Some journalists, economists and politicians have been saying that we just need to let the virus run and only worry about protecting the elderly or vulnerable.
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Given that would mean a lot more community infections, hopefully limited to those at lower risk of death or severe infection, let’s have a look at what it would take to try to protect those who need protecting.
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The residents of aged care facilities have been hit particularly hard, so we’d obviously have to focus a lot of energy on trying to stop COVID-19 from getting into their facilities.
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That would mean anyone working there would have to do everything possible to avoid taking COVID-19 to work, given that they could spread it when they are in an asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic phase of the infection.
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They would need to avoid public places like supermarkets, shopping centres, parties, restaurants, bars or cinemas. And if they have children who are back at school, they would have to avoid all contact with them too.
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In fact, they would have to avoid contact with anyone who is going out into public areas that would lead to potential exposure. Perhaps it would be necessary for them to live onsite at the aged care facility to minimize the danger of the virus being introduced.
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Possibly a bit too much of an ask, even for these amazingly dedicated workers.
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Who else would this sort of issue apply to? Pretty much all healthcare workers would be exposed to vulnerable people at work and so those healthcare workers would also have to avoid going out in public or meeting up with anyone who is at risk of having COVID-19.
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They would also have to avoid contact with their own school aged kids if applicable or do home schooling, leaving their kids alone if they are a single parent or if both parents have to work. We have approximately 300,000 nurses, 25,000 physios and 88,000 drs in Australia.
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Add to those numbers all the social workers, occupational therapists, speech therapists, hospital cleaners, clerical staff and volunteers.
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The vast majority of healthcare workers who look after the vulnerable would have to be stop having any type of social life for as long as there is circulating virus.
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Particularly in the Victorian hospitals that have been dealing with this, many healthcare workers are already exhausted, made worse by having many colleagues on enforced leave because of either being infected or needing to be in quarantine after being exposed at work.
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If we enforced this extreme social isolation on them, enough would probably leave that we’d struggle to have a functioning healthcare system.
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Other people who might be classed as vulnerable are those who have health conditions associated with a worse outcome from COVID-19.
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Some common examples would be chronic diseases like COPD (affecting about 5% of the population), asthma (affecting about 11% of the population), and diabetes mellitus (affecting about 5% of the population).
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There are also many Australians with heart problems, cancers, kidney failure, or weakened immune systems. And roughly 1 in 5 of the population is over the age of 70. All these people and anyone in regular contact with them would need to isolate from the rest of society.
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This suggestion to protect the vulnerable is very easy to say but the specifics are a lot more challenging. In fact, they are impossible. We cannot just live with this virus like this and not expect disasters on a scale that make our current situation look mild.
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