By Henric Sundlof • Published: 18 Mar 2020 • 11:09
The small village, Vo Euganeo, that suffered Italy’s first death due to the coronavirus, decided to test everyone in the village, all of its 3,300 citizens, twice in ten days. The first test revealed that 50% of the infected had no symptoms.
The second test revealed that six people were still infected without having symptoms and were isolated. The outbreak stopped. If they had not been found, the outbreak had continued, Andrea Crisanti, a UK professor in molecular parasitology, concludes.
“In the UK, there are a whole lot of infected people that are ignored. We could control the outbreak in this Italian village because we identified the invisible cases and isolated them. That’s what makes the difference!” He continues with a warning: “One asymptomatic person could infect ten people.”
“Test, test, test!” the head of WHO encouraged earlier.
When we have this knowledge, it makes it even more important to respect the isolation in Spain right now. Even if you are fine, you could possibly infect many others and risk their lives. “Social distancing” is the way to go.
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