from Hacker News

Denmarks shuts down all schools, daycare facilities, universities, highschools

by mixmax on 3/11/20, 8:26 PM with 158 comments

• by mixmax on 3/11/20, 8:30 PM

  Also, all public sector employees who do not perform critical functions will be sent home on paid leave, and all private companies are recommended to do the same.

  On top of this all public gatherings of more than 100 people is discouraged, and it is alsp encouraged for all bars and nightclubs to keep closed for now. These are expected to be signed into law within the week.

• by JPKab on 3/11/20, 8:42 PM

  Something that I heard from an epidemiologist the other day is how shutting down schools and daycares can be incredibly counterproductive, because such a high percentage of health care workers have children which suddenly are at home and need to be supervised, pulling these workers out of their duties.

  I suppose its ok early on, but seems problematic if enough people eventually get infected.

  Understood that schools are primary transmission vectors.

• by phillipseamore on 3/11/20, 9:25 PM

  Interestingly Iceland, which has most of it's infections from Italy (and the other Alpine countries), designated those countries as areas with high risk of infection long before those countries would admit it, is not looking into these kinds of closures. I understand that they request people not to gather in large groups, on a completely voluntary basis and anyone is free to self-quarantine with pay or benefits.

  The consensus over there is that the disruptions would be worse than an increase in infections. Closing schools and other limits would only delay the infections and they would likely become unmanageable when limits are lifted. The emphasis is on protecting those that are most likely to get seriously sick, and not limiting the number of infections of those that are not at (high) risk. They also consider that if those that have been infected build immunity, it would be better (and I'm paraphrasing) "to just get it over with."

  On Friday they will start testing around the country to get a better understanding of the infection rate, especially whether it's already prevalent in the community. This will be on an unprecedented scale, as they expect to test >2% of the population. The expected result is that the infection is already widely distributed in the community.

• by ksec on 3/11/20, 8:53 PM

  Only days ago, a Denmark university professor openly claimed ( actually more like lashed out ) at Hong Kong people /students over-reacting with CoronaVirus and there is no need to wear masks.

  I guess that didn't age well. Still wish more people have trusted the advice from HK from our experiences with SARS and how to handle information from CCP.

• by laxd on 3/11/20, 8:43 PM

  Norway got more cases than denmark (622 vs 514), and our government is still asleep. The "wait and see" attitude makes shure they are always 3 steps behind.

• by duxup on 3/11/20, 8:45 PM

  It will be interesting to see how these things / if they help.

  The scale of impact and longevity of these shutdowns could be dramatic.

  Keeping kids home certainly restricts what parents can do. Some of whom may be needed to do other things.

  Is there really a lot of good data to know, this will do a thing?

• by kernaussage on 3/11/20, 8:36 PM

  Austria has taken similar measures as well.

• by matsemann on 3/11/20, 8:40 PM

  Most big cities in Norway as well have drastic measures now. No gatherings over 100 people, encouraged to work from home etc.

• by nikolay on 3/11/20, 8:42 PM

  Smart move! Ignoring the best practice of preventing loss of life during pandemics will be a costly mistake!

• by fasicle on 3/11/20, 9:07 PM

  Madrid has also shut all schools and universities as of today, for 2 weeks.

• by Neil44 on 3/11/20, 9:02 PM

  It's my understanding that the UK's reserved response so far is because a 'shut down' is not sustainable for a long time, and we feel that it's not the right time to start yet.

• by lossolo on 3/11/20, 8:37 PM

  Poland is closing too from Monday.

• by aazaa on 3/11/20, 8:49 PM

  All of these shutdowns, especially the large ones recently announced, raise the question: how long?

  How long do we continue and what criteria will be used to begin opening things back up?

  How long before other parts of the economy begin to fail?

• by ultimoo on 3/11/20, 8:38 PM

  I wonder if the US will see a similar shutdown in the coming weeks.

• by interestica on 3/11/20, 9:18 PM

  Did the article previously mention daycare facilities? Not explicitly stated right now.

• by bitL on 3/11/20, 9:00 PM

  About time... They might be able to reduce R0 < 1 and be done with the pandemics in 3-4 weeks. On the other hand, Spain and Germany are going to blow up next week, Italy-style.

• by top_kekeroni_m8 on 3/12/20, 11:45 AM

  Same thing happening in Slovenia on monday.