they need to start making decisions about who should get treatment. A recent Morning Consult poll finds nearly three-quarters of American voters support a national quarantine. She's excited and nervous to receive her first dose of vaccine soon. In the beginning, Trump focused on the virus. How about Iowa?'. Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange watch as Trump makes his announcement. But she misses normal occasional trips with her sister, dinners out with her husband and family. Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange watch as Trump makes his announcement. hide caption. That was itsown learning curve, she said. It did in 1918, when a strain of influenza known as the Spanish flu caused a global pandemic. "We cannot let the cure be worse than the problem itself," Trump wrote. "Seriously people STOP BUYING MASKS!" The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that people who had recently tested positive were about twice as likely to have reported dining at a restaurant than were those with negative test results. The curve peaked in mid-April, but that peak itself was nowhere near overwhelming. Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox. Burgeoning caseloads overwhelmed hospitals, while health care workers became heroes, putting in long, harrowing hours, often (in those early days) without sufficient supplies, to care for patients with COVID-19. "That's what we're doing. The first instance of Flatten the Curve can be found in a paper called Interim pre-pandemic planning guidance: community strategy for pandemic influenza mitigation in the United States: early,. Morrato said social-distancing efforts in other countries could offer clues as to how long Americans should remain isolated from one another. NASA warns of 3 skyscraper-sized asteroids headed toward Earth this week. That seems to be what's happening in Italy right now. In the spring of 2020, as Covid-19 was beginning to take its awful toll in the United States, three words offered a glimmer of hope: flatten the curve. Lifting social distancing measures prematurely, while cases continue to increase or remain at high levels, could result in a resurgence of new cases. Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services. But as far as any (COVID) specific therapy, we really had nothing.". At the time the 2007 research was released, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a leading adviser in the U.S. response to COVID-19, the disease caused by the current coronavirus, said the evidence was clear that early intervention was critical in the midst of the 1918 pandemic. "I was given a pretty strong look by these two people. That was 663 days ago. And he again recalibrated his message. "There were two key elements in our scientific knowledge that we didn't fully understand. New York, (To be clear, this is not a hard prediction of how many people will definitely be infected, but a theoretical number that's used to model the virus' spread.) April:As cases continue tosurge, countries keep their borders sealed. Fauci and Deborah Birx, the White House task force coordinator, had reviewed a dozen models and used data to make their own projections, which Birx said aligned with estimates from Christopher Murray of the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. But you know, people are still getting diagnosed with this every day. "At the beginning of this, we had the kind of usual supportive care we are used to providing for patients that have respiratory failure pneumonia. We are now nearly two years, 2 presidents, 6 trillion dollars, and countless stolen rights into slowing the spread. Joe Biden told us we would be rid of the mask requirement his first 100 days then later told us we might be wearing them through 2022. During an epidemic, a health care system can break down when the number of people infected exceeds the capability of the health care system's ability to take care of them. It just can't handle it, and people wind up not getting services that they need.". "It is fair to say, some form of social distancing will be required until we have a vaccine or effective treatment identified," Morrato said. "Two weeks to flatten the curve" (March 16) The lockdowners settled on a catchy slogan in mid-March to justify their unprecedented shuttering of economic and social life around the globe: two weeks to flatten the curve. We still should be wearing masks and we still should be social distancing, even for those who are vaccinated. Vice President Pence holds up a copy of the 15-day coronavirus guidelines at a briefing on March 24. It's called COVID fatigue, and it's incredibly common, Rice said. One struggle that public health has had was understanding what role asymptomatic patients played in the spread of the virus, Robertson-James said. That infection rate, scary as it sounds, hides just how much the out-of control virus has spread, especially in the hardest-hit communities. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. [16], According to The Nation, territories with weak finances and health care capacity such as Puerto Rico face an uphill battle to raise the line, and therefore a higher imperative pressure to flatten the curve. "There were people with legitimate credentials and stellar careers that were feeding information, and I had never seen that before, and that was enormously difficult," Birx said Thursday at a virtual symposium hosted by the New York Academy of Sciences and NYU Grossman School of Medicine. A week later, it grants another EUA to Moderna, also for an mRNA vaccine. Rice and Hoolahan said that UPMC the largest non-governmentemployer in the state with 40 hospitals and700 doctors offices and outpatient campuses in western and central Pennsylvania and other health care communities responded quickly as information came available on how to treat, prevent and handle the virus. 4. "Two weeks to flatten the curve" we were told. Theater stages remain dark. It's very simple. [9] Governments, including those in the United States and France, both prior to the 2009 swine flu pandemic, and during the decade following the pandemic, both strengthened their health care capacities and then weakened them. Italy hit its apparent peak in daily cases on March 20, with more than 6,000. Yuri Gripas/Bloomberg via Getty Images JHU.edu Copyright 2023 by Johns Hopkins University & Medicine. YouTubes privacy policy is available here and YouTubes terms of service is available here. It's getting close guys! Gone is the roar of a crowd at a Steelers or Eagles game. December:The FDA grants Pfizer-BioNTech the first Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for an mRNA vaccine, a new type of vaccine that has proven to be highly effective against COVID-19. More than 100 million people around the world have been infected by COVID-19 and more than 2.5 million people have died of the disease. After months in lockdown, states slowly begin a phased reopening, based on criteria outlined by the Trump Administration, in coordination with state, county, and local officials. "But it is tough because we can't fully express ourselves. They'll be crushed by it," Fox News Channel host Steve Hilton said on his show on March 22. "Simply put, 15 days is not enough to address so much of what we were facing in March 2020 and this plan really reveals an administration and national plan that was quite superficial in response," Popescu said in an email. "Hindsight in circumstances is alwaysgoing to be 20/20, I think, when you are moving through something like this and things are evolving very quickly," Rice said. In the U.S., the Grand Princess cruise ship is held at sea off the coast of California after 21 of the 3,500 people aboard test positive for the virus. But come November, his advisers say what will matter the most is that the crisis is contained and the economy has turned a corner. Within six months, about 16,000 people had died. Many hundreds of thousands of infections will happen but they don't all have to happen at once. [2] Healthcare capacity can be raised by raising equipment, staff, providing telemedicine, home care and health education to the public. "The hospital systems I think operated in good faith and just tried to make the best decisions we could with the information we had.". "From what I am hearing now, it likely will be 12 to 18 months before a vaccine is available.". To see how it played out, we can look at two U.S. cities Philadelphia and St. Louis Drew Harris, a population health researcher at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, told NPR.org. Before the pandemic, Trump had staked his reelection campaign on the strength of the economy. "They came in experts and they said, 'We are going to have to close the country.' Line shows 7-day moving average of new cases per day in this state. We joked that days and time had no meaning since every day was the same. "It's very clear that President Trump has seen certain models and certain growth projections that gave him great pause," said Miller. It has been one year since Governor Wolf called on Pennsylvanians to take steps in order to keep hospitals from becoming overwhelmed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The two largest failings of the guidance were that it didn't acknowledge that people without symptoms can spread the virus and didn't say anything about wearing masks, formerBaltimore health commissioner Dr. Leana Wen said. Vice President Pence, who leads the White House coronavirus task force, said the decision about what to do next would be guided by data, and the country would only reopen in sections, bit by bit, when it could be done responsibly. Marion Callahan, Bucks County Courier Times, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. All Rights Reserved. It needs to "raise the line. 1:02 p.m. ET, March 17, 2020 Fauci says we won't know if the curve if flattening "for several weeks or maybe longer" From CNN's Betsy Klein Moore and others wanted the president to send a signal that businesses would be able to reopen, that the shutdowns and social distancing wouldn't go on indefinitely. Stephen Moore speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Feb. 28 before health officials shut down large gatherings because of the coronavirus. A stay-at-home mom of two, Baughman, 34, of Rochester Township, Beaver County, has had to adapt. [4], An influential UK study showed that an unmitigated COVID-19 response in the UK could have required up to 46 times the number of available ICU beds. We were told it would only last two weeks, then four weeks, then a little while longer, then a little longer. "Early on, there was just not a lot of information," she said. On Sunday morning, Anthony Fauci said models show 100,000 to 200,000 Americans could die from the virus, even with social distancing measures. "All of these lessons are going to be extremely helpful as we move into 2021.". A look back at the first coronavirus guidelines issued by the federal government demonstrates just how little was known at the time about the virus that has sickened almost 30 million Americans and killed at least 535,000 in the U.S. Drew Angerer/Getty Images [15], According to Vox, in order to move away from social distancing and return to normal, the US needs to flatten the curve by isolation and mass testing, and to raise the line. ", Daveen Rae Kurutz is a staff writer for the Beaver County Times and part of USA Today's Pennsylvania network. A look back at how the coronavirus pandemic affected Pennsylvania and its residents over the past year. That's because confirmed cases give a clearer picture of how people become infected and for how long. "If everyone makes this change, or these critical changes, and sacrifices now, we will rally together as one nation and we will defeat the virus," he said. "This is where technology really begins to take us forward in leaps and bounds.". One was the degree of asymptomatic transmission, and two was the aerosols, how this is not just transmitted through people sneezing and coughing.". "People are still getting sick every day. "They really tried to limit the travel of people and implement Public Health 101 isolating and treating the sick, quarantining the people who have been exposed to disease, closing the schools, encouraging social distancing of people," Harris says. We need to stick with current strategies. A week later, the floor shut down because of the virus, and trade moved fully to electronic systems. The ultimate decision showed that the models and projections had given Trump pause, said Miller, his former adviser. A week later, the floor shut down because of the virus, and trade moved fully to electronic systems. Vice President Pence holds up a copy of the 15-day coronavirus guidelines at a briefing on March 24. That was 663 days ago. From the start, there were questions of what would happen after 15 days, whether the push for what public health officials call social distancing would become the new normal. It's hard to have anything to look forward to. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories, The Trump administration has released a 15-day plan to, The plan involves asking healthy Americans to avoiding social gatherings and. hide caption. A year later, we look back on one of the most challenging periods in recent memory. A successfully flattened curve spreads health care needs over time and the peak of hospitalizations under the health care capacity line. Samuel Corum/Getty Images "A year ago, we had no idea what we were in store for," said Candace Robertson-James, assistant professor of public health and director of the bachelor and master of public health program at La Salle University in Philadelphia. "Youknow, everything's probably not going to age perfectly well. For a simple metaphor, consider an office bathroom. But there were also communication issues, she said, and the politicization of the virus. [4][bettersourceneeded], In a situation like this, when a sizable new epidemic emerges, a portion of infected and symptomatic patients create an increase in the demand for health care that has only been predicted statistically, without the start date of the epidemic nor the infectivity and lethality known in advance. "It's like everything stopped," said Vernacchio, 63. ET Meanwhile, the WHO recommends steroidsto treat severely and critically ill patients, but not to those with mild disease. He expressed amazement that the streets of New York City were empty, and dismay about conditions at Elmhurst Hospital in Queens. The curve being flattened is the epidemic curve, a visual representation of the number of infected people needing health care over time. Access your favorite topics in a personalized feed while you're on the go. A former critical care nurse, she's worked through H1N1 and other pandemics. As a result, St. Louis suffered just one-eighth of the flu fatalities that Philadelphia saw, according to that 2007 research. His writing has appeared in The Washington Post, Reader's Digest, CBS.com, the Richard Dawkins Foundation website and other outlets. A complementary measure is to increase health care capacity, to "raise the line". It seems like with the current data available, this may end by the end of Summer 2020. On Sunday, the night before Day 15, Trump told the country to stick with the plan for another month, until April 30. So this belief that the vaccine is basically to 'wave a magic wand, I take it and I can just go back to things as normal,' it's unfortunately not where we are right now.". As the end of the 15 days drew closer, the United States became the nation with the most reported cases of the virus, surpassing China. Measures such as hand washing, social distancing and face masks reduce and delay the peak of active cases, allowing more time for healthcare capacity to increase and better cope with patient load. Her father-in-law had a heart transplant weeks before COVID struck the region. By the way, for the markets. Snyder began going food shopping for both families or ordering groceries online, andpicking up prescriptions between doctors' appointments. But with slow distribution,huge demand and low supply, it hasn't been the panacea many dreamed. Trump announced his 15-day plan to slow the spread of the coronavirus on March 16. However, Harris says, if we can delay the spread of the virus so that new cases aren't popping up all at once, but rather over the course of weeks or months, "then the system can adjust and accommodate all the people who are possibly going to get sick and possibly need hospital care." But even as testing capacity has improved in the last week, hospitals have faced a shortage of swabs needed to perform tests particularly in states like Missouri, Michigan, Ohio, and Washington. UW model says social distancing is starting to work but still projects 1,400 coronavirus deaths in the state. The next two weeks will be "absolutely critical" for containing the virus, Elaine Morrato, dean of the Parkinson School of Health Sciences and Public Health at Loyola University Chicago, told Business Insider.