Covid-19 outbreaks infections origin big question limits ability to cope: As the world continues to confront the rise in coronavirus cases, one obstacle continues to undermine countries ' ability to cope with the pandemic: the inability to know where people are being infected.

The pressure on the economy is forcing the authorities to adopt restrictive measures more localized in the most affected places of the country or where there is the greatest risk of spread. The problem is that it is unknown what those places are.

In Germany, authorities say they do not know where 75% of people who currently test positive for the coronavirus were infected. In Austria, the figure is 77%. In Spain, the Ministry of Health said it could only identify the origin of 7% of infections recorded in the last week of October. In France and Italy, only 20% of new cases have been related to people who previously tested positive.

This is what the Wall Street Journal collects, which has spoken with numerous experts who point out that it is very complicated to establish the origin of most infections.

Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at Harvard's T. H. Chan School of Public Health, points to government data from several countries showing that most people are getting infected in their homes. The home, while undoubtedly a driver of infections, probably tops the list because of how difficult it is to track infections that originate elsewhere, assures WSJ.

"We may be putting too much emphasis on what we can track... and not acting on the types of establishments that most likely contribute, but for which the data are not so convincing," he notes.

Covid-19 outbreaks infections origin big question limits ability

A recent report from the Ministry of Health in Spain indicated that infections in our country occur in the social sphere, residences and educational centers

However, the ministry itself recognizes that the data presented in this report do not refer to the total number of confirmed cases, but to those that have been traced to their origin.

For this reason, it recognizes that this information "overdimensions those areas that are better monitored, such as the residences of seniors or educational centers", as well as those outbreaks that occur between people who know each other and for whom it is easier to make the plot.

The difficulty is compounded by a virus that can manifest itself very differently among the patients it has infected and that has an incubation period of several days.

Since some people experience the disease without any symptoms, it can be almost impossible to determine who is the source of an outbreak in some cases.

In addition, interactions in establishments such as bars and restaurants, where many strangers coincide in the same place, also represents a problem for tracking and hospitality is being affected by restrictions during these outgrowths.

In fact, researchers at Stanford University and Northwestern University have used data from the mobile phones of 98 million Americans to model how the virus spread during the first wave of COVID-19 in the spring.

The study, published in the journal Nature last week, showed that restaurants, gyms, hotels, cafes and religious organizations had the highest risk of spreading infections.

Countries are trying to increase their tracking capacity to meet this challenge. In Spain, the military has joined this work and pharmacies are demanding to be able to perform tests in their offices to keep a record of data and collaborate with traceability.

Covid-19 outbreaks infections origin big question limits ability

More news:

Paack closes the largest round of financing in Spain in 2020 by raising more than 44 million euros

Paack, the specialized parcel firm founded in 2015 in Dubai with international capital, has just raised more than 44 million euros in a series C financing round.the company, whose headquarters are located in Barcelona, thus records the largest round in Spain so far this year.

The investment round is led by Bregal Milestone, and the company will allocate the capital raised to accelerate its geographical expansion. At first, Paack's model as a logistics firm relied on city stores as a sort of urban warehouse. Today, the firm has distribution hubs and delivery stations in cities.

A few months ago its co-founder and managing director, Javier Rosales, explained to Business Insider Spain that they already had three new storage facilities planned, one of them in Madrid.

In the round, in addition to Bregal Milestone, the current investors of the company participate: Unbound, RPS Venturs, Rider Global and FuseVentures. Following the round, Jan Bruennler and Rob Hetherington, director and managing director of Bregal Milestone and Milestone performance Partners, will join the company's Board of directors.

This is the first investment that the fund makes in Spain. "We are very pleased to partner with Paack in this next phase of growth: it is a leader in innovation with services such as scheduled delivery and has developed a technology platform unmatched in Europe. E-commerce and home delivery continue to grow, and we believe that Paack is well positioned to capitalize on this great market momentum," says Bruennler himself.

The CEO and co-founder of the company, Fernando Benito, has assured to feel " delighted "and" grateful "both for the entry of Bregal Milestone and for the" continued support " of the current shareholders. "Paack is at an exciting stage as a company, and this investment will allow us to drive growth, expand coverage in Europe, and continue to invest heavily in the development of proprietary technology."

The company was founded at the end of 2015 in Dubai by several Spanish entrepreneurs. They land in Barcelona after reaching an agreement with El Corte Inglés: thanks to the Association, the Spanish retail giant began to offer the distribution of packages and orders in less than 2 hours in several of its cities, as the information then collected.

Today Paack has a presence in 4 European markets. Most of its delivery stations are located in Spanish and Portuguese cities, although it also has several operations in France and the United Kingdom, and many others planned and under construction in these last two countries.

The startup was born at the end of 2015 in Dubai with international capital from Fernando Benito, Xavier Rosales and Suraj Shirvankar. It is one of the fastest growing technology companies in Spain thanks to its technological solutions, which allow it to become a platform for the delivery and delivery of scheduled packages. "It delivers several orders per second with an operational network in more than 60 cities with more than 3,000 professional couriers," they detail in the press release.

Paack today has more than 100 international clients, including 11 of the 15 major retail firms. Its management was strengthened a few weeks ago with the hiring of Google Cloud's former Chief Technology Officer for Europe and the Middle East, Olivier Colinet, who has joined the company as head of Technology and production.