Developing COVID-19 Prevention Strategies

The Overview of Disease

• Respiratory infection spread from person to person
• Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)
• 14 days to become symptomatic
• Activity of the virus for a period
• Instant infection due to close contact

The Coronavirus Statistics

• Outbreak of Covid-19 in Wuhan in 2019
• 16 million infected people within 188 countries
• Over 643,800 reported deaths (John Hopkins University, 2020)
• Afflicted individual infects two to eight others
• Men accounting for 60.6 percent of deaths

Process of Infection

• Direct contact with an ill person (Harvard Health Publishing, 2020)
• Large-droplets from sneezes or coughs (Zhang et al., 2020)
• Aerosol transmission in asymptomatic cases
• Droplet transmission suspended in the air
• Touching contaminated surfaces and noses, mouths, faces

Population Demographics – 1

• Vulnerability of the older adults
• The low functionality of various body systems
• Weakness of the immune system
• Over 74.8 percent death rate
• A risk factor in Covid-19

Population Demographics – 2

• Risk for people with underlying medical conditions
• Relative compromised immunity of the body
• At least one condition in 76.4 percent
• Highly susceptible to infections and death
• Seeking medical care quickly and practicing social distancing.

Other Groups in Risk Factor

• Racial and ethnic minorities
• People living in rural areas
• Breastfeeding and pregnant mothers
• Homeless and people with disabilities
• People with a behavioral and developmental disorder

The General Ways to Prevent the Virus

• Contact tracing to identify cases
• Compliance with the rules of social distance (Norwegian Institute of Public Health, 2020)
• Wearing masks in public places (Zhang et al., 2020)
• Usage of hand sanitizers to avoid infection
• Cleaning high-touch areas with bleach, ethanol solutions

Social Control Measures

• The implementation of quarantines
• Travel restrictions for people arriving from high-risk locations
• Correlation between human mobility and COVID-19 incidence
• The separation and observation of potentially infected individuals
• China’s experience of drastic interventions

Social Distancing

• Maintaining a maximum distance from others
• Avoidance of physical contact and mass gatherings
• Focus on slowing the contagious disease spread
• The minimum length of six feet apart
• Transition to remote work and study

Protective Equipment

• Nonsterile disposable patient examination gloves
• Portable gloves in maintaining the hygienic standards
• “Liberal use of masks” in healthcare settings (Asad et al., 2020)
• Respirator against inhaling hazardous airborne particles
• Low availability of protective devices problems.

Importance of Facemasks

• Containment of droplets within the mask
• Preventing transmission
• Preventing from breathing in airborne microorganisms
• Effectiveness of N95 type of masks
• Reserving N95 masks for health workers

Current Initiatives by the US Government

• Educating people to keep precautions
• Advise to use hand sanitizers
• Maintaining physical distance in public places
• Requirement to wear facemasks whereby distancing is not possible
• Encourage people to stay at home

Radical Initiatives by the US Government

• Closing down several public places
• Shut down of schools, malls, and places of worship
• Imposing total lockdowns of cities
• Prohibition for residents to visit crowded places
• Permission to leave house to only those involved in the provision of essential services

The Work Against Covid-19

• Federal government and private sector cooperation
• Fund toward creating awareness and safety

• Enforcing preventing regulations and buying protective equipment
• Ensuring that the public is assured of its safety and health
• Buying and ship essential supplies

The Work of Federal Government

• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• Director of National Intelligence and Food and Drug Administration
• Drug Enforcement Administration Diversion Control Division
• National Institute of Health and White House
• Donating medical equipment of $130 billion (US Department of Health & Human Services, 2020)
• Giving financial assistance over $150 billion (US Department of Health & Human Services, 2020)

The Work of Private Agencies

• Philanthropic organizations and development banks
• Multilateral and bilateral donors
• Providing budgetary help to healthcare structures
• Ensuring patients get the care

• Producing evidence-based guidelines and advice

Chinese Experience

• Treatment protocol for Covid-19 cases
• Laboratory testing and biosafety processes
• Strict containment measures in practice
• Emergency control measures in the epidemic areas
• Integration of resources from multiple systems

Challenges in Coping with Covid-19

• New nature of the virus
• High speed of virus transmission
• Inaccessibility of cure against the virus
• Widespread asymptomatic and presymptomatic transmission
• Limited herd resistance and lack of compliance (Asad et al., 2020)

Unanswered questions

• The measurement of exact success rates
• Data on the comparative effectiveness of prevention strategies
• Information on the long-term outcomes of prevention measures
• The current understanding of social control measures
• The knowledge of behavioral interventions

Conclusion

• Global pandemic of Covid-19
• Address the problem of rapid transmission
• Preventing further spread through new infections
• Creating public health and safety measures
• Importance of the information in the capstone project

Current Strategies or Policies

• Rapid case detection, accelerated testing, detailed contact tracing (Wilder-Smith et al., 2020)
• Hand hygiene, respiratory etiquette, and physical distancing
• Ensuring the continuity of essential health and social care services
• Protecting frontline workers and vulnerable populations
• Healthy People 2020 objective about providing access to healthcare services
• Usage of technologies having applications monitoring circumstance (Elavarasan & Pugazhendhi, 2020)

Non-practicality of Strategies

• Disinfection of air in cities is not sufficient for fighting diseases
• Large amounts of alcohol and disinfectants are potentially harmful to humans
• No evidence of preventing the acquisition by masks (Xiao & Torok, 2020)

New Strategies

• Global cooperation and public awareness rather that legislative changes
• Creating vaccines against Covid-19
• Affirming which populaces remain at the most noteworthy hazard
• Premise for a globally equitable vaccine distribution system
• A global network by G7 countries (Lurie et al., 2020)

Implications

• Active involvement of politicians, nursing groups, and healthcare organizations
• Nurses must receive clear, concise, and up-to-date information
• Adequate access to appropriate PPE (Fernandez et al., 2020)
• Supporting medical attendants in assembly competing family obligations
• The positive physical and mental impact of working

References

Asad, H., Johnston, C., Blyth, I., Holborow, A., Bone, A., Porter, L., Tidswell, P., & Healy, B. (2020). Health care workers and patients as Trojan horses: a COVID19 ward outbreak. Infection Prevention in Practice.

Elavarasan, R. M., & Pugazhendhi, R. (2020). Restructured society and environment: A review on potential technological strategies to control the COVID-19 pandemic. Science of The Total Environment.

Fernandez, R., Lord, H., Halcomb, E., Moxham, L., Middleton, R., Alananzeh, I., & Ellwood, L. (2020). Implications for COVID-19: a systematic review of nurses’ experiences of working in acute care hospital settings during a respiratory pandemic. International Journal of Nursing Studies.

Güner, H. R., Hasanoğlu, I., & Aktaş, F. (2020). COVID-19: Prevention and control measures in community. Turkish Journal of Medical Sciences, 50, 571-577. Web.

John Hopkins University. (2020). COVID-19 dashboard by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE). Web.

Lurie, N., Saville, M., Hatchett, R., & Halton, J. (2020). Developing Covid-19 vaccines at pandemic speed. New England Journal of Medicine, 382(21), 1969-1973.

Xiao, Y., & Torok, M. E. (2020). Taking the right measures to control COVID-19. The Lancet Infectious Diseases, 20(5), 523-524.

US Department of Health & Human Services. (2020). Coronavirus (COVID-19) grant opportunities and guidance.

Wilder-Smith, A., Chiew, C. J., & Lee, V. J. (2020). Can we contain the COVID-19 outbreak with the same measures as for SARS? The Lancet Infectious Diseases. 20(5). 1-6.

Zhang, Y., Zhao, Q., & Hu, B. (2020). Community-based prevention and control of COVID-19: Experience from China. American Journal of Infection Control, 48(6), 716-717.