Importance of suppression and mitigation measures in managing COVID-19 outbreaks

Michael E. Hochberg

Second, future analyses will need to translate actual tactics into their effects on different epidemiological parameters, and specifically â„›C. A number of tactics have been proposed and some variously adopted by different communities, including: spatial distancing, quarantining, hand washing, wearing masks, gloves; diagnostics such as contact tracing, and virus and antibody testing; and interventions such as employing repurposed drugs and developing vaccines. Such approaches will need to be employed in complementary ways, since no single one is likely to attain reset or management objectives. Moreover, calibration of â„›C in particular will require accurate assessments of the contribution of asymptomatic transmission to the propagation of the virus, the latter having been recently demonstrated in mathematical models to potentially influence COVID-19 dynamics (23).