“going into [stage] three, monitoring changes in the rt (i.e., the effective reproductive number) is particularly important,” he says. “this is the number of infections attributed to one individual. ideally, we would like rt to drop when we enter phase three but any number less than 1.0 is tolerable. personally, i’d like to see this number at 0.7 for a prolonged period of time.”
imgrund, who is monitoring the rt value in all 34 ontario regions on twitter everyday, says ontario should be striving to keep all metrics green — which is a low transmission rate — but it may slip into yellow temporarily as numbers will likely increase with reopening.
“if three weeks after opening a region is green, things are coming along well,” he says. “we just need to try and tame them.”
the rt value offers a snapshot into transmission rate. rt value should be below 1 and all metrics should be green for three weeks after each stage of re-opening. biostatistician ryan imgrund monitors all 34 ontario regions on twitter.
@imgrund/twitter
keep wearing masks but skip the gloves
of ontario’s 34 public health units, 26 have
implemented mandatory masks
. it’s especially important that we continue to follow these protocols — unless there is an age or medical exemption — as it’s been shown if, 80 per cent of the population wears a face covering, that could be enough to keep the rt value under 1.
“it’s also important to remember that my mask protects you and your mask protects me,” says imgrund. “social distancing is still necessary even when masks are being worn. it may be difficult to wear a mask in places like a gym, but the difficulty in wearing them is exactly why we need to.”
6 minute read
