In a new study, researchers found that rates of mortality from COVID-19 are lower in areas where public health measures aimed at preventing the spread of the disease were implemented earlier in the outbreak.
The research was conducted by a team from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.
In the study, the team analyzed data from 50 countries in Europe on COVID-19 mortality.
They compared the date when each country reported reaching its first 100 confirmed cases with its overall COVID-19 mortality rate.
The date of reaching 100 cases was used because it is a good indicator of the virus reaching community circulation.
The team found that countries that reached 100 cases sooner also had higher mortality rates.
The European countries that experienced the earliest community circulation of COVID-19 suffered the worst consequences in terms of mortality.
In Europe, most countries put containment measures such as closures of schools and nonessential businesses and bans on nonessential travel by mid-March 2020. Some cities were placed under lockdowns.
The World Health Organization first reported human-to-human transmission of the virus on January 22, 2020.
For their analysis, the researchers calculated how many days it took (after January 22) for each country in Europe to reach 100 cases.
They compared the countries that reached 100 cases in less than 50 days with those that took longer than 50 days.
Beyond mortality rates, the total incidence of the disease was higher and the overall life expectancy was lower in the countries that reached 100 cases in less than 50 days.
Putting measures into place even a few weeks earlier could have dramatically reduced the amount of virus circulating in the community.
The findings showed that efforts to delay the early spread of the virus may have saved an average of 30 deaths daily per 1 million inhabitants.
The study may inform the response to the pandemic moving forward.
One author of the study is Yan Yan Wu, an associate professor of biostatistics.
The study is published in PLOS ONE.
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