Mass global effort is required to fight COVID-19. When the WHO declared a global health emergency on 30 January 2020, 7,818 people in 19 countries and territories had contracted the novel coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2.
By
ANDREAS YOGA PRASETYO
·6 minutes read
Kompas/Wawan H Prabowo
A staffer of the Attorney General’s Office (right) takes records of the people queuing at the Covid-19 rapid test drive-through on Thursday (23/4/2020) on Jl. Panglima Polim in South Jakarta. The free rapid test was provided for taxi and ojek (motorcyle taxi) drivers, as well as for pedestrians. Puskesmas (community health centers) and hospitals in South Jakarta, including the AGO’s Adhyaksa hospital, provided their health workers to conduct the test.
Mass global effort is required to fight COVID-19. When the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global health emergency on 30 January 2020, 7,818 people in 19 countries and territories had contracted the novel coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2.
Cases increased to 118,139 when WHO declared COVID-19 a pandemic on 11 March 2020. Seven weeks later, confirmed cases surged. This is why a global cooperation to prevent the spread, treatment for patients and finding vaccines is important.
Spread prevention and patient treatment strategies require data availability of COVID-19 cases from all countries. Specifically for COVID-19 data availability, the WHO requests all countries provide seven types of data.
China had assumed asymptomatic carriers to have low risk of spreading the disease and had not included them in the confirmed cases figure
The data include updated number of cases, deaths, patients in treatment, recovered patients, tested people, age range of new cases and gender proportion of new cases. These seven data types are input to determine patterns of COVID-19 spread.
Furthermore, there is a new wave of COVID-19 spread in the pandemic, namely asymptomatic carriers. South China Morning Post reported on 1 April 2020 that China authorities had announced 1,367 asymptomatic COVID-19 confirmed cases.
Previously, China had assumed asymptomatic carriers to have low risk of spreading the disease and had not included them in the confirmed cases figure. These asymptomatic carriers, found through contact tracing of confirmed cases, had been quarantined and then released if they did not show any COVID-19 symptoms.
Medical staff treat a COVID-19 coronavirus patient at a hospital in Wuhan, in China\'s central Hubei province on March 19, 2020. - China on March 19 reported no new domestic cases of the coronavirus for the first time since it started recording them in January, but recorded a spike in infections from abroad.
Close contact
Considering the risk factors, there are at least three data groups of persons most at risk of contracting COVID-19, namely patients under surveillance (PDP), persons under surveillance (ODP) and asymptomatic carriers (OTG). These three groups have had close contact with people with COVID-19.
Close contact here means physical contact or being in the same room as people with COVID-19 between two days before symptoms appear and 14 days after.
Identifying close contact is part of a COVID-19 case investigation. This identification process can be carried out on people who are alive or have died. In the latter case, identification can help determine the cause of death and whether COVID-19 may have been it.
During the contact identification phase, people in contact with the case between two days before symptoms appear and 14 days after. This can include all persons who share the same close spaces with
the people with COVID-19, such as work colleagues, household members, classmates or schoolmates and people in meetings.
People who are in touch with confirmed cases, both at home and at healthcare facilities, can also be included. They all have close contact with the confirmed case. Referring to WHO data availability guideline, close contact data categories ideally also include full identities, age range and gender proportion.
Data tracing
Human-to-human transmission risk factors demand countries to implement quicker and more effective ways to prevent and mitigate COVID-19. WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urges all countries to continue with mass testing, especially for people suspected to have COVID-19. Without testing, COVID-19 cases cannot be isolated and the chain of transmission can never be cut.
Moreover, he said that the action is part of the collective response on the COVID-19 pandemic. Mass testing will accelerate finding of cases. When confirmed cases are detected, they can be isolated and it will help cut the spread. Local authorities can also conduct contact tracing from confirmed cases.
Contact tracing can be carried out to collect patients’ data. Other than patients’ identities, international travel history, family members and a list of persons in contact with the patient can be gathered at the start of the tracing process.
From such information, state authorities can observe the pattern of spread and keep watch over epicenters. Eventually, contact tracing efforts can be followed by quarantines or strict social distancing as the key of COVID-19 mitigation.
The COVID-19 control and prevention guideline published by the Health Ministry disease control and prevention directorate general on 23 March 2020 explained the danger of human-to-human COVID-19 spread.
The disease spreads through sneeze or cough droplets and is not airborne. The publication also cited that people at the most risk of getting infected are those in close contact with confirmed cases, including those caring for COVID-19 patients.
FABRICE COFFRINI / AFP
World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus talks during a daily press briefing on COVID-19 virus at the WHO headquaters in Geneva on March 11, 2020. - WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced on March 11, 2020 that the new coronavirus outbreak can now be characterised as a pandemic.
Increase
COVID-19 data availability is also required to map the risk of COVID-19 spread. The risk of COVID-19 spread increases after it was confirmed that the virus could spread between humans. The first human-to-human transmission was confirmed by China’s National Health Commission on 20 January 2020.
Two confirmed cases in Guangdong contracted the disease form a family member who recently visited Wuhan. Other than that, 14 medical workers treating COVID-19 patients in Wuhan also contracted the virus.
It was then found that human-to-human transmission also occurred in South Korea. The South Korean government confirmed its first COVID-19 case on 20 January 2020. The disease first spread from a church community in Daegu. South Korea’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said that 309 patients were confirmed to have been linked with the Daegu case.
Reports of human-to-human transmission then emerged in Indonesia. Data on the websites COVID19.go.id and kawalCOVID19.id show that there were 450 cases and epicenters in 16 provinces as of 21 March 2020.
Several of these human-to-human transmissions were traceable, such as Case 2. Case 2 was confirmed to have COVID-19 after it contracted the disease from a Japanese person at a restaurant in South Jakarta on 14 February 2020. In later interactions, Case 2 spread the disease to two other people, including its parent.
KOMPAS/INSAN ALFAJRI
Three Covid-19 patients who have recovered, namely Cases 1, 2, and 3, were discharged from RSPI Sulianti Saroso, Jakarta, Monday (16/3/2020). According to them, people do not need to panic facing Covid-19 because the disease can be overcome by increasing endurance and a healthy lifestyle.
Data monitoring
Among the reasons the WHO declared COVID-19 as a pandemic was its rapid spread. As of 29 April 2020, 3,136,052 COVID-19 cases had been reported in 210 countries and territories.
By declaring a COVID-19 pandemic, it is hoped that all countries will implement serious steps to control the spread. Curbing COVID-19 spread is a strategy to reduce the number of COVID-19 cases.
Cutting COVID-19 spread will reduce the risk of people contracting the disease. This will hopefully give enough time for health authorities in all countries to prepare facilities and provide the correct treatment for COVID-19 patients.
Strategies to reduce COVID-19 spread must be continuously implemented until COVID-19 spread is finally cut. Integrated data monitoring, including on testing, contact tracing, contact identification and spread patterns, is a concrete step to curb the disease’s spread.
These steps must also be accompanied by continuous surveillance, including on OTGs, PDPs and ODPs. Through continuous data management, it is hoped that COVID-19 spread can be stopped. In turn, socioeconomic impacts will hopefully be minimized.
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