08/05/2020

Tiago Pereira advocates for decentralized quarantine.

There has been much discussion about the ideal strategy in the fight against the new coronavirus. Mathematician Tiago Pereira, from ICMC-USP, suggests the creation of a decentralized quarantine model. In the webinar “Mathematics in times of crisis” , promoted this Friday (8) by IMPA, the researcher defended the strategy of having more and less rigid isolations in each location, taking into account the particularities of the health networks and the evolution of the disease in the states and cities.

“The evolution of the disease in cities does not occur simultaneously. While the city of São Paulo had practically 80% of the state's cases at the beginning of Covid-19 in Brazil, the interior of the state was free from this problem. By creating a synchronized distancing protocol, we ended up generating much larger quarantines than they needed to be,” he explained.

Moderated by journalist and coordinator of the Bori Agency, Sabine Righetti, the debate also included the participation of the general director of IMPA, Marcelo Viana, and Luciano Irineu, a researcher at the institute. The mathematicians presented insights on social isolation and the economy during the crisis.

Luciano Irineu, a specialist in mathematical economics, stated that Brazil's biggest post-pandemic economic challenge will be public debt. According to calculations presented by the researcher, the primary deficit is projected to jump to R $ 680 billion with the benefits and spending approved by the federal government, an amount representing 9.5% of GDP.

The webinar marked the closing of #NationalMathematicsWeek, organized by IMPA. The virtual program, with live streams on Instagram and the webinar on YouTube, was followed by more than seven thousand people. In addition to marking National Mathematics Day, celebrated on May 6th, the debates addressed the importance of science in confronting the pandemic.

“We are experiencing a crisis on a planetary scale and, at the same time, an unprecedented scientific effort to confront it,” Viana pointed out in the webinar, adding that the epidemic reminded society of the important role that science plays. In his presentation, he addressed the interaction between mathematics and the development of computing in the context of World War II. “Scientific advances are often catalyzed by crisis situations,” he noted.