Don’t relax social distancing in United States before summer, researchers warn

US risks a resurgence in the coronavirus if it eases restrictions sooner, according to new computer modelling

Without a safe vaccine, controlling Covid-19 rests on limiting contact, tracing and testing, team says

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The United States risks a resurgence in cases if it lifts social distancing limits before summer, according to a new study. Photo: AFP

Published: 2:00am, 30 Apr 2020Updated: 3:04am, 30 Apr 2020

The United States needs to maintain strict social distancing measures until the summer to avoid setting off a deadly resurgence of the pandemic coronavirus, according to a study by two American researchers.

Using a computer model of transmission, the researchers from the University of Notre Dame in Indiana concluded that the consequences of relaxing control measures in May were alarming and that social distancing should be kept at a high level until sometime in the summer.

“Strategies that maintain control at a high level until summer 2020 allow for tapering of control thereafter and minimal deaths, whereas strategies that relax control in the short term lead to fewer options for control later and a higher likelihood of exceeding hospital capacity,” the researchers said in a non-peer reviewed paper released on preprint service medRxiv.org.

“[Then the measures] can be relaxed to a small degree but will still need to be maintained at a relatively high level thereafter.”

The study was authored by Alex Perkins, an expert in infectious disease epidemiology and population biology, and Guido España, a postdoctoral fellow in mechanical engineering.

The administration of US President Donald Trump is under pressure to reopen businesses, schools and other public spaces to counter a slowing economy, soaring unemployment and anti-lockdown protests across the country, particularly as Trump seeks re-election in November.