Cite as:

Ruishan Chen, A family guide with thoughts on safe spaces, (March 17, 2020).

 

The novel coronavirus, widespread in China from December 2019, has now become a global pandemic. New cases in China have decreased to less than 10 per day, while in other countries there are more than 4000 cases per day. Learning the lessons from China, reflecting on what may work and what may not, can help the world control the virus and reduce the costs. The following 11 lessons are not intended to list all the actions taken in China and they may not be equally effective. This is only an overview, and the reflection is still ongoing, but I hope more people can comment and add their own ideas.

(1) Practice physical distancing, including locking down the epicenter city, closing public transportation, and locking down communities. Some of these actions have given other regions more time to prepare for the arrival of the virus. Two recent works have examined the effectiveness of these measures: “The effect of travel restrictions on the spread of the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak,” and “The impact of transmission control measures during the first 50 days of the COVID-19 epidemic in China.”

(2) Practice social distancing, including canceling mass gatherings, closing restaurants, canceling meetings, extending vacation for workers, postponing the start of school, and encouraging working at home. These collective actions have reduced the R0 of the disease and helped to flatten the curve.

(3) Call for individual behavior change, including wearing masks, washing hand, stopping shaking hands, dividing food on the table and not using shared chopsticks or spoons to get the food (分餐制和公筷).

(4) Address the increasing demand for resources, like masks, test kits, protection suits, etc. Collaboration between Red Cross, IoT industries, and volunteers has made this possible and reversed the initial chaos.

(5) Create temporary shelter hospitals. Two new hospitals were built and 14 temporary shelter hospitals were created out of exhibition centers, stadiums, etc.

https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_6423077

(6) Declare a national emergency and deploy resources all over the country. More than 40,000 doctors and nurses from all over the country were deployed to support Wuhan.

(7) Check temperatures of individuals entering supermarkets, shopping malls and other public spaces.

(8) Implement digital tracing and control. A mobile phone QR code that records everyone’s travel history was widely used on highways and at the gates of buildings and markets. The code links personal IDs to personal records of phone calls or messages, use of Baidu or Gaode maps, wechat, qq or sino weibo accounts, linking local wifi and so on. If someone cheats, the local police will find them to learn the details. I suppose this virus outbreak will help the population census and determine the numbers early.

(9) Implement relief package policies, including free tests of suspected cases, free cancelations of flights and train tickets, reducing the rent in shopping malls, and eliminating or delaying social security taxes and insurance payments.

(10) Pay attention to places with concentrated populations, like prisons, social welfare homes, churches, etc.

(11) Pass wildlife protection legislation. China has passed a ban on the trading and consumption of wildlife since Feb. 27, 2020. The full document can be found here.