Study by ICMR suggest one COVID positive can infect 406 people

NEW DELHI: A recent study by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has found that a novel coronavirus infected person can infect 406 people in 30 days if preventive measures like social distancing and lockdown are not implemented, said Union Health Ministry on April 7.

Lav Aggarwal, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Health said, with preventive measures implemented the chances of spreading of virus from one person to other has reduced to an average of just two and a half person per infected patient in period of 30 days.

Referring to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) study, Agarwal said the current ‘R0’ or R naught for the coronavirus infection is somewhere between 1.5 and 4.

‘R0’ is a mathematical term that indicates how contagious an infectious disease is. It tells the average number of people who will catch a disease from one infected person.

“If we take the ‘R0’ to be 2.5 then one positive person can infect 406 people in 30 days, if the lockdown and social distancing measures are not in place, but if social exposure is reduced by 75 per cent then that one sick person will only be able to infect only 2.5 persons,” Agarwal said, highlighting the importance of the ongoing 21-day lockdown and social distancing.