Growing Consensus on How You Catch COVID-19

I'll also be focusing on how we're reopening America. Going through the coronavirus pandemic has been a learning process for both people and governments and how the virus infects someone. But there's finally a growing consensus on how you catch COVID nineteen. Getting sick from touching surfaces or quick encounters is less of a worry than close up person of person interactions for extended periods of time. It's crucial to understand how the virus has transmitted because it informs governments

on the proper ways to reopen economies. We should still be worried about things like concerts and bars. We need to improve ventilation and buildings, and we need to continue to wear those face masks. Betsy McKay, Senior writer at The Wall Street Journal joins us for more on how you catch COVID nineteen. Thanks for joining us, Betsy, thanks for having me right now. We're finally getting to a

consensus about how people actually catch COVID nineteen. When we first started, there was a lot of concern about surfaces. Don't touch things that might be have come in contact with somebody else that might have had it. We're starting to learn that that's a little less worried about that. And the big worry now is these up close person of person interactions for extended periods of time. This is really where they're finding that the transmission is happening. Betsy,

tell us a little bit more about this. Yeah, No, you're absolutely right. When this pandemic first started, I think we all thought, gee, everything's at risk. I can get it anywhere surfaces just breathing the air around me. Now it really does seem like it is, as you said, close up person to person interactions, and that can be a lot of things. You know, um, so crowded events where you have a lot of people. You may have heard the term super spreader event, and and that happens

when there's one infective person. You know, really confined space, maybe talking loudly, and the air the room is poorly ventilated. So these types of things. You know, there's a famous study now, a famous event a church choir rehearsal, where percent of the people who were there actually got infected just from one person being infected, and that scientists believe is because of all the singing. When you sing, you project.

So as we start to learn more about this, it starts to help policymakers figure out okay, what's okay and what's not okay going forward. Yeah, and just a little bit more on that church example that you were talking about, because it's important. All told, fifty three of the sixty one attendees at that practice got infected. But it was a two and a half hour practice. The members of the choir changed places four times, and as you mentioned,

they were tightly packed in their confined space. They were mostly all they're so all they were doing was just kind of playing this musical chairs with each other, continuously spreading that in that one confined space. These are the things that we're worried about. And you mentioned how learning this informs governments on how to reopen. That's why things like concerts going to a bar, even going to the

gym can be a really problematic area. Right. Some people ask where the lockdowns necessary, because we have to lockdown absolutely everything, And the people I've talked to have said, look pretty much yes, for two reasons. One, they didn't know where the dangers were and there was no way to know it at that point. You know, the virus from only five and anths months old or it's only

been spreading five and a half one. The second thing is, um, you just don't know where the next danger is going to come when you've got so many people, for example in New York City who are infective. But now you know, now, while you've got outbreaks all over the country, and it's certainly a huge concern, it's a little less, little less intense. So this will be help going forward, um figuring out you know, what stores should do to reopen or what

you know, but not bars for example. Yeah, and especially you know a bar very cramped, it's kind of loud in there, so what are you going to be doing talking very loudly? And that's gonna you know, enhance the viral particles that are going to be out in the air. There are two large recent studies that showed that the wide scale lockdowns and stay at home orders did prevent millions of infections and debths around the world. Just as you were saying, tell me a little bit about the

attack rate with which this spreads. And then this kind of you know people have heard like the rule. There's this kind of ten eighty rule where the it's an estimated that ten percent of people with COVID nineteen are responsible for about eight of transmissions. So there is this thing called the attack rate, which is the percentage of people who were infected at a given place or time. For examp people at this this church choir rehearsal, which we should say took place in March, when people knew

very little about this virus. So it wasn't you know, people didn't understand their risk when they were coming to this thing. So it's that of the attendees were infected. So so the attack rate um can be very high

in these in these crowded types of events. Also in homes, particularly where you have multi generation multiple generations living many people in a small home, or just other places where people people come together um in you know, have extended exposure to each other in tight quarters or a place that's just poorly ventilated, so you don't have the air circulating and the the virus able to disperse. So this idea that ten percent of the people are responsible for

about eight percent of transmissions. That's from a recent study, and what it's describing are these so called super spreader events where you have um, you know, one person in at a conference. For example, there was a conference in Boston in March. Um this church choir would be another. Certainly the cruise ships um so months ago. These were

also super spurturban. You just have several factors to come together, both environmental and there may be something about that that effected person they speak loudly or where they're standing or whatever, um and and so then you end up getting a lot of people infected at once. The opposite of that is that that means that a lot of people aren't

actually infecting anybody else. If you have a small number of people infecting ten people infecting, ten percent of the infected people infecting more, that means you've got a large number of people who are not infecting either anybody or a very small number of people. And that definitely makes that definitely makes the case for wearing face masks. You know, if if you were talking loudly and you know, spouting out those viral particles, you know, face mask, it's not

gonna stop everything. It is going to help a lot. And you think about transitioning back into the workplace, I mean, this leads me to believe that you know, there will be no more conference rooms. You know, why would you put a lot of people in a small space sitting next to each other and you know, what do you have? You have a speaker, you have people taking turns talking

like that. We've proved that we can do without those now with virtual meetings and whatnot, So that seems like that could be something that goes by the wayside as well. You know, the idea of holding a large event indoors. It's really difficult to justify right now because you never know if somebody's infected, and you know, it's important for everybody to remember that if you're infected, you can start spreading the virus to other people two days before you

show any symptoms yourself. So we actually don't know who's infected in a group of people, either nobody or people who aren't aren't sick yet, So there's a strong argument for masks and for everybody to wear a mask because you don't know if you're infected, and you don't know who around you is infected, and so if you both wear it, it's it's a way to protect everybody and just keep the air clean. You know this this basically, this disease spreads through um it's kind of a gross term,

but respiratory droplets. The virus comes out with spit and there's either little tiny pieces of spit that hang in the air a while, and then there's large pieces that kind of fall to a surface right away. And um. The idea when you get in these consigned spaces, particularly those that aren't well ventilated, that's another thing. Building codes are probably going to have to change. Right Um, when you get you get this sort of build up virus, and that's that's one way you get a lot of

people infected. Yeah, I mean, it's super important to understand how this works so that we can change those policies. As you just mentioned right now, you know, better ventilation systems and buildings probably across the board is what we're gonna end up needing. But you know, learning so much more about this and it's starting to click in my head a little bit why this might be so difficult for some people to go through, because it's almost like a changing of a lifestyle really that we have to

go through in real time right now. You know, we have to adjust the way we've been doing things for so long so that we can limit the spread of this. You know, these person a person encounters. You know, people are so used to this in the workplace and just in their general lives, and we have to kind of moderate how we do that now. You know, you also

want to know where it's safe. One of the things that inspired me to do this story was I was wondering for myself and my faith outside, like could I get it from a passer by, you know, walking on the street, And so I started looking into it, and the answer is, you know, the chances are really low.

It's because because it's just such a fleeting encounter and somebody's passing you by, and your outdoors where the viral particles would disperse pretty quickly and some lay will you help decay it and all that stuff, You're actually pretty safe. So I think it's helpful for people to know, you know, we can't think of ourselves and these total lockdowns forever. I think it's it's economically impossible, it's for the rest of our health, physical and mental health, very very difficult.

And so knowing what you can do and what you really shouldn't do, UM, and that there are things you can do, I think is is really helpful for us as we move forward, knowing that we have a long ways to go before we come out of this. Yeah,

I totally agree. UM. You know, spending that time outdoors, given yourself and your body, that kind of respite from being on that lockdown is so important, and you can at least have a little more confidence now knowing that you're generally safer in that sense, and you know, as you mentioned, you know where to keep away from UH in order to help yourself. So some very good information. Betsy McKay, senior writer at The Wall Street Journal, Thank you very much for joining us. Well, thanks so much

for having me. I'm Oscar Ramirez and this is reopening America. Don't forget day's big news stories. You can check me out on the Daily Dive podcast every Monday through Friday. We'll follow us on I Heart Radio or wherever you get your podcast.