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Comment by normalnorm | Hacker News Reader

How do you "slowly lift it"?

First you allow all shops to be opened, then few weeks later open public places like gyms, museums etc, another few weeks later you open borders again, even later allow some mass events etc. After every lift you wait at least two weeks to see how much it increases number of new cases and you balance it so that healthcare system does not get overwhelmed.

Once you have large scale testing available, you can do heavy testing in a region to determine the risk, and then you can release quarantine on regions where there are no infections.

Control is much easier if testing is cheap and ubiquitous, and quarantines can start to become a lot more targeted as opposed to widespread.

First open restaurants for lunch. A few days later open them in the evening. Then later again, open bars. Then theaters. Then clubs.

You have plenty of things to lift slowly.

if you look at what happened in china, specific manufacturing hubs were opened first then slowly other core economic areas finally ending with travel restrictions being lifted. the aftermath is that the populace is still fearful of infection so movement is still limited and thus spread of infection is much much lower to almost nonexistant

By lifting the most adversely impacting parts, and monitoring infection on a wide-spread basis while maintaining measures that lower the how contagious it is without negative effects.

> monitoring infection on a wide-spread basis

Temperature checks in every commercial, retail and residential building and mode of public transportation?

> maintaining measures that lower how contagious it is

Masks for all? Expecting 20 sec handwashing vigilance to stay indefinitely? Restaurant tables and desks at work kept meters apart?

I’m wondering what the new normal looks like and how well it will be implemented in western countries.

> Expecting 20 sec handwashing vigilance to stay indefinitely?

This is not the same as the other two. People should wash their hands properly regardless.

You shouldn't only call a cab after going out drinking, only because you know there'll be a checkpoint that night, right?

That may be true, but humans tend to get lax once the immediate crisis is over.

Right, I'm not optimistic that we'll learn the lesson. I hope I'm wrong.

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