Time-variant strategies for optimizing the performance of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) in protecting lives and livelihoods during the COVID-19 pandemic

Wei Aun Yap; Dhesi Baha Raja

A key limitation which is relevant to the results, many of which demonstrate 'tipping point' phenomena, is the wide variation in parameter estimates available in the public domain at this early period during the COVID-19 outbreak. For example, estimates for the proportion of those testing positive who do not have symptoms vary from 5 to 80 percent (Carl Heneghan, Jon Brassey, and Tom Jefferson 2020). Furthermore, parameter estimates are derived from a wide range of countries, with different population, environmental, and climactic conditions. The simulations here can hence only be interpreted as the relative performance of NPI strategies for a hypothetical population for which parameter estimations used are true, although these findings provide qualitative insights which may be generalizable to other populations with similar characteristics and epidemiological parameters.