‘A recently published article in Lancet Infectious Diseases has taken a look at potential associations between country-level reproduction numbers (R) and non-pharmaceutical interventions introduced and lifted throughout the course of the pandemic.
‘Increases in R were associated with relaxing of the following measures: school closures, public event bans, bans on gatherings greater than ten people, stay-at-home orders and other movement restrictions. However, the only significant associations for increases in R above 1 were school reopening and lifting bans on gatherings over 10 people.
‘Authors noted that the full effect of introducing or lifting non-pharmaceutical interventions took 1-3 weeks on average from the date of implementation. Authors made further recommendations regarding the use of non-pharmaceutical interventions by national governments, noting that other factors, such as population compliance, also influence the success of non-pharmaceutical interventions and may not be fully captured in the study.’
Read here (The Lancet via Johns Hopkins University, Oct 22, 2020)
