What we are doing simply isn’t working. There have been countless individual sacrifices; relatives not seen since Christmas and restaurants shuttered forever. As cases spiral alarmingly again, we are moving back towards economically devastating restrictions or, worse, thousands more patients struggling to breathe in intensive care units.
Can we take hope from the new strategy of ‘circuit breaker’ lockdown? Yes – but only if done correctly.
From our vantage points by the bedside on COVID wards, and as part of the COVID-19 Statistics, Policy Modelling, and Epidemiology Collective, we saw firsthand how we failed before. We argue that a coordinated circuit breaker followed by intermittent and contingent ‘reset’ periods could avoid a longer lockdown, help the economy, keep a handle on COVID, and save lives.
