the corona virus outbreak has been
declared a pandemic here's the whu-oh
earlier we're deeply concerned both by
the alarming levels of spread and
severity and by the alarming levels of
inaction we have therefore made the
assessment that kovat 19 can be
characterized as a pandemic this is the
first pandemic caused by corona virus
and we have never before seen a pandemic
that can be controlled at the same time
while you see coverage of this
announcements on the BBC News website in
our coverage we described a pandemic as
meaning a disease that's spreading in
multiple countries around the world at
the same time but the question here is
what is this change in categorization
actually mean well is the BBC's Philip a
roxb w-h-o says this will not change
anything that they're saying it will
change very little that countries are
actually doing because they've already
been having very close relationships of
many of these countries over weeks and
weeks now and telling them what to do so
this this is really it's not surprising
that this word is now being being used
mainly in a figurative way it won't
change very much on the ground this
graphic from Johns Hopkins coronavirus
Research Center shows the spread of the
disease across the world the bigger the
red circle the bigger the outbreak we
know there are now more than 120
thousand cases globally in a hundred and
eighteen countries and more than 4,300
people have died and one consequence of
this pandemic is pressure on healthcare
systems for example in Iran and Italy
this is really putting Italy's
healthcare system which is one of the
best most well developed in Europe it's
putting it under a great deal of strain
we've seen footage from some hospitals
where intensive care units have been set
up in hospital corridors and their fears
that if this virus spreads significantly
to the south where the health care is
not as well developed that could have a
very serious effect the corona virus is
rapidly
claiming lives across the country and
not just the elderly young medics in
their 20s with thousands of confirmed
cases the hospitals can't cope nor can
the staff this is one of several
makeshift hospitals that are being set
up in the city of Rome the epicenter of
the outbreak and of course in Iran and
Italy as the number of cases rise so
does the pressure on healthcare and
that's a concern that's widely shared
his angle of Merkel's speaking today
when the virus is out there the
population has no immunity and no
therapy exists then 60 to 70% of the
population will be infected as long as
this situation continues to exist most
60 to 70% of the German population is
around 50 million people and if that
were to happen even if only a small
proportion of those people needed
hospital care that would still swamp the
German health system and earlier this
week mrs. Merkel outlined the best way
to avoid that kind of scenario it's us
food stamps the middle getting us
vehicles they're or sight in a
situation like this the most effective
means against the virus is to gain time
to reduce the pressure on doctors and
hospitals if a lot of people were to
become ill within a very short space of
time the most effective tool against the
virus is to slow it down and to stretch
out its development this idea is often
called flattening the curve this is what
it looks like in a graphic form is from
the New York Times adapted from a report
from the Center for Disease Control the
red area here is what would happen with
the surge of infections if you have no
proper measures in place and you can see
it goes across this dotted line which
signifies healthcare capacity it's way
above health care capacity if a country
though concedes early on there are going
to be large numbers of cases and focuses
on slowing the spread the outbreak takes
longer to play out but you never reach
that point where a health care system
can't cope here's one senior US official
and there are a number of things that
one can do in order to blunt it if you
look at the curves of outbreaks you know
they go big peaks and they come
what we need to do is flatten that down
that would have less people infected
that would ultimately have less deaths
you do that by trying interfere with the
natural flow of the outbreak well the
man who popularized this graph is a
population and health analyst called
drew Harris he was initially using this
to teach his classes but it's since gone
viral after it was linked to this
particular virus and as drew points out
in this tweet you've got a bear in mind
that what his graph represents is the
difference between finding an intensive
care unit bed and events later or being
treated in the parking lot tents and I
spoke to Drew earlier from Philadelphia
on what governments can do to flatten
the curve well they certainly can begin
to isolate and treat the sick to
quarantine to quarantine quarantine the
people who they've contacted close to
schools and prevent the spread of
disease through their children and
encourage social distancing keeping
people apart both in time and place and
that means maybe folks stagger work
hours so they don't go to work at the
same time or you make sure that when
people are in the same place that
they're not as close to each other and
of course we need to protect ourselves
individually by making sure you wash
your hands in using and sanitizers but
there's evidently some discussion about
when best to bring those measures in the
UK for example is acknowledging they may
come but they're not coming yet yes the
challenge is starting too soon is that
people become complacent they say well
what's the point there's no disease
spreading but if you wait till late
until the Dory is taking hold then you
are dealing with a situation like they
have in Italy so that timing is going to
be absolutely critical and generally the
experts are going to tell you is one of
the cases start to show up spreading
within the community from person to
person the challenge we have with this
particular virus is it seems that people
are contagious even before they show
symptoms so they don't know that their
efforts for spreading the disease until
maybe they have done it that's ready to
eat isn't there a third scenario we
could add to your graph which is where
governments do take the relevant
measures but still the number of cases
take healthcare systems beyond their
capacity
well if all about flattening the current
maybe we don't do it as completely as
necessary but anything we can do to
lower that peak and prevent folks from
everyone from getting sick at that same
moment in time instead spray them out so
they get sick later is is going to be an
improvement and hopefully preserve some
of that capacity for the people who
really need it and one final question is
there a choice between trying to contain
this virus and trying to flatten the
curve can those two things actually be
working against each other I think at
this point containment is is not going
to happen as though this disease is
going to spread every expert will tell
you that the pandemic of this type is
going to eventually move itself into
every community in the world the
question is whether we have vaccines at
that point you can help prevent the
further spread of it and whether we are
protecting the most vulnerable people in
this particular situation the elderly
and the folks were they in their
compromised systems and making sure that
they don't get these because the other
ones are most likely to die