Curing Social Distance Fatigue

areas because there are few clear answers. But first, here's what happened today. Yet another study is showing the dangers of antimillaria drugs touted by US President Donald Trump for treating COVID nineteen. Hydroxy chloroquine and chloroquine were linked to an increased risk of death and heart ailments. The drugs don't benefit patients with the coronavirus, either alone or in combination with other drugs, according to a study published today

by the Lancet Medical Journal. Trump's endorsement has led many people to take the medications without scientific proof of their benefit. An experimental vaccine developed by Chinese company Cancino Biologics is showing promise. An early study shows that the vaccine was safe and generated an immune response. That's according to another report out today from The Lancet. The researchers from the Beijing Institute of Biotechnology and other organizations said further study

is needed to show its effectiveness against the virus. And finally, coronavirus is having another direct health effect, this one on very small children. The pandemic has kept parents from taking their children to routine doctor visits. That means, according to the world's top health agencies, that more than eighty million children under the age of one are at risk of

life threatening diseases like polio and measles. That's because routine vaccinations of children have been substantially hindered in at least sixty eight countries, according to data from the World Health Organization UNICEF and other organizations. The agencies called on countries to resume campaigns against vaccine preventable diseases and made recommendations

on how to safely deliver shots. Amid the pandemic and now our main story, there's a growing public health argument about how people should calculate risk when it comes to social distancing. Many U S States are now lifting stay at home restrictions. Summer is around the corner, and people in the third month of what many hoped would be a week's long disruption are desperate to visit friends and

get outside. That means we will be socializing a lot more in many cases without clear guidelines as to what's really risky. As we learn more about how the virus spreads and what constitutes risky behavior, messaging from experts will have to become a little more nuanced than just stay home, stay safe, reports Kristin V. Brown. Here's Kristen with more on how we can make social distancing work for the long haul. A few weeks ago, I did something that

broke social distancing rules. I live in Oakland, California, and on March seventeen, my county enacted a strict shelter and place order That means no hanging out with friends or family you don't live with, or spending time outside of the house unless it's necessary at all. Like many people, I coped by moving my social life to the screen. I had lots of Zoom happy hours and Zoom game nights. My best friend I would go for runs while chatting on the phone. But a few weeks ago I hit

a wall. I just wanted to have a drink with a friend in real life, so I suggested that my best friend and I meet for a drink in her backyard. We were careful, We stayed six ft apart, weight chips from separate bowls. It seemed really low risk, but still I felt guilty. Julia Marcus is an epidemiologist at Harvard University. She calls what I've been experiencing quarantine fatigue, and she says I am far from the only one feeling it today.

The public health health messaging right now has been um stay at home, and of course that is the safest option right now, staying at home, either on your own or with your family, But it's not sustainable for the long term. Julia is among a growing number of people in the public health world to think the messaging around COVID nineteen needs to change. At the beginning of the pandemic, the idea was that we would all hunker down for a few weeks or even a few months until the

virus was more under control. But now we're at an inflection point at states reopen. On the one hand, we still don't have a vaccine, and the threat of a new outbreak of disease is very real. But on the other hand, forcing people to continue to exclusively stay inside

it's unsustainable and taking a real psychological toll. Julius has all of this means we need to make a plan for the long haul, and now that that's become clear that this is a long term proposition, we have to rethink how we're going to do this so that we can do it in a sustainable way and people can live their lives such that they have things to look forward to and they have joy, and they're not oppressed and isolated. And it's not going to look the way

it did before. But you know, we have to adjust to a new normal that balances people's need for human contact with keeping the risk of transmission as low as possible. Julia studies HIV and points to the AIDS epidemic as an example of why our COVID nineteen playbook needs to change. Asking people to not have sex doesn't work, but advising people in ways they can have sex while reducing the

chances that they'll contract the virus does. She says, New York City today is setting a good example, It just put out guidelines on sexual health during COVID nineteen. The best way to avoid risk, the guidelines say is to not have sex, but it does recognize not everyone is going to follow that advice and suggest some ways to decrease the risk of other scenarios. To health is not just prevention of disease transmission, and there are other aspects

to health that we're going to need to consider. We don't want to see an increase in suicide, you know what I mean, It's there. There's a lot to balance here that I think needs the more holistic approach to health if we're going to do this. The other thing is that we know more about COVID nineteen than we did two months ago. We have a better idea of how it spreads and of who is most susceptible to getting really sick from it. Marty Marqueri is a public

health expert at Johns Hopkins. He says he first supported sheltering in place in order to reduce the burden on hospitals, but things have changed now that we have flatten the curve nationally, now that we have data coming in showing that it is it has fallen short of some of the more dire projections. We need to evolve our strategy, and at the same time, the country simply cannot tolerate

anymore of a harsh shutdown. Marty says that we need to customize public health recommendations to better fit what we now know about the virus. For example, we now know that the virus is much less likely to spread outdoors. Most cases seem to come from people who have close contact with each other, so have that socially distanced drink in the backyard. Some of this thinking has actually already

made its way into policy. For example, in California, businesses can now open up for curbside pickup that will reduce contact opportunities, but will also allow life to inch back towards normal. Marty says that businesses might even be able to just shift to sidewalk shopping. He says, we need to completely rethink many aspects of society. We can actually fight this thing with a pretty good toolbox of many

different interventions and have a lot of success. Now does that mean that people can resume summer camps and kids can play soccer together? It depends on the local viral burden in that community. So there's no one size fits all strategy, and the strategy needs to evolve. But not every region has taken into account what we've learned about

the virus in deciding how to roll back restrictions. In Alabama, for example, restaurants and bars have been allowed to reopen with limited seating, even though the state has yet to meet White House reopening criteria. The percentage of positive tests in the state has increased, causing concern that a second wave of the virus may be on the way. Marty says public health officials could create a virus threat level for every community. This would change as a virus does

and help people better make their own risk assessments. In the United States now with the pandemic, we have numbers of cases, hospitalizations, new intubations, and we can create a risk level for every locale, which will actually stratify the degree of elective activities, be it um, social gathering, sporting events,

or essential services. And so we can do this. We can figure out, hey, in this particular community, the disease burden is so low that it's reasonable for young, healthy people to essentially do whatever they want in that community. In other areas, we can say, look there's still a risk. It's not a severe risk, but it's a moderate risk. We're going to ask people to limit themselves to activities where they can conduct them selves with distancing hygiene masks

and redesigned business processes. That's very feasible and that's what we should be doing. The big message here is that now that the virus spread has slowed, public health policy requires more of a balancing act. We need to consider not just risk of exposure to the virus, but mental health, economic well being, access to other kinds of healthcare, and happiness. That said, don't count on shaking hands anytime soon. That

was Kristin V. Brown and that's our show today. For coverage of the outbreak from one bureaus around the world, visit Bloomberg dot com slash coronavirus and if you like the show, please leave us a review and a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It's the best way to help more listeners find our global reporting. The Prognosis Daily edition is produced by Topher Foreheads Jordan Gospore, Magnus Hendrickson and me Laura Carlson. Today's main story was reported by

Kristin V. Brown. Original music by Leo Sidran. Our editors are Francesca Levi and Rick Shine. Francesca Levie is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. Thanks for listening.