Coronavirus Explained: Social Distancing and Flattening the Curve

subjects related to COVID nineteen. In a moment, we'll talk to a top medical expert who will help explain the concept of social distancing and why it's so important. We'll also discuss what to do if a family member in your household comes down with symptoms associated with this particular coronavirus. Also, if you're someone who still works with the public, perhaps a first responder or a supermarket employee will tell you

some better way as to better protect yourself. I'll also check in with the government response expert, who will explain why it's so crucial that we flatten the curve, a term I'm sure you've heard a lot recently. We'll also talk about where things stand with the medical equipment and supplies needed to treat coronavirus patients and help slow down

this spread of the disease. And finally, we'll spend some time with a clinical psychologist to answer questions you may have about how to discuss these extraordinary circumstances we find ourselves in With children. It can be a frightening time for kids as they've had their routines turned upside down and may not understand why certain changes have to be made.

All of that and more is on the way as we try to help you better protect yourself and your family and better understand how to navigate this public health crisis. Our first guest is going to help us better understand the virus itself. I'm joined now by the Chairman of Medicine at St. Joseph University Hospital, Dr Bob lahed Uh. Dr Lahda explain what the concept of social distancing is so important and also why it's vital to keep surfaces

and objects clean. Well, let me take the second part first, because the first part is going to require a bit of an explanation. This bug lives. This bug with its nucleo capsid, which is protein around an RNA core lives for two to four days on surfaces, particularly surfaces like cushions and leather and arms of chairs, and on your computer, keyboard,

and on your cell phone. So you've really got to be careful and you've got to really cleanse these various objects with wipes, with chlorox, it can be deluted clorox with lysol. All of that works for this virus. It's very sensitive to those agents. Now, with regard to the first part of your question, why are we quarantining? What are we telling people to stay home? Because we're We're

doing two strategies here. One is what I call mitigation, which focuses on slowing the infection but not stopping it, and that means that we're going to reduce the peak demand while protecting most people who are at risk, particularly our elder population, you know, or those people with chemotherapy or um heart disease, or emphysema, chronic obstructive lung disease and bad asthma. And then the second thing is suppression, and that's probably the more realistic approach, and what that

does is reverses the epidemic growth. It reduces the case numbers to such low levels that we we attempt to keep and you've heard this on TV and on the radio, keep the curve very low. We want there's there's gonna be cases, but we don't want to exceed. We don't want to go up that big hump so that all of a sudden we don't have enough hospital beds. We haven't, we don't have enough m I CU beds, and everybody goes nuts, which at the present time we are controlling.

So I'm happy to say that suppression seems to be worth king. And that's the whole idea of home isolation, uh quarantine of those living in the same household as suspected people, and distancing socially the elderly and others, keeping them out of supermarkets during prime time, keeping them out of malls. You know, we're talking about closing malls, etcetera. And I suggested that we have older people have a

certain time where they can go shopping. And I was told by one of my residents that that already happens. That the elderly people are given from six to eight in the morning in the local supermarket to buy groceries, which I had no idea they were doing, which I think is pretty neat what if there's a situation where someone with the family household begins to feel ill. Is there a way to mitigate the spread with it a home? Yes, um,

that is to keep that individual. And I have such a case right now where I have a young woman who is sneezing, coughing, and has a temperature of a hundred and three, and she's home with her parents, who are both older, and she is staying by herself off in her room. And of course there's a way, uh to serve food to her and make sure everything is wiped down and uh if she if they have a mask,

which God God I will I hope they do. If there's a mask, even if it's a cloth mask and not an end nine one of these snazzy masks that are in short supply, at least keep the sneezing and the coughing isolated and have only one person in that family, probably a healthy youngster, go in and serve that individual food and UH and have him or her take care of their toiletry needs, etcetera, in a very isolated toilet someplace where no one is in contact until such time

as that patient symptoms go away. Now, as a as an added on. The question that's been raised to me is, oh, I'm home with my relatives, my mother, father, and my brother sister. Do we need to test everybody in the family. And the answer is no. Right now, you would want the patient to be test said for regular respiratory viruses

like influenza or other types of coronaviruses and uh. And then if that patient clears up on Thailand all or whatever, not to do anything else, and not to test for COVID unless the respiratory panel is negative and the patient

gets sicker. And of course, for all your listeners, if anybody has problems breathing, there to go to the hospital or to their doctor's office or to urgy care and have themselves examined, because we can determine by listening to your chest whether or not you've got pneumonia, or whether whether or not you're going to be have a positive X ray or positive cat scan, and then that's an emergency. We're joined here on I already by the Chairman of

Medicine at Saint Joseph University Hospital, Dr bomb Leahida. Are there any other measures that those who still have to deal with the public should take, And let's start with first responders and healthcare workers. Now let's take first responders. I happen to be the medical director of two towns here in northern New Jersey, and all of my e m T s have been educated on COVID nineteen. And here's what we do. The dispatcher at the center gets a call, I'm short of breath and I have a fever.

So he or she gets more answers to those questions, dispatches an ambulance. When the ambulance arrives, we have one e m T who's gowned, gloved, and wearing a mask and possibly a face shield, who goes in and sees the patient and evaluates the patient, verifies the temperature, may listen to the patient's chest with their stethoscope. Of course, might call the paramedics to come and evaluate the patient

if the patient is very sick. And then when the patient doesn't have what appears to be the signs of COVID nineteen, the rest of the team who have who are wearing masks and gloves but are not so exquisitely gowned, will go in and get the patient out and take the patients of the hospital. So we're being very careful because the first responders, like the fireman and the police to the police officers, they have no choice. They have

to respond and they have to do so judiciously. So what I'm doing is educating and I'm advising, and everybody in the State Office of Emergency Management, both in New York and in New Jersey knows this that our first responders have to respond carefully because all we need is one positive COVID infection and knocks out the entire ambulance squad and then you don't have an ambulance. Everybody's quarantined,

so we have to be careful. What about those working in restaurants, providing food through delivery or takeout, or supermarket and pharmacy employees, Well, there you have a very interesting uh thing, because you know, eighty percent of the people who get this infection are asymptomatic. That means they have

no symptoms whatsoever, but they can still be infective. So what I suggest for workers in restaurants, in take out places, wherever they're in in headed with the public, wherever they're face to face, they should make sure they wash their hands and avoid anybody who's sneezing or coughing a dry cough ree member sneezing, a dry cough, and a fever are really the signs of active infection. Now, that could just be influenza. It could be a regular cold, or

could be seasonal allergies. But it's never too much to be too careful. So hand washing I got. I washed my hands twenty five times a day. Hand washing is very critical. And not touching your face if you're one of these servers or waitresses or waiters, be careful there, uh and you'll be fine. We're talking to the Chairman of Medicine at Saint Joseph University Hospital, Dr Bob Lajda here on I her radio. Finally, the impact of the virus on young adults. I want to touch on this.

We know those who are most at risk for the most severe symptoms are older adults and individuals with serious underlying medical issues, but we've also seen some in that millennial age group get hit hard by this disease. Just because you're a certain age doesn't mean you should just assume you'll be asymptomatic, right, that's correct, that's correct. We have twenty year olds and thirty year olds who are around respirators with the pulmonary failure because of this virus.

So you're not necessarily immune, and I use that that's a pun your immune system. Everybody's immune system is quite different. And I was reading a report from China today where over a thousand children were tested below the age of fifteen and a hundred of them were critically ill. So children are not immune to this at all. But remember that's about that's about ten of those who were ill who wind up being very very ill, and so nobody

is totally immune, uh, to this condition. People are out there who have glitches in their immune function, not just those on chemotherapy and those with chronic illnesses. We don't know. You'll never know what you're what your true immunity is until you get infected and see what this virus does to you. So that's us to be very very careful. But most of the big problems come with the elderly people above the age of seventy. Chairman of Medicine at St.

Joseph University Hospital, Dr Bob Lihida. Dr Lohita, thank you for taking the time to help us better understand the medical issues related to COVID nineteen. We appreciate it. Oh It's my appreciation to give out good information, and I hope we speak again. Next, let's turn to an expert who can shed some light on the local, state, and federal response to the coronavirus outbreak and why flattening the

curve is so vital for our health care system. Joining me now is a former counter terrorism and community outreach official and former chief spokesman for the New York City Office of Emergency Management, and Jared Bernstein. Jared, thank you for joining us here on iHeart Radio. Things are moving fast these days, and new challenges related to the coronavirus

outbreak continue to emerge. People are hearing a lot about the need to flatten the curve, and I want to make sure they fully understand what that means and why it's so important. Can you explain what could happen if

we don't get ahead of the spread. Sure, well, you know, we can have an unprecedented UH outbreak here where we have you know, larger and larger percentages of the population, particularly people with underlying medical conditions and older people get sick, get tremendously sick and require the use of ventilators and quickly overwhelm our impatient hospital capacities and certainly overwhelmed our

number of ventilators that we have on hand. There is a stockpile of ventilators at the federal government mainteam for scenarios like this that is quietly being deployed, but really that even that stockpile could be overwhelmed if people don't exercise the universal precautions here and use some social distancing and really listen to authorities when they say stay at home unless you are at first responder, healthcare worker or other coal employees. And if things get out of control.

In addition to an issue with ventilators, you can also have a shortage of hospital beds, right, yeah, I mean there's some some of the scenarios are are truly scary. I think that's why you saw the President authorized the deployment of a Navy hospital ship to New York, which brings another thousand beds of hospital capacity. You know, in the last ten years, more and more things that you used to need to go to the hospital for and

stay over for it to in an outpatient setting. And so because of that, hospitals have actually gotten smaller and smaller in terms of the number of inpatient beds and Unfortunately, when you have a pandemic situation like this, that kind of downsizing, which is good overall, is not good in the pandemic situation. We're talking to former counter terrorism and community outreach official and former chief spokesman for the New

York City Office of Emergency Management, Jared Bernstein. One issue in particular that's gaining more and more attention are shortages of personal protective equipment for healthcare workers and supplies needed to conduct the tests. We're seeing more and more tests being allocated across the country, but you need supplies to actually conduct the tests. Talk a little bit about that and the measures government officials can take to try to

meet the demand. You know, government, government organizations are really they are having to be very judicious about how they apply how they deploy resources, everything from ventilators to masks, gowns, rubber gloves and masks. And that's going to be how we get through this in the long long haul. Fortunately, our supply system will catch up probably in the next you know, thirty days, will have more and more production

capacity coming online. Uh, the manufacturers of the nine masks only makes so many in a year because that's what the demand is. But they've certainly ramped up production, and that's something that we're all going to have to just be very judicious at every level of government, making sure that only the responders that need them get them, but

that every responder who does need them get them. And while we're on the topic of supplies, despite the fact that a lot times when you go to the grocery store these days, they're out of a whole bunch of different items, there really hasn't been a disruption in terms of the amount of supplies that we have for these stores or the ability to get those kinds of supplies, whether it's toilet paper, paper towels, those kinds of products

to supermarkets. Right know, what you're really seeing is a little bit of panic buying, um, where they're short terms, short term shortages, but they will usually last less than a week um. And you know, it just takes a while for supermarkets to sort of restock because there again not used to selling, uh, you know, as much toilet paper as they normally sell, and so their supply chain

is sort of not always set up for that. But you will see in the next few days that h that that supply chain will sort of start to catch up, and you know, as long as people can get to the grocery stores, there will be grocery, you know, the grocer We've not seen any problems with supply chains like that so far. There was an interesting situation that took

place recently at Chicago Midway Airport. It involved a couple of individuals who worked in the air traffic control tower testing positive for COVID nineteen and contingency plans had to be put in place. Talk a little bit about some essential professions doing that planning and how important it is to have a contingency plan to go to. Yeah, that's

a really great question, a really great point. You know, every one of these critical UH pieces of infrastructure, they are going through what's called a continuity of operations plans. That's something that they do typically on an ongoing basis, but for sure, UH they placed renewed emphasis on it in the last few weeks. UM that in many cases involved dividing up your teams into separate teams where people

don't overlap. So that way, if you have somebody get sick on one or more of the teams, you can still stretch out your existing team into UM, make sure you fill all the spots that you need to and that's going on from everything from air traffic control to firefighters and these police officers, uh you kill public utilities,

any kind of critical infrastructure. Everybody's going through this continuity of operations planning to space out their critical folks so that if somebody gets sick, you don't uh you don't you know, have some you know, lose the whole operation.

We're talking to former counter terrorism and community outreach official and former chief spokesman from the New York City Office of Emergency Management, Jared Bernstein as somebody who used to deal with counter terrorism talk a little bit about our government's ability to handle this pandemic while also working to keep America safe. Yeah, I mean it's a significant challenge.

I think that, you know, having those uh sort of twofold challenges of the pandemic and people who are out to disrupt our way of life in whatever whatever way. You know, it's something that's been planned for for lots and lots of years. Ever Sinceeptember eleventh. How do we face multiple threats at once? Uh be they you know, maybe it's a hurricane and then we want to make sure, you know, after a hurricane we're prepared to deal with

a tax on our critical infrastructure. So you know, I think when you when you you know, wonder what our public employees are being paid for and the next time collective bargaining agreement has come up, and we wonder why paying people what we're paying? Uh, you know it should be No, it's not lost that that the police officers police Department doesn't get the ticket day off, you know, Customs and Boarder Protection doesn't get to ticket day off,

The FBI doesn't get to take a day off. And so they need to figure out ways to work through that because there are still people who are out to hurt us stump that way of life. And so that's a very real concern and we'll have to you know, we're all gonna have to pitch in here. Uh. The flip side of that is that because there are lots and lots of you know, far fewer people out on

our streets and out in general circulation. Uh, those who are, we're probably gonna get a little bit more scrutiny on them. So if you're a bad guy out trying to plan some bad things, uh, and you're out there when everybody is being told to stay home, You're probably going to arouse some suspicion, uh and and stick out in terms of, you know, attracting the attention of law enforcements or it does cut both. Please, but certainly it's a challenge that

we have to overcome in the nation. Final question for you. Lockdowns have started to go into effect in some parts of the country, most notably San Francisco. What kind of general powers do local government, states, and of course the federal government have during a pandemic. You know, most states and mayors, you know, cities have a curfew authority. UM. It really depends upon the individual city code and how

that city code interacts with state law. UM. You saw in New York there's a little bit of the difference of opinion at the moment between Mayor di Blasio and Governor Cuomo about who has what power to do what. Generally speaking, when you bring out the national Guard, only the governor or the president the United States can can bring out the national guard for police type actions. UM,

and the mayors typically can't do that. So I think that you know that it varies from state to state, and and you know, it's very difficult to do the larger the scale, the harder it is. In San Francisco, they've done something where they are allowing people to go to the grocery store, to go outside and exercise, but they are basically curtailing pretty much everything else. Um, and I know that you know that that is something lots of other cities in America are looking at right now.

Former counter terrorism and Community Outreach official and former chief spokesman from the New York City Office of Emergency Management Jared Bernstein, Jared, thank you again for the time and insight. We appreciate it. Thank you. Finally, to offer advice on how to explain to children this major disruption of everyday life.

We're joined by Dr Jamie Howard, clinical psychologist at the Child Mind Institutes Anxiety Disorder Center and the director of the center's Trauma and Resilience Service, who's been a leading voice on talking to kids about the coronavirus. Dr Howard, there's so many things occupying the minds of parents these days, as everyone's life has been completely flipped upside down. One issue that could easily get overlooked is how children are

processing so many changes. What's your most important piece of advice for parents during this coronavirus pandemic. My most important piece of advice would be that parents should definitely talk to their kids, even if you think they already know everything that's going on, even if you think they don't have any questions. You definitely want to have an open line of communication, and when you do talk to them,

you want to model sort of calm emotions. Um, it's okay to say, you know, I'm feeling I'm feeling worried about grandma, Grandma, I'm feeling frustrated, But you don't want to do too much processing of your own emotions and you don't want to appear to distressed in front of your kids. What do parents say to their children about a break and visits to grandma and grandpa, older relatives that they just can't see right now that perhaps they're used to seeing on a regular basis. Yeah, it's so

it's really tricky for younger kids. I would say, you know, kids who are ten enough probably would understand, right, They really get sort of the catchiness of certain illnesses for younger kids. Though they do talk a lot about um, good hygiene in preschools, washing your hands a lot because of germs who can sort of build on that kind of conversation and you can say, Grandma and Grandpa really want to see you, or we really want to see them.

We're not mad at them, but we just can't touch them right now, because we need to give scientists and doctors a chance to learn quickly about this illness, and they will learn all about it. And so in the meantime, we're going to talk over FaceTime or Skype and maintain a connection, and you can write letters and do all sorts of other kind of special things without actually seeing

them in person. We're talking to Dr Jamie Howard here on I radio clinical psychologist at the Mind Institute's Anxiety Disorder Center and the director of the center's Trauma and Resilience Service, who's been a leading voice on talking to kids about the coronavirus. With school out, is it best for parents to continue to stick to some kind of

a routine or does that really not matter? Right, So, as much as possible, it's helpful to keep kids on a routine where you have breakfast, lunch, and dinner at the same time. If your school has sent out remote learning instructions, you try to follow those that kind of thing, and then a lot of times parents are working from home right now, I know I am, and I'm really hoping my own kids don't walk in while I'm talking

right now. So we we kind of have to devise the schedule for for grown ups as well to to watch over the kids. Um. And it's going to take a little time. This is still pretty new for everyone and we're all sort of dealing with accepting this still. And I think within a week or so you want to have a routine in place, but take the next few days to think through what's going to work best for your family, and then you'll do the best you can.

It's not necessarily something we're prepared for. So the best you can is the best you can do. What's your parents tell their kids about seeing their friends? Children are used to interacting with friends every day in school and now that's not possible. So again you can, um, you can validate the disappointment, like, I really miss my friends too. Um. It's totally makes sense that you miss your friends and they want to see you just like you want to

see them. Um. So let's think of some other things we can do so that we stay connected to them, and that can be arranging for video calls with friends, similar to parents. It can be um here similar similar to grandparents and ants and extended family. You can make projects and send cards. It's very important that we think of this as physical distancing more than social distancing, and

that we maintain these important connections. We're a social species and we need connection, so we want to maintain that in these creative ways. Right now, what would you suggest parents tell children if they happen to come across some alarming information online, like say a study that says a million people could die from this disease or something along

those lines. Yes, so that's why you want to keep an open line of communication and keep checking in with your child, and also tell them please come to me if you if you read anything or hear anything that's really scary, and I'll talk to you about it and I'll let you know if it's true or not. And so then what you would do is you would say, I don't know that that's true, Let's look at that news source, let's look for more information, and then you

can sort of get the facts with them. We don't want them to be sitting with sensational misinformation for any period of time. So that's why you'll want to really be monitoring them and let them know that it's not a burden to to bring it up. It's always most important for kids to get news from trusted adults rather than from news sources like newspapers and TV shows and whatnot, because, um, they do tend to present things in a more dramatic way.

We're talking to Dr Jamie Howard, clinical psychologist at the Child Mind Institutes Anxiety Disorder Center and the director of the center's Trauma and Resilience Service. Let's talk about social media usage during these unusual times. Do you try to limit it more so than maybe parents already do well. So, on one hand, it's the only way kids can connect right now is virtually, so you want to give them some latitude to connect, which is different than everything we've

always been saying for them. We've always been trying to sort of limit it, but right now we want to encourage them to use some kind of virtual communication. On the other hand, you want to make sure that they're not getting misinformation or dramatized sort of news. Um, So

you've got to strike a balance. I would probably recommend that you talk to older kids who are on social media and say, you know, I think this is important now, so you can stay in touch with your friends, but I want you to know that all the news that might pop up is going to be accurate, and so I want you to come talk to me if you

see anything that's alarming. And I also kind of want to sit down with you for a minute while you look through your Instagram feed just to see, you know, if if you're going to be inundated with stuff about the coronavirus, because our brains need a break from that now. Teenagers older teenagers will definitely not want their parents to sit down and look at it with them, and they're fine, but you can just say to them, you know, simply, it's not good for you to be inundated with this.

Our our brains need a break. So so please let's I'm gonna check in with you. I'm just gonna say, after you know, twenty minutes, Hey, do you do you need a break right now? Because we can get sucked in and then forget to sort of come out of it. Finally, what can parents do to make sure teens and young adults are taking this seriously? Yes, so you you should be in daily contact with your kids right now just

because they need socialization. They can't be isolated um and and still need to hear from their parents and UM I would say like a lot of young adults seem to be taking it seriously if they're if they're in the workforce, because a lot of them have been forced to go home. Teenagers tend to have a bit of

an invincibility about them. That's developmentally normal, um and, so that is something we want to keep an eye on right now, is teenagers who are like, I won't get it, I'll be fine, and that might be true, but this is more about social responsibility, UM. So we want to make sure they understand that and take it very seriously.

Dr Jamie Howard, clinical psychologist at the Child Mind Institutes, Anxiety Disorder Center and the director of the center's Trauma and Resilience Service, a leading voice on talking to kids about the coronavirus. Dr Howard, thank you so much for

your time and expertise. We appreciate it. Yeah, thanks for having me, and of course a big thanks to all of our guests, including Chairman of Medicine at St. Joseph University, Dr Bob Lahita, former counter Terrorism and Community Outreach official and former chief spokesman for the New York City Office of Emergency Management, Jared Bernstein, and Dr Jamie Howard, political

psychologist at the Child Mind Institutes Anxiety Disorder Center. And I'd like to thank all of you for trusting us to provide you with the right information during these unprecedented times. Hopefully our guests were able to answer some questions you might have about this public health crisis and provide you with strategies to deal with any challenge associated with this

coronavirus that may come your way. Also, you can find even more resources on our iHeartRadio app, from daily updates on the outbreak to a breakdown of coronavirus facts first coronavirus Fiction. We appreciate you listening to Coronavirus Explained. I'm Ryan Gorman on iHeartRadio.