# Covid-19

## Covid school modelling

Looking at the impact of different test, trace and isolation protocols.

BC schools are about to restart, and there is a high level of anxiety among parents and teachers. In this post we will outline some common concerns, and run modelling adapted from the University of Washington network-based model to test the relative effectiveness of various test, trace, and isolate (TTI) scenarios. Cases in schools There will be cases at schools. Quebec already has over 180 schools with reported cases, Ontario had over 7 on their first day of school.

## Covid Series 3 Survey

A quick tour through Covid series 3 survey data.

I was browsing the Canadian Perspectives Survey Series 3 on Resuming Economic and Social Activities During COVID-19 and thought that some of the results were interesting. I don’t have time to do a detailed post on this, but thought that others might enjoy a quick series of graphs highlighting some of the result. The survey is only released as microdata, and I have not seen much uptake or reporting other than the high-level results put out by StatCan in The Daily.

## On mixing covid-19 and census data

Doing this with Canadian data is a tall order. But since people are doing it, we might as well explain some of the ins and outs.

Mixing census data with COVID-19 case and mortality data seems like an obvious thing to do when trying to understand how COVID-19 affects different groups. But it’s only of very limited use. COVID-19 data is only (openly) available on coarse geographies and can only be matched at the ecological level. Deriving individual level relationships from this is extremely ambitious. At best, it can inform decisions on what individual level data should be collected moving forward.

## COVID-19 data in Canada, effective reproduction rates

A follow-up on what data we need.

We have written about the situation of covid-19 data in Canada previously, and the need for good data is becoming more pressing as we are poised to slowly open up some of our restrictions and need to closely monitor how the spread of COVID-19 is responding. A key number to watch is the effective reproduction rate, the average number of people an infected person passes on the virus ($R_0$). Our collective social distancing has led to the effective reproduction rate to drop below 1, so the spread of the virus is receding.