Transmission dynamics of the COVID-19 epidemic in India and modeling optimal lockdown exit strategies
Mohak Gupta, Rishika Mohanta, Aditi Rao, Giridara Gopal Parameswaran, Mudit Agarwal, Mehak Arora, Archisman Mazumder, Ayush Lohiya, Priyamadhaba Behera, Agam Bansal, Rohit Kumar, Ved Prakash Meena, Pawan Tiwari, Anant Mohan, Sushma Bhatnagar
Abstract
decreased from 1·67 on March 30 to 1·16 on April 22. We observed that the delay from the date of lockdown relaxation to the start of the second wave increases as lockdown is extended farther after the first wave peak-this delay is longer if lockdown is relaxed gradually. Aggressive measures such as lockdowns may be inherently enough to suppress an outbreak; however, other measures need to be scaled up as lockdowns are relaxed. Lower levels of social distancing when coupled with a testing ramp-up could achieve similar outbreak control as an aggressive social distancing regime where testing was not increased.