Pandemic - A Runaway Reaction

Here are some thoughts about the pandemic that we as engineers, particularly chemical engineers, can relate to. These are like runaway reactions that need to be contained by all possible means before they can result in loss of containment. As we all know that loss of containment in a reactive system can cause significant damage to the facilities and potentially to the employees and communities. We know from experience that we take all necessary steps to avoid and arrest the runaway reactions and not worry about the production. That's the reason for our pandemic experts and emergency response teams are telling all of us to stop the reactive chain of pandemic. This is going to be a tough task given the size and complexity, it does require individuals to be fully involved and responsive to the needs of the times.
Once the dust settles, we will need to assess the impact before getting things started towards the road to normalcy. Again, like in a runaway situation we look at the mechanical integrity of the system and we reevaluate the procedures before restarting so that we can avoid another situation where we can avoid the conditions that result in a runaway in first place and recur.
We, as individuals and companies/businesses, have to do our part to deal with this pandemic and there will be a time to look back and assess lessons learned to make the systems more robust and resilient.