Are states doing well against Covid? Criticism and proposals of a former Apple top manager
Vaccines are essential but they are only one piece of a more complex puzzle. Eradicating Covid will not be easy (and perhaps not even fast), which is why it is time to tackle a 21st century virus with 21st century tools. Word of Myoung Cha, former head of Apple Health's strategic initiatives
Myoung Cha was in charge of Apple Health's strategic initiatives for about six years until last May when he definitively left the Cupertino giant to become president and Chief Strategy Officer of Carbon Health, a startup active in the field of first aid.
In particular, at Apple he led the development and launch of several products and research initiatives, including a notification system on exposure to Covid in collaboration with Google. His role also included agreements with governments and important companies related to the world of health.
Here's what you think about the strategies implemented, or not implemented, by governments to fight the pandemic.
THE THESIS OF CHA
The sudden increase in Covid cases linked to the rapid spread of Omicron led Cha to return to a reflection : "Public health agencies have not fully grasped the power of technology as a way to massively increase more traditional NPIs [non-pharmaceutical interventions , or public health measures that aim to prevent and / or control the transmission of Covid in society, ed ] ".
At first the mistake, according to Cha, was in thinking that the "experts" had all the answers, while the notification system was an "unproven" technology that no one had validated before.
THE OBSTRUCTIONISM OF GOVERNMENTS
When the project of the notification system on exposure to Covid was proposed to several governments, they preferred other systems that did not care about privacy as, instead, Apple and Google had done.
THE CASE OF SINGAPORE
Cha in his tweets brings the case of Singapore, where the government had ensured that the data collected with the TraceTogether app would only be used to trace contacts during the pandemic and instead ended up in the hands of the police who also used them for investigations penalties.
THE APPLE AND GOOGLE SYSTEM
Exposure notification technology from Google and Apple, Cha explained, unlike other government-favorite apps does not allow for centralized collection by local authorities. Singapore rejected their system saying it would be "less effective".
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN COUNTRIES
The expert then noted how "surprisingly, the United Kingdom and Europe have been the most progressive, coordinated and decisive in the use of technology", while, at least at the beginning, the United States preferred to set up call centers. to search for contacts and subsequently a federal approach was still lacking.
The UK, on the other hand, has released data showing that Apple and Google's system worked to dampen last winter's wave.
VACCINES ARE NOT EVERYTHING
Vaccines have certainly saved thousands of lives but, as Cha recalled in a tweet, “it's time to bring 21st century tools and technology to a 21st century virus. Vaccines are a piece of the puzzle, but we should deploy every tool at our disposal –N95 masks [Ffp2, ed ], boosters, quick tests and yes, even exposure notifications ”.
In fact, the notifications would allow people to immediately check if they are positive through a test and possibly to isolate themselves by interrupting the chain of contagion.
THE FORECAST OF CHA
"While one should always hope for the best, it is a collective failure of the imagination not to be prepared for the worst," wrote Cha , who thinks we could only be at the beginning of a decade under the sign of Covid because for now despite many experts have repeatedly announced that we were close to the end which then raised false hopes.
And the fact that there are still too many people in the world who have not received the vaccines means that there is a breeding ground for the virus that will continue to mutate. Not only. Even if Omicron or future variants were to be less serious, according to Cha we should not underestimate the aftermath that will leave the long Covid , of which the long-term implications are not yet known. Which is why he says he fears that Covid will never be "just a flu".
In addition to this, our habits will also change. For example, traveling by plane for years could mean taking tests and always wearing a mask. “I paint this scenario – wrote Cha – not to increase our fears, but to urge our politicians to think of longer-term solutions. The short-term solutions may make sense if the end of Covid is 'around the corner', but they may not live up to what is needed to bring normalcy back into our lives ”.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/sanita/gli-stati-stanno-operando-bene-contro-il-covid-critiche-e-proposte-di-un-top-manager-apple/ on Mon, 27 Dec 2021 14:33:54 +0000.