#ZeroCovid is a #PublicHealth elimination strategy. It means that you resource #PublicHealth teams to play whack-a-mole to crush disease outbreaks when they occur. Act Fast - Save Lives. When outbreaks get big, you need to #BreakTheChain of transmission. 1/2 @ISAGCOVID19 https://twitter.com/Dr2NisreenAlwan/status/1360663366562373640

Depending on the disease, you #BreakTheChain by doing different things. Ex 1: Head lice jumps from head 2 head. 2 break the chain u stop transmission by keeping heads apart and not sharing pillows, hats or towels. You treat the affected person & watch 4 recurrent infestation /2

Covid is an airborne disease so it hangs around in the air we breathe. This makes it very hard to break the chain of transmission as we love to be with other people. Science is learning fast but the virus is continually trying to outsmart us. So it makes sense to be cautious /3

Travel is one of the most NB features of this disease outbreak - when people move, the virus moves = limiting travel means limiting the virus. You can limit travel by locking people in their homes or imposing inward restrictions - or both. To get the disease under control.. /4

you need both lockdown and inward restriction. When cases get low enough to manage by our #PublicHealth teams ( @marietcasey may confirm current #), you remove lockdown and keep inward restriction. Then life for people here is mostly back to normal... /5

Instead Gov 'wasted' this lockdown by NOT doing inward restrictions. Soon as we remove lockdown without inward restriction we allow new case importation and circulation. And we end up back in a new lockdown: this yo-yo approach is what is so damaging... /6

economically, medically, socially and emotionally. By aiming to #CrushCovid with both lockdown and inward restriction we get cases under control and equip our public health teams to respond swiftly to new infections. You can still have inward travel but it must be quarantined /7

If we keep going with the Irish #LivingWithCovid plan we extend the lockdown time and continue a cycle of long rolling yo-yo lockdowns - open up, cases increase, lockdown hard as our health system can't cope - on repeat. This does most damage to our economy & our people /8

The reason why it is so damaging is because it only enacts one half of the containment or elimination process. It increases our vulnerability as it allows #Covid to mutate & outsmart us - resulting in, you've guessed it, the potential 4 even worse outcomes & longer lockdowns /9

#ZeroCovid is a science term meaning *the aim* of zero cases or *elimination*. This is being confused with eradication. Lockdowns are a blunt instrument to quell case numbers. Scientists & #PublicHealth pros know that a zero covid plan will mean new clusters of disease /10

and the action Gov needs to take is help them eliminate it. Listen 2 @AileenKitching @marietcasey @sinead_donohue & support them, our #PublicHealth doctors, to #CrushCovid- get it down, keep it down, keep it out (inc new variants). /11

Get them outbreak management software as a basic tool @ 50k. Invest the money in supporting our public health experts to eliminate covid vs the current cost of not doing so. Allow us to return to relatively normal life - even if we can't yet travel outside the country /12

It should always be about the people. Those on the frontlines are near/have passed breaking point. This can not continue. Those who died #TheyAreOurFamilies #TheyAreOurFriends. We are all struggling to cope. We need a clear action+ a new path based on evidence - not this non-plan