NORTH BRABANT

A day earlier, the researchers had already seen the inflection point passing in the province of North Brabant, which is in line with the signals from the hospitals in Brabant that the number of new cases is decreasing. Spain also appears to have passed the inflection point, according to the same calculations.

The researchers substantiate this conclusion with figures from other countries, where they have calculated the same ratio daily. "In Italy around March 24 we saw that this ratio exceeded fifty percent," says Van den Heuvel. "In Italy this meant the actual start of the flattening and we saw new numbers decrease on average."

MEASURES SEEM TO WORK

The researchers were also able to demonstrate that the relative speed with which new infections of the virus have occurred in the Netherlands has decreased since the schools and other public institutions here closed their doors. They saw the same in Italy, Spain, France and Germany. "So it seems that the measures are working," says Van den Heuvel, although he hastens to say that it is very important to continue with the so-called 'intelligent' lockdown and not give the virus a chance to strike back. "We also have to wait and see how the new test policy here in the Netherlands will affect the figures," says Van den Heuvel. “The estimate of the maximum therefore remains somewhat uncertain. As in Italy, this can vary a bit. ”

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