I would like to first state that I DO NOT think we did the wrong thing by trying to flatten the Covid 19 curve. The point I am going to make in hindsight is that it seems as if our efforts failed. In Massachusetts we shut down and sheltered in place starting around March 15th. The MA new case data shows that the cases did not peak until April 24th or about 7 weeks later. After the peak on April 24th the number of new cases fell dramatically.
The most famous historical data of how flattening the curve works comes from a comparison from 1918 between Philadelphia (where they did not social distance) and Saint Louis (where they did social distance). The following graphs shows the comparison of the death rate per 100,000 people in each city. It is clear that Saint Louis’s response clearly accomplished their goal of flattening the curve. In Philadelphia the deaths peaked at about 4-5 weeks and then declined rapidly.
In comparison, I downloaded the Covid-19 cases from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health website. The following chart shows the data.
The chart shows the cases in Massachusetts peaked at about 7 weeks and then dramatically dropped off. As a resident of Massachusetts I do not know of any social behavior that changed from March 15th when we began sheltering in place and April 24th to make the curve peak and then drop off. In fact by April 24th I think many people started to become more comfortable going out. Based on this simple analysis it doesn’t look like our efforts to flatten the curve actually worked. It appears that the virus made it’s own curve as it did in Philadelphia in 1918.
Why didn’t it work?
My best guess of why it does not appear that our social distancing worked is because we really did not strictly social distance. While some people were very strict many were not. I will admit that my family had a group of friends, neighbors and relative that we interacted with on a regular basis. Each of those friends, neighbors and relatives also had their group of “quarantine” friends with whom they interacted. With only a few cycles you get to the theory of “6 Degrees of Separation” which basically states that everyone is connected to everyone else in the world within 6 contacts. In this case we quickly can be in contact with the whole community with only a few outside contacts. On top of this, only three places were open (grocery stores, Home Depot and Lowe’s). So we basically herded everyone in the community into the same indoor spaces; like funneling everyone through the contaminated zone.
Commentary:
We were successful at flattening one thing: The Economy. While we have also completely dismantled our health care system. Our overall public health has been completely abandoned to stop one virus, while so many other diseases and problems have gone unchecked for months. I will repeat trying to flatten the curve was the right response when we did not know what we were dealing with, however based on this data it does not look like it paid off. Let’s not make the same futile mistake this fall.