A very interesting paper (not peer-reviewed) by a team of Israeli scholars proposes that a more manageable exit from pandemic lockdown might be achieved by implementing a scheme in which employees go in to work for four days and then return to isolation for ten days before repeating the cycle. A variation on the proposal would have two staggered relays of workers cycling through the 14 day routine.
The research has been popularized in a New York Times op-ed and a Fast Company feature, so I would bother to discuss it here in detail. Not being an epidemiologist, I can't vouch for the authors' assumptions about average infectiousness. Obviously, implementing such a scheme out of the blue would present formidable challenges even assuming competent political leadership.
12 comments:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.04.20053579v4
April 4, 2020
Adaptive cyclic exit strategies from lockdown to suppress COVID-19 and allow economic activity
The paper is interesting but makes too little sense for the complexity involved and the New York Times column on the proposal "distorts" what is happening in Austria. Monitor workers for symptoms, as by daily temperature checks in and out, keep social distancing as schools are in fact doing in Austria, and getting back to work or school seems reasonable.
I am bothered at the distortion of the Austrian school policy, which is all about social distancing in the schools, by the writers in the NYT.
China is generally back to work with repeated temperature checks and social distancing and so far this is successful.
I appreciate this post, since I might have skipped the New York Times column and the proposal is interesting, but the proposal strikes me as ridiculously complex and costly and of no benefit that would not be gained by check for symptoms, social distancing and masks being worn. Too, too clever.
By the way, could you possibly comment on why Canada has handled the coronavirus so poorly. For a time, it appeared Canada was doing well but no more.
By the way, could you possibly comment on why Canada has handled the coronavirus so poorly....
[ This is in no way meant to be sarcastic. I am interested in what has gone wrong in Canada, since I would have expected a better response. I have no idea, however. ]
There is every reason to believe that with temperature checks, masks and social distancing the opening of workplaces will be safe and effective. The plan suggested here makes no sense given what is already being found in China, which has opened, and other countries that are opening. I thought carefully about the paper and the plan impractical and needless and the writers uninterested in actual experience of opening up.
"There is every reason to believe..."
It may turn out that temperature checks, masks and social distancing will be enough to keep workplaces safe and effective indefinitely. We don't know that yet, though. The proposal here is in addition to the full complement of safety precautions. It is also suggested as a way to facilitate social distancing through the staggering of alternative work weeks.
I acknowledged in my post the formidable challenges to implementing such a scheme. This would be in addition to the formidable challenges to implementing temperature checks, masks and social distancing in a country like the United States where the presumptive "president" and his followers dismiss the pandemic as a hoax and scorn precautionary measures.
THERE IS EVERY REASON TO BELIEVE temperature checks, masks and social distancing will NOT be enough to keep workplaces safe in the U.S. because a substantial part of the populations thinks their cult religion trumps science and therefore won't tolerate temperature checks, mass and social distancing. Incidentally, they also would not accept a four-day work week followed by ten days of isolation.
As is my custom, I left unsaid much of my own thinking about the 4-10 proposal. First, I don't see employment levels automatically rebounding with the reopening of the economy. Shorter work weeks would be one way of spreading the available jobs.
Second, following the analysis of Leacock and Dahlberg that I have previously discussed here, a great deal of the work that existed before the pandemic arrived was unnecessary. This is not to say that there weren't needs being neglected but that the financial incentives favored bullshit jobs at the expense of work that needed to be done. Rationing work would provide an occasion for rationalizing what is essential and what isn't.
Third, following from Chapman's analysis, a substantial reduction of working time per workers would be likely to result in a substantial gain in productivity per hour worked. It may be that 75% of pre-pandemic output can be produced in 40% of the hours. People may learn that they would prefer to have a little less income in return for a lot less working time.
Fourth, the sustained reduction in work and consumption has obvious and profound implications for fossil fuel consumption, carbon dioxide emissions and global warming.
These four effects are incidental to the epidemiological outcomes that the proposal intends. There is not "every reason to believe" that adopting the proposal would somehow trigger the four things I have enumerated here. But there is no reason to dismiss the possibilities out of hand.
Sandwichman,
Really fine response, which changes my thinking. I needed your argument and quite agree.
Thanks so much.
Sandwichman:
I acknowledged in my post the formidable challenges to implementing such a scheme. This would be in addition to the formidable challenges to implementing temperature checks, masks and social distancing in a country like the United States where the presumptive "president" and his followers dismiss the pandemic as a hoax and scorn precautionary measures....
[ Scary passage. This president is unnerving so I increasingly try to avoid knowing what the president is about. ]
Rethinking the policy proposal still again, I would be more sympathetic if any of the epidemic successful countries in Asia were not using far simpler but so far effective policies in getting back to work. Israel shows no inclination to adopt such a policy. There really has to be an example, and the Austrian school example that was mentioned in the New York Times is entirely different.
I am still grateful for the post.
Sandwichman:
First, I don't see employment levels automatically rebounding with the reopening of the economy. Shorter work weeks would be one way of spreading the available jobs.
Second, following the analysis of Leacock and Dahlberg that I have previously discussed here, a great deal of the work that existed before the pandemic arrived was unnecessary. This is not to say that there weren't needs being neglected but that the financial incentives favored bullshit jobs at the expense of work that needed to be done. Rationing work would provide an occasion for rationalizing what is essential and what isn't.
Third, following from Chapman's analysis, a substantial reduction of working time per workers would be likely to result in a substantial gain in productivity per hour worked. It may be that 75% of pre-pandemic output can be produced in 40% of the hours. People may learn that they would prefer to have a little less income in return for a lot less working time.
Fourth, the sustained reduction in work and consumption has obvious and profound implications for fossil fuel consumption, carbon dioxide emissions and global warming.
These four effects are incidental to the epidemiological outcomes that the proposal intends. There is not "every reason to believe" that adopting the proposal would somehow trigger the four things I have enumerated here. But there is no reason to dismiss the possibilities out of hand.
[ This is the argument I am completely sympathetic to, but beyond the epidemic. ]
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