SCIENCE per se is not going to entirely solve the pandemic. Not even medical science in general. But a specialized field called epidemiology or the field of medicine dealing with public health may be a big help. Of all the tools epidemiologists use, one such important tool is now globally discussed as crucial to stopping virus transmission, yet this same tool is seemingly ignored by many countries – contact tracing. The Philippines has been releasing billions of economic grants and aids and incurring more billions in debts to assuage the growing impoverished situation these last six months. For a country ruled mostly by traditional politicians, money has always been considered as god. The same god which politicians think can solve the pandemic. However, the economic depression today is not caused by anything that money alone can stop – it is caused by a highly infectious, humanly transmissible virus without a scientifically proven and tested working vaccine.
As of August 20, 2020, there have been 22,256,220 confirmed cases of Covid-19, including 782,456 deaths as reported to by the World Health Organization (WHO). Did the stimulus packages stop transmission? Negative. Did the virus stop the economy from growing? Affirmative. These two questions should be the driving force in every decision-making table.
Since January, WHO has already warned countries to invest time, policy and resources in detecting, testing, isolating, treating Covid-19 cases and tracing contacts. Sadly, our Philippine leaders were too excited about the ease that a pandemic will give to releasing billions of public funds. It became a “public fund holiday” in the Philippines – with all the shortcuts to justify the automatic release of people’s money due to fortuitous events as Philippine Health Insurance Corporation or PhilHealth officials classified Covid-19 patients to be stricken of along with dialysis patients. In short, it made life easier for politicians. Let it be, but how about the goal of stopping transmission – which is the reason why the economy is down.
So I go back to the 1855 contact tracing system that John Snow used to address the spreading of cholera in the fields of London. One particular explanation comes from WHO Infectious Diseases expert Dr. Maria Van Kherkove in her answer to an interview on August 19, as to how ordinary citizens can help in contact tracing. The succeeding paragraphs are transcriptions I made.
First, in countries where you have been identified as a contact, you may be called by a health professional. Please answer the call. They will give you instructions about what you can do and how you can quarantine yourself, if it can be done at home and what it means for them to follow you up and what type of care you may need to seek.
The other thing is that several apps have been developed for contact tracing. I have one that I participated here in Switzerland where I downloaded on my phone and I’ve agreed to participate in this where it will tell me if I have been in close proximity to somebody who has been identified as a contact. That is a choice that I have made to be able to use that app. There are some countries which are using this app and you can choose to participate in something like that and that could be quite helpful.
But, most importantly, if you decide to attend certain locations, then be your risk manager. If you are making decisions about where you go and how you live your daily life, if you are participating in events that will put you in proximity to one another, you may be asked to give your name or your phone number, please do so. That will help authorities quickly identify the cases and the contacts so that you can be put in quarantine or so that you can receive the care that you need to break those chains of transmission.
As to concerns about sharing data, Van Kherkove says the app that I am using is using Bluetooth and I have agreed to share the location of my phone so they can see where I am and this makes some connections between where I have been and where a case may be. And that helps make those links. The data that is specifically used for contact tracing purposes and is not sold to other individuals and they are not sharing information but it is important to know what you are agreeing to and that there is a choice to agree to that or not. But these apps only supplement what contact tracing is because most of what contact tracing is – is done by people who are making connections, making phone calls, sometimes spending time, we call it boots on the ground, shoe-leather epidemiologists which essentially means walking around, it came from John Snow, walking around the streets of London in the cholera outbreaks in London, or walking around and finding where the contacts are of known cases. These apps can help but they cannot take the role of real-life human beings who are doing contact tracing. Many countries have tens of thousands of contact tracers and so we do need people to help make the connection so even if you are identified by the app, you still need to talk to a human being and say “what does this mean?” “Where can I do my quarantine?” “What type of care do I need?” “If I develop symptoms how can I get a test?" Or, “do I need to seek medical care?”
Dr. Michael Ryan of WHO concludes – “if you put bad surveillance and bad contact tracing together with less than perfect community participation in risk reduction, then you have a very dangerous mix which allows the virus to jump back.” That is the recipe for disaster.