The timing and rules for a return to normal, or re-opening the economy, is a Risk Management problem. Really surprised more leaders don’t use that term. There is no such thing as 100% safe. There is no such thing as being certain no one else will ever get sick or die from COVID-19.
But know this: You cannot control what you cannot measure. That’s just a fact. And if your metric for measuring COVID-19 spread is how many people go to a hospital sick, that’s a lagging indicator and you’re always 2 weeks behind the problem. You measure with widespread, reliable testing. That will enable intelligently managing a relaxation of restrictions to achieve some new normal.
Notice I said a NEW normal. Not the old normal. Testing alone cannot get you there.
Life will not, cannot, return to our previous version of normal until there is a vaccine. No reputable medical or scientific expert has said this will ‘just go away’. They’ve said the opposite. Polio didn’t ‘just go away’, nor did Yellow Fever, nor SmallPox, etc. If social behaviors return to the previous version of normal without a vaccine, death rates will not be the previous normal. Work force absentee rates will not be normal. And so on. And so on. It’s impossible to return previous normal without an effective vaccine.