R value
- August 3, 2020
- Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
- Category: DPN Topics
No Comments
Subject: Science and tech
Context:
R value has fallen below 1 in Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai, for the first time since the novel Coronavirus outbreak began in India in March
Concept:
- R0 or reproduction number tells you the average number of people who will contract a contagious disease from one person with that disease
- R-naught is a frequently used mathematical metric to estimate how contagious an infectious disease can be. It can help in making projections for the number of people likely to be affected by such a disease and is often used to decide on the kind of policy interventions required to halt the epidemic.
- A less than one value for R-naught would mean that disease would not take the form of an epidemic. Any value more than one indicates an exponential rise in the number of patients.
- R-naught is also a dynamic metric, and is sensitive to the kind of interventions made to contain the spread.