“Quantifying SARS-CoV-2 transmission suggests epidemic control with digital contact tracing” science.sciencemag.org/content/early/… 1/ 
Isolation, contact tracing, and quarantine are proven methods of infection control, but for COVID-19 conventional tracing is too slow. 50% of transmissions happen before symptoms, so the epidemic is always a step ahead. 2/
Because it is near instantaneous, digital contact tracing changes that: if people install an app that ‘remembers’ contacts for them, and those contacts are instantly notified on diagnosis, this cuts a week of the whole process of contact tracing. 3/
Our modelling suggested that digital contact tracing with a middling effectiveness could be really effective, even reversing epidemic spread. 4/
@OxfordViromics and I developed the concept; the paper was a team effort @mishkendall @ChrisWymant @LucaFerrettiEvo Lele Zhao, Anel Nurtay, Lucie Abeler-Dörner, and a key contribution was the summary of thinking on ethical considerations and good governance @michaelethox . 5/
Other groups reached similar conclusions at similar time, notably Singapore with TraceTogether, and Thomas Wiegand and team at Fraunhofer Institute. 6/
NHSX in UK, who lead an amazing portfolio of work in digital solutions in the NHS are in advanced feasibility study. Though the concept is simple, there are very many facets to consider in exploring this as a policy option. 7/
The Norwegian public health institute (FHI) has developed a linked proposal announced earlier . fhi.no/nyheter/2020/u… 8/
The Fraunhofer group have announced EU level solutions. uk.reuters.com/article/us-hea… 9/
These groups have converged on low-energy Bluetooth contacts as being the most reliable and the most privacy preserving whilst still having the desired effectiveness. 10/
Good public health is joined up. Tracing apps need to be linked into public health policy. Such a system needs to guarantee security and privacy, and have oversight to ensure confidence and appropriateness. @michaelethox 11/
We are currently advising ongoing efforts, testing the properties of different tracing algorithms, and exploring detailed individual-based simulations, with help from IBM @IBM_UK_news 12/
As a team we have received many offers from developers and collaborators, each welcomed with gratitude, few responded to properly, sorry. In our view, this is a job for national or international efforts. 13/
We’ll keep the website up to date, and keep disseminating findings as soon as they are ready and tested. Thanks to Lucie Abeler-Dorner, Andrea Stewart and Ana Bulas Cruz coronavirus-fraser-group.org 14/
The current lockdown is necessary and working, but we now have a third of the world’s population in effective quarantine. We urgently need to find ways to resume our livelihoods, and the need is the most urgent in the most vulnerable and in lower income countries. 15/
