I don’t think that’s correct. If you look at the graph, the area under the curve is much lower for the city with the later, lower peak. The full area you’re qu

I don’t think that’s correct. If you look at the graph, the area under the curve is much lower for the city with the later, lower peak. The full area you’re quoting seems to say that implementating multiple interventions had an impact, but no single one had an effect if done on its own. Relevant section: > Cities with more early NPIs also had fewer total excess deaths during the study period (Fig. 2 b, Table 2, 1918 total), but this association was weaker: cities with three or fewer NPIs before CEPID = 20/100,000 experienced a median total excess death rate of 551/100,000, compared with a median rate of 405/100,000 in cities with four or more NPIs (P = 0.03). They also noted second waves of infection only occurred once restrictions had been lifted. If we delayed a peak till a vaccine was developed or an existing treatment discovered, we could lower deaths further.