Do the measures work, or is it luck that you haven’t caught Covid?

[Alexapourmewine]

Just that really...

Do the masks, distancing, ventilation all really work?

Is it just pure luck that you haven’t caught it, or is it that you haven’t actually been In contact with a positive case.

SO many people I know who have tested positive, swear they don’t know how they caught it.
Swear that they’ve distanced, worn a mask, washed hands etc, but still caught Covid.

So do the measures actually work?

It raises the question, is Covid in the air? Or do you have to have been around a positive person?

I teach in a large secondary school and think the measures must make a difference or I would have had it by now.

I have had a couple of kids in my form test positive (prior to Xmas) but I had maintained a 2m+ distance so didn't need to isolate. Never caught it.

Some kids in other classes were close contacts of positive cases -again, I never caught it.

A colleague worked in school with me the week after Christmas and although we maintained a 2m distance, we were often in the same room. He got it and I was convinced I'd get it. Never did.

Just before the first lockdown, my Nan was in hospital for 10 days. I was going every day, when folk weren't wearing masks, into a hospital that had cases. Again, never caught it. Her last 4 days were spent back in her own home -I was there pretty much constantly with GP/various nurses coming. Never caught it.

I have to say, I am surprised but I wear a mask/handwash/social distance where possible.

Bit of luck, bit of the fact that I don’t go anywhere other than the supermarket (and the odd local shop) to catch it. I work from home and have throughout, have followed the rules in respect of socialising and nearly everything I’ve done had been outdoors. Did visit some restaurants last summer but they were really good at distancing etc.

It’s luck. I work in a school where quite a few children, parents and staff caught it, and I didn’t. Despite being in close contact with two people who were in the contagious period right before developing symptoms.

I wonder if it's something to do with it being able to infect some types of people more than others. It doesn't make sense that some people don't catch it whilst sleeping next to their partners who are positive etc.
My Mums boyfriend had it, but she never caught it, yet people are catching it without really going anywhere. Not sure what would make a virus able to infect one person and not another but it puzzles me how it can cause such a massive pandemic yet some people just don't catch it when around it enough, that you'd think they would

I think it must be equal measures of luck and precautions. Me and my wife (my wife and I?) spent a week doing extended visiting to a Covid patient in an open Covid ward, we took reasonable precautions and self isolated, but had no ill effects

It is very strange. One family of four I know all had positive antibody tests a month ago yet none of them recall being ill since last March.

A lot of people I know have a theory that the people who are following the rules to the letter and isolating as much as possible are actually making themselves more vulnerable, as many people doing this inexplicably go on to catch it.

The ones carrying on shopping regularly etc and going to places where there are quite a lot of other people are maybe getting exposed to all the other bugs normally around, that the majority of people would be exposed to in normal circumstances, making their immune systems typically robust.

The people leading very safe and more isolated lives than usual would perhaps have a more weakened immune system as a consequence, and could be much more likely to catch Covid (or develop symptoms) on the rare occasions that they do venture out.

I don’t think the measures can work that well given that around 25% of the population have had covid on recent estimates and that there doesn’t seem to be much pattern to measures taken and covid rates in different countries.

Some people seem to have natural t-cell immunity despite not having had covid before. That probably explains why the infection rate within a household is only 50%.

We know that some people are superspreaders who can infect hundreds of people and some covid positive people infect no one else. I wonder if this adds an element of randomness which makes covid so difficult to control I.e masks and 2m distancing don’t work well against superspreaders.

I also suspect that the sort of masks people are wearing do very little if you are in close proximity to someone all day. This is what the government said initially and SAGE has always been lukewarm on masks. The Western countries which have embraced masks don’t seem to have done any better for it though that may be because masks have been used as a justification to open things - so Spain couldn’t economically cope with the length of lockdown seen elsewhere so opened up more with masks as mitigation.

So far as I know there is still very little evidence of fomite transmission being a significant issue so hand sanitisation and cleaning probably makes minimal difference. I think sometimes businesses have embraced this because it is easy.

There is good evidence for decreased transmission outside so I can believe good ventilation is helpful though air flow is probably a bit unpredictable.

It’s luck in that when DS was still going to school before Christmas, he was inevitably in contact with the other children in his bubble, but didn’t catch it or bring it home, and luck in that when we hosted Christmas for the permitted number of people (parents and sisters) no one brought it here. It’s luck that when DH was in northern Italy last March, in a city that went into lockdown the day after he left, he didn’t get it.

But very much not luck in that we have strictly kept every rule, hand sanitised all the time, worn a mask, not seen anyone outside the household apart from briefly outdoors in months, only waved at our parents over the gate while dropping groceries, only really leave the house for exercise within 5k or grocery shopping at quiet times etc etc.

people who are following the rules to the letter and isolating as much as possible are actually making themselves more vulnerable

One of the possibly important things with any virus is viral load, so someone who encounters a small amount of the virus will be able to develop antibodies, possibly without any signs of illness, but someone who has remained in a more controlled environment might never develop this resistance

@NailsNeedDoing

It’s luck. I work in a school where quite a few children, parents and staff caught it, and I didn’t. Despite being in close contact with two people who were in the contagious period right before developing symptoms.

How do you know you weren't asymptomatic? Were you tested daily?

A lot of people I know have a theory that the people who are following the rules to the letter and isolating as much as possible are actually making themselves more vulnerable, as many people doing this inexplicably go on to catch it. A lot of people have 'theories' about all sorts of stuff but this is nonsense, there's no evidence for this. Best thing is to avoid entirely until vaccinated, next best thing is a mild case (low viral load), worst thing is a heavy case.

@chessie678

Everything you say sounds eminently sensible to me.

Some people definitely had higher degrees of immunity . It was never the case that we were all equally susceptible. But the government had to maintain that stance to get people to follow the rules, because there is no way of telling who.

Aerosol transmission seems responsible for most super spreading events, so masks do very little (if anything).

You are most likely to catch it in a confined space with an infected (likely symptomatic) person for a longer period of time. Hospitals and care homes being highest risk. I have to think work would also be high, unless you can all distance massively.

Places where you are just downright unlucky to catch it would be the supermarket or outdoors.

I got the flu around October time and was in bed for 2 days, bad for a week....... looking back, it could have been COVID..........

Been seeing the in-laws weekly for lunch etc and they were ok, so who knows............

I think there might be genetic differences in susceptibility. Some people don’t seem to catch it despite multiple exposures (e.g. working on Covid wards with minimal PPE).

How do you know you weren't asymptomatic? Were you tested daily?

When I was notified that I had to quarantine (with only three days left to go because T&T is so effective ), I lied about having symptoms and got a test.

That admission might open me up to criticism but that’s fine by me, I’ve never agreed with how strict the testing criteria was. I was in a support bubble with someone more vulnerable and I wanted to know.

It is my understanding that some people have some kind of T cell immunity due to exposure to other viruses. There was also a suggestion that some blood groups are more susceptible to it than others. I guess in the same way people come into contact with flu and other things not everyone is actually going to get it. I really wish there was more studies into this stuff.

It's a bit of both I reckon.

Hygiene, distancing, masks, coughing into your elbow, etc are bound to stop some spread of germs.

But a lot of it will of course be down to luck. Someone in my household caught it despite following all guidelines, must have simply been in the wrong place wrong time, nobody else in the household caught it however despite sharing one bathroom.

I think a bit of both. I caught it, the only place I could have got it is through my toddler who attends nursery, literally haven't been anywhere else. On the other hand, my best friend is a primary school teacher who has been working in a high infection area throughout the whole pandemic and has managed to avoid it. Certainly seems like bad luck that I caught it!

No real idea. I do wonder if masks make any difference though (or at least the kind of masks most people are wearing)? The data doesn’t show a drop in numbers since masks became widespread, if anything, the opposite.

Some people appear to have natural immunity. There are many examples of close contacts not getting it.

I expect in time we’ll figure all this out. It may be that some of our measures have been counterproductive. It’s already appears that ‘hands, face, space’ is the wrong way round, for example.

We had no cases in the school I work in September-December. That's luck.

We've had 5 cases since Christmas. 3 were completely isolated cases and 2 were siblings in different year groups. No one caught it from those 5 children. That's the measures (less people in, distancing, ventilation) working.

As far as I know I've not had it, unless I had it last March when I had a slightly weird lurgy for a few days with a tight chest.

I work from home, have generally stayed outside in pub gardens when we were allowed to eat in pubs, get in and out of supermarkets as quickly as possible and exercise outside with friend(s) depending on the rules at the time. I went swimming (inside) a few times when it was allowed.

DH also works from home and DS was at college but they had very few cases so nothing for him to bring home.

So I've been low risk.

I work in a care home, few of the staff have had it but none of the residents. We wear masks all the time at work and the usual other ppe.

Hard to know, but I'm an essential worker and having been in every day, travelling by bus since this began. My kids have been mostly home from school though. I feel a bit lucky I think. If you'd told me last 8th March when Leo made his dramatic announcement on tv (I'm in Ireland) I thought it was an inevitability that I would get it. I felt terrified, like we were going to war with a virus and it would be like the plot of contagion (and there are parallels I know! but the survival rate for this one is 99.5%)

I live alone, WFH. I had it and I had no contacts to give to test and trace as hadn’t been near anyone. Don’t know anyone who I had been remotely near in the previous week (was before November lockdown) who has had it. I would love to know how/who I caught it from though, just out of interest really as I wore masks and hand sanitised etc religiously!

Before masks became mandatory, they were saying that czech republic and slovakia had done better than we had because right from the get go they made masks mandatory. Obviously new strains came out but at the beginning, all strains being equal, it was reported that their volume of cases was much lower than in countries where only medical staff wore masks.

Could have been other reasons though.