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Liquid`Drone
Norway28674 Posts
On September 22 2021 00:35 Dingodile wrote: What about black death which happened at year ~1300? Or it was a very different virus? It killed about ~30% of the world population. was considerably more devastating than the spanish flu!  | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
Is COVID bad? Maybe I'm lucky enough not to be critically affected. But I definitely wouldn't want to exchange living during COVID than, say, in the middle of WW1 or WW2 battlefields. COVID is bad, but things can always be a lot of worse. Let's appreciate our blessings, rather than always curse our luck. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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BlackJack
United States10568 Posts
On September 22 2021 01:51 RKC wrote: Without any objective metric, discussion on what's 'better' or 'worse' will be left to subjective determination. Also, recency bias tends to blur our views. Is COVID bad? Maybe I'm lucky enough not to be critically affected. But I definitely wouldn't want to exchange living during COVID than, say, in the middle of WW1 or WW2 battlefields. COVID is bad, but things can always be a lot of worse. Let's appreciate our blessings, rather than always curse our luck. Right, I don't think if I was one of the people dying of the Spanish Flu that I would take much comfort in knowing that it's not that bad because in the future modern medicine would be better at treating it. Same goes for any disease that used to kill enormous amounts of people but now hardly kills anyone due to modern medicine. Whenever I read something about the Spanish Flu it's always accompanied by pictures of field hospitals with rows of cots and sick people. Looks miserable. I'm glad that almost all of the emergency field hospitals that were set up in the US to deal with COVID surges have mostly sat empty, even though hundreds of millions of dollars were wasted to construct them. Renown in Reno, NV is the only hospital I know of that actually put their field hospital to serious use. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Falling
Canada11355 Posts
The answer is not determined yet, you would need to at the very least wait until this is over and put estimated vs estimated. I don't think we need to be agnostic about this. As far as I'm aware, we don't have thousands of unburied bodies with morgues refusing to take more. We aren't running out of coffins, and we are not not digging massive trenches to double stack coffins. Unless our morgue to grave system is orders of magnitude more efficient than it was in the past, I think we could confidently say the Spanish Flu is considerably worse. We don't have to wait for the jury on this one. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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DarkPlasmaBall
United States44376 Posts
Hopefully soon, we'll have safer elementary schools. https://apnews.com/article/business-science-health-coronavirus-pandemic-coronavirus-vaccine-202cb6e44b90270ec4d1f19690ed94c5 | ||
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Slydie
1921 Posts
I honestly don't think comparing to the spanish flu makes sense as the world is very different. I would rather compare with the 2018 flu season, which was particularly bad. The total number of hospitalisations and deaths of covid is WAY higher almost everywhere, but if you look only at the Delta wave in countries with good vaccine coverage, the 2018 flu was actually much worse! | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
But we shouldn't be surprised - what more enraged - if nature 'fights back'. Modern medicine is truly a miracle - one that we should be grateful about. But our expectations also needs to be tempered. Viral outbreaks are part of nature and will happen, again and again. Most times, we are well-defended against them. Sometimes, by a fluke of probability, a virus becomes truly deadly (not intentionally, because killing the host isn't in the interest of the virus). Point is, if COVID has taught us anything, is that we should live healthily and take precautions. Modern medicine is not a magic pill, and may even lull us to a false sense of security. Live free, but live responsibly. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Magic Powers
Austria4167 Posts
I think the Biden administration should have a very deep think about this. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Amui
Canada10567 Posts
On September 22 2021 22:15 JimmiC wrote: Completely, the sad part is that people think about themselves, or their country, or their state, or their city, or their family, over everyone and short term it benefits them so that behavior continues and is pretty universal (but a spectrum). Where as thinking global about everyone in most cases also benefits the individual more, tide rises all boats and all that. This is even more true in a pandemic like this where the entire west could have everyone 100% protected about all the current covids, and new mutation could happen in Afghanistan (insert country) and none of that would matter. The distribution of the vaccine should have been based on who can effectively get it out to the most people. In Canada we extended the duration between the first and second shot to get more people first shots, it both worked out better for stopping spread and it looks like the efficacy and longevity has also improved. At the very least once the west started having a supply issue instead of a demand issue they should have been prioritizing getting the vaccine out. The cost of the vaccine, shipping and all that is a drop in the bucket compared to delta or the next one (please let there not be a next one). Just about the only good news is that Delta has almost maxed out the viral load skill tree, and the infectivity skill tree. A ~300x increase in viral load only resulted in a doubling of the spread rate, so I'm somewhat doubtful it could go much further in that direction. The spike protein for Delta is also extremely good at attaching to receptors, so that's not a great Avenue of improvement. The scariest thing would definitely be immune escape, which could evolve literally anywhere. World isn't going to be able to handle Delta#2 if our vaccinated and acquired immunity population doesn't amount to anything. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Mohdoo
United States15690 Posts
On September 22 2021 22:03 Magic Powers wrote: Thinking it over again and again, my conclusion is that the FDA has made the correct decision. More first and second doses should go to countries that desperately need them. We shouldn't let doses expire, but they should also be distributed smarter in the first place, and honestly I think more humanely. It will also likely help end the pandemic sooner. I think the Biden administration should have a very deep think about this. This would only be true if we were sending anywhere near enough to prevent another variant. We are not. Not even close. That amount of manufacturing doesn’t even exist. We simply don’t have the throughput. I’m going to continue to get boosters and ignore the criminally incompetent FDA | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
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RKC
2848 Posts
But since US thrives on open borders and free trade, their long term national interests may be better served in focusing on distribution. Contrast this with smaller, insular and self-reliant countries like Israel. While there's surely some way to calculate the risks on both approaches using statistical modelling, ultimately it's a decision based on politics and economics (and morality, or so governments and politicians would preach). | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15690 Posts
On September 23 2021 11:58 RKC wrote: It's up to every country to decide on booster shots (despite WHO pleading for a moratorium to enable distribution to poorer countries). But since US thrives on open borders and free trade, their long term national interests may be better served in focusing on distribution. Contrast this with smaller, insular and self-reliant countries like Israel. While there's surely some way to calculate the risks on both approaches using statistical modelling, ultimately it's a decision based on politics and economics (and morality, or so governments and politicians would preach). And this is why I am entirely ignoring the FDA here. My profession and career have given me a great deal of insight into how science ends up being filtered into policy. I understand why they are doing what they are doing and I disagree with it. | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
Ironic. One would think that scientists should favour boosters while progressive political leaders idealise on saving the world... | ||
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