UT Researchers Say Social Distancing Is Working. Slacking Off Could Put Us On A 'Catastrophic Path.'
UT Austin's COVID-19 Modeling Consortium is analyzing data on a rolling basis to chronicle and predict the spread of the coronavirus. The news so far in the Austin-Round Rock area is pretty good. Adherence to social distancing and other guidelines has reduced transmission by over 90%.
But there is no guarantee that it will continue on this path.
Lauren Ancel Meyers is a professor of biology and statistics at UT Austin and leads the consortium. She says the results so far are promising.
The social distancing success in the area means the spread of COVID-19 is progressing at a rate that has not overwhelmed capacity at local hospitals up to this point.
"Our social distancing seems to be sufficiently effective that we are curbing the number of hospitalizations so that it will remain below the estimated capacity for the Austin-Round Rock area," Meyers said. "But we don't know if that will be true going forward. It will depend on the extent to which people continue to social distance or take other measures to reduce transmission."
Read more: https://www.kut.org/post/ut-researchers-say-social-distancing-working-slacking-could-put-us-catastrophic-path
