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On April 19 2020 22:38 Vivax wrote: Swedens curve looks good for a country that didn't go nuclear on the measures. IE: The curve is more or less flattening by itself.
With a >10% death rate and a low number of tests, I’d say it’s more likely they dropped the ball on testing than that they flattened the curve. That data looks just... too good to be true.
It's not dropping the ball on testing if you don't even try to (or you simply can't) test people that don't need hospital care. Also last week testing actually increased (but reported cases stayed the same).
That sounds exactly like dropping the ball on testing. Either you fail to catch the spread by not testing people who are spreading it, or you don't procure enough tests to be able to do so. Both situations would lead to a low number of confirmed cases relative to the death rate, which seems to be the tell-tale sign of an infection that is poorly contained.
I don't know if you have a nice and cozy rock home that you have been living under for the past couple of weeks but the only reason that people are paying attention to Sweden is because we are one of the few countries that have explicitly gone with a strategy of not trying to contain the spread. "Poorly contained" is probably the understatement of the week. Instead we are focusing on non binding recommendations, partial shutdowns and other less invasive limitations to limit the spread to below what our up-scaled healthcare can handle.
Mass testing is completely useless in that strategy and was not even attempted. Other metrics where you test people are useful (such as properly done studies based on random sampling) and are used. So tests are used strategically for knowing if patients are going to corona wards or not, testing personal etc. There are still no current plans on general testing for people with mild symptoms, and I think that outside certain specific groups (working with elderly, healthcare, other essential services) there probably never will be.
Once there is a reliable antibody test there will be mass testing with that however.
Finding it really hard to follow what point you're trying to make in all of this. Sounds to me like an argument for saying that "things that matter (testing, prevention, etc) don't actually matter" which I'm aware is a way to argue for the approach that Sweden has taken.
It doesn't change the fact that an absence of evidence against the effectiveness of that system seems to largely spawn from a general lack of evidence collected in the first place. A real "head buried under sand" approach to evaluating its effectiveness, I'd say.
Its quiet obvious to me and it makes perfect sense. Its not an argument for the strategy,its a result of the strategy. If you look at the strategy then those things indeed dont matter that much. They do matter if you try to fully contain the virus and eradicate it,but that is not the strategy and never has been.
I still fail to understand how it's possible that suddenly they are so concerned with health when tobacco and alcohol are still legal, potato chips (acrylamide) and sugar are widely available. Those are some of the leading causes of death through cancerogenity, obesity, cardiovascular disease in industrialized countries fwiw. Literally the top two.
To which you could rebuke that they are up to the lifestyle choices of someone, yet they cause strain on health care just as much. Somehow everyone had the freedom to deteriorate his own health or infect others with flu, STDs, but Corona became an exception.
And again, the purpose of this post is not to portray this as something harmless or nonexistant, but to question the validity of setting such a precedent in handling a possible hazard. Because today it's lockdown because Corona, tomorrow it's lockdown because ???
Because when one person drinks too many cokes it does not make somebody else get diabetes and likely kill their grandpa.
To be frank they are so clearly different it is hard to take someone at face value when they write such things. You will notice we have rules about speed limits, dui's and so on that also effect others. It is consistent.
So if something were to appear in the future out there that is similarly dangerous for you and others like Corona, you would agree again to be imprisoned at home for your own security? Because what applies to you also applies to grandpa, or you are grandpa by then and millions of young people have their freedom taken away for your health. Would you think that's noble?
Edit: Besides the point was to prevent a run on the health-care system. Not to prevent deaths at any costs.
If another infectious disease that threatens to kill millions appears, and the correct response to reduce the spread is to quarantine hundreds of millions - yes, I expect millions of young (and old) people to accept severe restrictions on their freedom of movement to stop the spread of said disease. My great grandparents did it in their youth; I see it as perfectly reasonable for me to expect to have to do the same in response to a similar threat. And if we see another pandemic like this several decades down the road, same goes for that generation.
I'm going to agree with this, as long as it's a one-time thing without permanent consequences. Which is why I'm watching very attentively what kind of law and measures are introduced to prolong a state of emergency or make it easier to call out.
On April 20 2020 02:51 JimmiC wrote:
On April 20 2020 02:26 Vivax wrote:
On April 20 2020 01:51 JimmiC wrote:
On April 20 2020 01:21 Vivax wrote: [quote]
I still fail to understand how it's possible that suddenly they are so concerned with health when tobacco and alcohol are still legal, potato chips (acrylamide) and sugar are widely available. Those are some of the leading causes of death through cancerogenity, obesity, cardiovascular disease in industrialized countries fwiw. Literally the top two.
To which you could rebuke that they are up to the lifestyle choices of someone, yet they cause strain on health care just as much. Somehow everyone had the freedom to deteriorate his own health or infect others with flu, STDs, but Corona became an exception.
And again, the purpose of this post is not to portray this as something harmless or nonexistant, but to question the validity of setting such a precedent in handling a possible hazard. Because today it's lockdown because Corona, tomorrow it's lockdown because ???
Because when one person drinks too many cokes it does not make somebody else get diabetes and likely kill their grandpa.
To be frank they are so clearly different it is hard to take someone at face value when they write such things. You will notice we have rules about speed limits, dui's and so on that also effect others. It is consistent.
So if something were to appear in the future out there that is similarly dangerous for you and others like Corona, you would agree again to be imprisoned at home for your own security? Because what applies to you also applies to grandpa, or you are grandpa by then and millions of young people have their freedom taken away for your health. Would you think that's noble?
Edit: Besides the point was to prevent a run on the health-care system. Not to prevent deaths at any costs.
We have a lock down and I am not imprisoned in my home, I'm fine to get essential stuff and expected to practice social distancing.
You making over dramatic references and stretching the truth does not make me think these measures are any less piratical or in some way unfair. You are probably also reading half truths meant to fire you up about things that are not happening.
And yes if another pandemic comes I would hope we would use every tool we have, and use the ones that worked best.
Not everything that goes against your view or that of the majority is stretching the truth. Unless you want a 'discussion' to be a bunch of accounts parroting a single opinion.
Comparing COVID to sweets and so on is not a discussion it is a logical fallacy. If you would like to bring up some scientific facts I would be happy to have that discussion.
Second hand smoking related illnesses are similar and I also support all the rules we have (not sure on where you are at) where smoking is not allowed inside.
I plan on staying isolated, until the medical community says otherwise.
I have been thinking that a very effective way to combat smoking would be to report smoking related deaths in the same way 'rona victims are. Over 8 million die from smoking each year globally. That is 21k per day which is in a different ball park than this virus. One difference is that smokers are accounted for in hospital capacity, but that is actually a very bad excuse.
Speaking of Worldometers: Spain just reported 0 recoveries the last couple of days and only 41 deaths yesterday. There are some very odd things going on with the reports from time to time, the sudden influxes in China probably being the worst examples.
It might work, but people are terrible about assessing future risk, with COVID you get sick in 4-7 days with smoking it takes decades. I kind of like Canada's approach where we make it very uncomfortable for smokers and tax it a super high rate to pay for the future costs on the health care system (we are probably still losing but it is better than nothing). I also like all the rules about how they can't market them almost anywhere, and can't have them flavoured so it less likely for kids to get them. Even when you go into a gas station they are hidden behind a white board and there are are horrible pictures of what smoking does to your lungs, teeth and so on.
It has not stopped it, but I'm not sure that anything would and making it illegal would just create a black market.
This is a little off topic and pretty cynical.
Smoking is great for the economy. Especially for countries with universal healthcare and government pensions. If you have a large percentage of the population smoking that's probably one of the biggest savings you can have.
First of all smokers spend a lot of money buying cigarettes and they are very heavily taxed. That's straight revenue with the argument that they have to pay for their added healthcare costs.
However, people always die of something. Smoking increases your risk of cancer and pulmonary disease. However if you don't smoke you will still die eventually (probably of hearth disease or cancer). Heart disease used to be "cheap" but today we usually manage one, or even two heart attacks alongside related problems. Cancer is the same thing, we can do a lot of expensive treatment today. Sure you could say that things like pulmonary diseases can be chronic but old people have many chronic diseases. So in the end, regardless of if you smoke or not, you will likely end up requiring medical treatment.
The difference is that you will likely need that treatment a lot earlier. And you will also likely die a LOT earlier. Economically speaking this is great because the real added cost lies not in the medical treatment but with pensions and general care of an aging population. If you can shave of 5-10 years of that it is massive. It could be a problem if you start getting sick before you retire but usually people manage fairly well until they are over that age.
So the economic argument against smoking is weak.
However the humanistic argument is crystal clear. Cigarettes is a fucking horrible product designed to get people addicted and ruin their lives (not only their lifespan but it also makes you weaker and gives you health issues while you are alive).
The argument for corona should be the same. It's not really economic damage/quarantine versus saved lives.
It's the SUFFERING caused by the economic damage and the quarantine versus the lives saved.
I personally don't give a shit if the top 1 % loses a couple of billions, or if my savings take a hit. But there are a lot of people out there who will have their lives ruined by the quarantine. They might never recover and suffer from this impact for decades. It's a real issue.
It doesn't sound so bad when you say that 12 % of Spains GDP is from tourism which is now completely crippled. But that will effect millions of people for a long time. Some might never recover. Some might even die (from suicide). A 12 % GDP reduction will also likely mean large budget cuts. Normally prevention programs for example tobacco, mental health and poor diets are the first to go. This might easily kill more people in the long run from smoking, diabetes or suicide than the virus ever did.
I guess you would have to do a cost based analysis based on the treatment costs vs the savings in old age pension taxes raised and so on. I think you might be surprised how much shit costs, my dad spent one night in the hospital for pneumonia, they ran some tests and gave him an IV, the cost for that one night
. I guess it depends also how much longer they would have lived, the cost of the oxygen and so on.
Either way the point of the comparison is that they have made these rules because people other than the smoker can get sick, like with covid.
And your Spain example makes no sense. Do you really think if they continued to keep the country open so more and more people got sick and there was zero space in the hospitals with hundreds or even thousands dying a day people would be like "lets go to Spain for vacation". There were almost 1000 people dying a day as it was.
They need to get their shit sorted out for people to actually want to go to there on a trip. Not to mention if 1000's are dying every day how productive do you think people will be among the all getting sick and funerals?
You might want to check out what Spain was like before they put in these measures before you say they would be better off economically if they didn't. I would argue they wouldn't be, and even if they are marginally better off do you think some 5-15 % die off is worth it? You think people are going to travel their? Really?
They need to get it under control and then open it up slowly. I'm not sure when you are talking about Spain and Italy there can be any remotely logical reason for them staying open.
And yes the government is going to have to step up for all the disadvantaged people, and the wealthy ones should pay for it with wealth taxes, estate taxes and what ever else they need to do.
Spain is just an example that was easily available since so much of their economy is in tourism. Sure nothing can save 2020 from a tourist perspective (maybe over Christmas?). That economic impact is going to be easy to measure and the suffering it will cause is easy to imagine.
The point is that there need to be a discussion about what kind of effect a certain measure has and how much it costs society as a whole. Obviously you have to keep the spread low enough that your healthcare system can handle it. But everything after that absolutely needs to be discussed and measured.
Birx, in the US COVID-19 briefing, laid out more statistical trends lately. I've queued the video to the metro breakdowns presented by Dr Birx. She was head of the CDC's Global HIV/AIDS division under Bush & Obama. Her slides show breakdowns of major urban areas. Seattle looks better than I hoped. Obviously, NYC has been suffering the worst and blows the scaling of other metro areas, so Dr Birx has a slide without NYC. Daily cases New Orleans, LA show daily new cases plummeting.
A lot of flat-ish plots. It's encouraging.
From later slides: (35m10s)
Mortality (Case Fatality per 100,000) Belgium 45.2 Spain 42.81 Italy 37.64 France 27.92 UK 21.97 Netherlands 20.14 USA 11.24 Iran 6.06 Germany 5.25 China* 0.33 + Show Spoiler +
(includes the recent Chinese government adjustment higher of Wuhan cases)
Hospitalization rate is declining nationally. (38m54s)
Those are some new USA statistical trends and raw statistics presented 4/18, contrasted against international numbers and inter-metro. I saw some pretty bad infographics on NYC vs other metro areas on twitter recently, and this gives a better sense of where that city is in relation to others.
On April 20 2020 06:47 Danglars wrote: Birx, in the US COVID-19 briefing, laid out more statistical trends lately. I've queued the video to the metro breakdowns presented by Dr Birx. She was head of the CDC's Global HIV/AIDS division under Bush & Obama. Her slides show breakdowns of major urban areas. Seattle looks better than I hoped. Obviously, NYC has been suffering the worst and blows the scaling of other metro areas, so Dr Birx has a slide without NYC. Daily cases New Orleans, LA show daily new cases plummeting.
Mortality (Case Fatality per 100,000) Belgium 45.2 Spain 42.81 Italy 37.64 France 27.92 UK 21.97 Netherlands 20.14 USA 11.24 Iran 6.06 Germany 5.25 China* 0.33 + Show Spoiler +
(includes the recent Chinese government adjustment higher of Wuhan cases)
Hospitalization rate is declining nationally. (38m54s)
Those are some new USA statistical trends and raw statistics presented 4/18, contrasted against international numbers and inter-metro. I saw some pretty bad infographics on NYC vs other metro areas on twitter recently, and this gives a better sense of where that city is in relation to others.
Any statistics on fatalities per population should probably include population density as well. This is something that the US definitely has going for it. It's much easier to isolate, even in suburban areas (barring NY), than in european towns.
On April 20 2020 08:54 SC-Shield wrote: Are these protesting people in the US dumb? US is one of the worst hit countries and these guys want out? It's too early for that.
Of course they're dumb, and they're following the lead of Trump, who insists every week that surely by now it's okay to reopen everything.
Over 4,000 New Jersey residents have already died from coronavirus. The population of New Jersey is 8.9 million, which means that roughly 1 in every 2000 New Jerseyans has already died from coronavirus. Several thousand more will die over the next few weeks. This isn't a joke.
On April 20 2020 08:54 SC-Shield wrote: Are these protesting people in the US dumb? US is one of the worst hit countries and these guys want out? It's too early for that.
On April 20 2020 08:54 SC-Shield wrote: Are these protesting people in the US dumb? US is one of the worst hit countries and these guys want out? It's too early for that.
Some people suffer more under the consequences of the lockdown than under the fear of the virus but somehow nobody cares about that.
It's all a delicate balancing act. A (hopefully weatherable) impact on the economy and mental health versus potentially a lot of deaths (mostly in a different population).
The lockdowns aren't to save lives they're supposed to be to slow down the spread until the infrastructure gets in place to minimize the deaths. Trump keeps swerving between being in absolute power and being absolutely powerless to do anything and so it'll be a couple of weeks until the nation should be opening up again.
Don't know if similar stuff has been posted here, but apparently the Innsbruck University tested some recovered COVID-19 patients, and six of those (who apparently had moderate corona cases) used to do under water diving sport. All of those had suffered too big lung damage from COVID-19 to continue the sport in their future.
www.rainews.it (German source, don't know if there is an English article on it yet)
On April 20 2020 17:21 HolydaKing wrote: Don't know if similar stuff has been posted here, but apparently the Innsbruck University tested some recovered COVID-19 patients, and six of those (who apparently had moderate corona cases) used to do under water diving sport. All of those had suffered too big lung damage from COVID-19 to continue the sport in their future.
www.rainews.it (German source, don't know if there is an English article on it yet)
Isn't it too early to have such conclusions? There should be a chance for lungs to recover over time, I hope.
On April 20 2020 17:21 HolydaKing wrote: Don't know if similar stuff has been posted here, but apparently the Innsbruck University tested some recovered COVID-19 patients, and six of those (who apparently had moderate corona cases) used to do under water diving sport. All of those had suffered too big lung damage from COVID-19 to continue the sport in their future.
www.rainews.it (German source, don't know if there is an English article on it yet)
Isn't it too early to have such conclusions? There should be a chance for lungs to recover over time, I hope.
Maybe so, it's just that the lungs look so bad that they can't really imagine it. But they'll continue to check the patients and who knows what happens to them later on.
On April 20 2020 08:54 SC-Shield wrote: Are these protesting people in the US dumb? US is one of the worst hit countries and these guys want out? It's too early for that.
Some people suffer more under the consequences of the lockdown than under the fear of the virus but somehow nobody cares about that.
Suicides due to economic reasons is the obvious one but let's not forget domestic violence which has also skyrocketed.Greenland, South Africa and Bangkok, provinces in Mexico (Tabasco) have already banned alcohol sales due to domestic violence fears and gathering concerns.
The longer you keep people cooped up the worse it gets.
Again i mentioned Sweden before and i think they have got it right in regard to reducing impact on the economy and not completely shutting everything down and causing that escalation in suicides and domestic violence.
Isn't it curious that folks who want to highlight the negative effects of shelter in place orders in service of establishing that "the cure is worse than the disease" do their best to avoid mentioning any of the incidental positives (ya know, like significant, across the board reductions in traffic and workplace accidents, to name two)? Instead, we get vague gestures towards suicide that have no basis in fact and sudden flip flop domestic violence service advocacy that was interestingly never a priority before the 'rona. Hmmm.
On April 20 2020 08:54 SC-Shield wrote: Are these protesting people in the US dumb? US is one of the worst hit countries and these guys want out? It's too early for that.
Some people suffer more under the consequences of the lockdown than under the fear of the virus but somehow nobody cares about that.
Suicides due to economic reasons is the obvious one but let's not forget domestic violence which has also skyrocketed.Greenland, South Africa and Bangkok, provinces in Mexico (Tabasco) have already banned alcohol sales due to domestic violence fears and gathering concerns.
The longer you keep people cooped up the worse it gets.
Again i mentioned Sweden before and i think they have got it right in regard to reducing impact on the economy and not completely shutting everything down and causing that escalation in suicides and domestic violence.
YYeah I don't blame other countries for playing safe and shutting down everything but I think they should adapt to the swedish model asap now.
On April 20 2020 20:39 farvacola wrote: Isn't it curious that folks who want to highlight the negative effects of shelter in place orders in service of establishing that "the cure is worse than the disease" do their best to avoid mentioning any of the incidental positives (ya know, like significant, across the board reductions in traffic and workplace accidents, to name two)? Instead, we get vague gestures towards suicide that have no basis in fact and sudden flip flop domestic violence service advocacy that was interestingly never a priority before the 'rona. Hmmm.
It almost reads like an excuse to me. People aren't buying the whole "sacrifice your lives for the Great God, Economy" thing, so now people everywhere are resorting to all kinds of violence and suicide because they have to stay home. I don't know about you folks. I'm pretty comfy staying in my apartment.
All the folks complaining about how keeping people at home will incite civil war or some shit, need to bear in mind that if we had any response on the national level whatsoever, our curve might've been flattened to any extent, and we could think about keeping more shit open. But The Cheeto didn't do shit. Calling us the king of ventilators doesn't fucking count. We did nothing for months after learning about it's dangers and are flabbergasted that it got this bad.
On April 20 2020 20:39 farvacola wrote: Isn't it curious that folks who want to highlight the negative effects of shelter in place orders in service of establishing that "the cure is worse than the disease" do their best to avoid mentioning any of the incidental positives (ya know, like significant, across the board reductions in traffic and workplace accidents, to name two)? Instead, we get vague gestures towards suicide that have no basis in fact and sudden flip flop domestic violence service advocacy that was interestingly never a priority before the 'rona. Hmmm.
It almost reads like an excuse to me. People aren't buying the whole "sacrifice your lives for the Great God, Economy" thing, so now people everywhere are resorting to all kinds of violence and suicide because they have to stay home. I don't know about you folks. I'm pretty comfy staying in my apartment.
All the folks complaining about how keeping people at home will incite civil war or some shit, need to bear in mind that if we had any response on the national level whatsoever, our curve might've been flattened to any extent, and we could think about keeping more shit open. But The Cheeto didn't do shit. Calling us the king of ventilators doesn't fucking count. We did nothing for months after learning about it's dangers and are flabbergasted that it got this bad.
Are you serious? Are you actually saying suicides and domestic violence aren't a problem because you're comfy staying in your apartment and it doesn't affect you? Or don't you believe the lockdown leads to that?
EPT
