This is also why contact tracing when a virus like this is so prevalent is a complete waste of money. The resources should be used to get more vaccine out there, as quickly as possible.
It's not THAT prevalent. In San Diego 97% of close contacts are traced in 24 hours from a positive test result (so more like 2-4 days), which is undoubtedly helpful, though not as fast as it needs to be. To the extent these things (contact tracing, vaccination) are not competing for the same resources (it's far from clear that they are, as contact tracers have a completely different skill set than those trained for vaccine transport and administration), we should do both. As you have said, we must do everything in our power to crush this virus and stop the spread, to avoid the possibility of escaping mutations emerging (fortunately has not happened - yet). Every single transmission chain that is broken is a win. Every single vaccine administered is a win. We should attempt to walk and chew gum.
nfact, it’s likely the virus was passed on the packing rather than the food. This is why even heating the food may not be sufficient.
Most likely, by far, given an inadequate mask was used, is airborne transmission. N95s are required; cloth masks have relatively low protection for the wearer (
if everyone wears masks, they likely are helpful, since they reduce aerosol production, though data is limited). Just read a paper yesterday showing no significant protection for mask wearers (but note this is 1) only for the person who was infected, 2) the quality of mask was
not assessed, and 3) I find it highly doubtful that masks were actually used at home in most cases even for a "yes" for mask use, where the highest risk of transmission was).
https://twitter.com/DiseaseEcology/status/1357117171369824258?s=20
It's a respiratory virus. Wear a proper respirator. Not saying these other modes of transmission can't happen (food, objects), but for any particular incident one should assume it is from virus that was inhaled (if a full-face respirator
was in use, which it wasn't here, I would suspect food in this case).
(Aside: one of the interesting things from this study is that it shows that age, health status, cardio status, and diabetes status have no statistically significant impact on the risk of becoming symptomatic if you are infected. It confirms what sort of seemed to be the case in my mind - asymptomatic infections are apparently randomly distributed amongst the population. Being super healthy and fit doesn't seem to have a significant impact on whether you end up symptomatic (which was about 45% of the infections in this study). It's very interesting. Obviously GIVEN a symptomatic infection, these factors matter a great deal for your prognosis. Would be really nice to know why half the people who get infected, even if they're super old and weak, show no symptoms, though! It's very odd.)
Here's another little writeup; sort of summarizes some of the prior posts here:
Why You Should Take Any Vaccine