Growth Of Coronavirus Cases In Pakistan Do We Have Enough Hospital Beds Available?
The number of Coronavirus cases grow exponentially, and a crude rule suggests it doubles every six days if we do not avoid regular contact with people and have low natural immunity. The goal of isolation, lockdown, and social distancing is to reduce the transmission of the infection. All depends on how well people follow the protocols. By following the protocols, we can flatten the curve. In Pakistan all education institutions and many offices were closed on March 13. After six days, (the figures for which came out on March 20), the actual numbers should have been less than double if we were following the protocol. Since all the figures for March 13 are not available, we cannot ascertain the exact trend for an earlier day but following the same six-day rule of the thumb, we have a look at the numbers coming out on March 26. Table 1 shows that the total active cases on March 26 stand at 1165, as against the 974 predicted on the doubling rule. The Forecast Error shows Sindh and Balochistan to be observing some level of the protocol while the Federal area, Punjab, KPK and Gilgit Baltistan being reluctant to follow the protocols to protect from COVID-19.