What could possibly go wrong.
A lot. It can potentially wipe out the non young generation.
Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
481–490 of 772 posts
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#482Earlier quoted context omitted.
But if you are in contact with someone under 31 who has no choice but to be in contact with someone over 31... I guess the question you have to consider is how much to blame is each individual who chooses to ignore recommended procedures yet passes the virus on to someone who ends up dying.
Then why are they out? They have no excuse. My parents are older and so I'm not going to visit them, and instead call regularly. That's unfortunate but that's the safest thing to do.
Scenario: Your parents get it from somebody who is acting irresponsibility, who in turn got it (in)directly from you.
Does it really matter that it's "somebody else's fault"?
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#483Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They are about slowing it, so that the load on the health care system isn't too grade. Again, the load on the health care system depends completely on the demographics of the people who get infected. By isolating and quarantining people in risk groups, the load on the health care system will be much lower. The gamble is this: By letting the virus spread indiscriminately through the part of the population that is no…
Are there any examples of countries isolating vulnerable people (elderly, obese, breathing problems, smokers)? It doesn't seem like that is actually viable at all.
It's an explicit part of the UK's strategy, it's been pointed out throughout this thread.
Also, why would that be less viable than locking down all of society the way for example Italy has done?
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#484This sounds like the "bargaining" stage, in the 5 stages:
denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.
(Acceptance being a China style lockdown of course...)
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#485Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's do math! I'll use US numbers, because I know them. The current worst case scenarios on the table are between 1% and 5% of the individuals catching the disease dying (there are better numbers, but we're worst casing it). For achieving herd immunity, numbers like 40-70% of the population infected and recovered are bandied about. So worst case, you're looking at 1.3-11.6 million deaths in the US. Now, the US gover…
> The current worst case scenarios on the table are between 1% and 5% of the individuals catching the disease dying (there are better numbers, but we're worst casing it). For achieving herd immunity, numbers like 40-70% of the population infected and recovered are bandied about. Yes, those numbers apply if it spreads indiscriminately throughout your entire population. But we know the virus is here, we know who is in…
> Some will still have an ok quality of life, but many people won't. They'll be fired, or their companies will have gone bankrupt, they'll have no money, no food.. Then what?
The point isn't to actually shut down the entire economy.
The point is that when you are talking loss numbers in the trillions, interventions that cost hundreds of billions or even "smaller numbers of trillions" to avert the big losses make economic sense; helicopter dropping a trillion dollars to allow people besides tech workers to self-isolate and socially distance themselves for a few months could be cheap, in the long run.
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#486Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#487Here is a rule of thumb that will be familiar to many who manage risk in a professional capacity: The time to get creative is when you face a capped downside on the one hand, and an uncapped upside on the other. The time to get conservative is when you face the opposite condition. The reason for this rule is that creative policies almost never work; but when they work, they have a much higher chance of working extrao…
Interesting way of managing risk. Curious - Does this rule of thumb have a name?
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#488All the kids get it, infect their parents, and off it goes.
I expected immunity once you'd had it, but have heard of re-infection occurring (not from official sources).
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#489It looks like to me just a comfort pill for the public. They basically acknowledged that they can't handle the crisis already. So what they gonna do? They want it to appear to be an advice from expert, to persuade the public, rationalize a forced decision. The uncomfortable truth is, the British government have weighted cost and benefit, and they have decided, the death of thousands or more is not worth the cost of n…
>These elder people are old enough anyway, and the death rate for young is just 0.2%
The numbers we're seeing from The Netherlands, Italy and France show that over half the people in the ICU are between 30 - 60 years old. I'm not convinced the 0,2 % is accurate anymore.
Re: Ask HN: Is UK government insane or genius?
#490Earlier quoted context omitted.
Some are against it, others (such as presumably a majority of those advising the government) are for it. That's just good debate. > It’s already too late. They’re on the Italy path. Well, that's pretty much the point of the policy. 'Already screwed this year, let's try to cope, and be less screwed next year'. I was very critical at first, but I'm more interested/satisfied with the response now, it does seem to be wel…
> such as presumably a majority of those advising the government Why? Politicians have shown several times that they prefer to listen to a minority of scientists that tell them what they want to hear, rather than a majority that doesn't.
Worse, politicians (particularly Health ministers) have disporportionately high infection rates.