05-24-2020, 02:50 PM
(05-24-2020, 01:28 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:(05-24-2020, 01:17 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: What is "R0"?
A medical term for how many people an infected person infects on average. If above one, you get an exponential growth of the disease. If below one, you get exponential containment. The further from one, the greater the speed of growth or containment. Isolation in the form of social distancing, masks, gloves, etc, is one way to lower R0. The population level of the environment is also a large factor. If you are a farmer who is well away from everyone, it is better than being in a prison, nursing home or meat processing plant with infected coworkers.
Sorry. I thought defining the term every time I used it seemed tiring. Still, it is one of the defining terms of the pandemic, along with the chance of death among those infected.
Thanks. I didn't think such a small acronym would be google-able. But I found it, and it means "Reproduction number." R stands for Reproduction. The "0" is often a subtext, and I guess it just means a number.