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Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

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Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#51

Post by uk_programmer »

lazyier wrote: post #20
varjag wrote: post #2

Doesn't seem very well thought out. The economic cost of the first scenario (numerous deaths in peak period) would likely be the highest with the impact both on workforce and market sentiment. The impact of long tail scenarios lower because death toll would not be just redistributed but also reduced by likely an order of magnitude.

No it's not. It's just one guy making up random shit on a blog and is pretending that governments think like him. The reality is probably closer to the fact that there isn't anything governments can do about it. They can try to shut down the borders of the country, but that is going to a lot worse and probably won't stop it anyways. Just because governments can do something and do do something doesn't mean that that…

Russia shutdown its borders pretty much straight away and IIRC they have hardly any cases.

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#52

Post by keiferski »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #37
lazyier wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it's not. It's just one guy making up random shit on a blog and is pretending that governments think like him. The reality is probably closer to the fact that there isn't anything governments can do about it. They can try to shut down the borders of the country, but that is going to a lot worse and probably won't stop it anyways. Just because governments can do something and do do something doesn't mean that that…

Denmark did close every school and most administrations. France did not. Many decisions can be taken, but are not (for various reasons). Most experts recommend to limit contacts rather than closing down borders, and no one is pretending to stop the virus but they all should try to flatten the curve. You don't seem to pay attention to the current situation.

France population: 66.99 million.

Denmark population: 5.6 million.

Doesn't seem like an accurate comparison.

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#53

Post by johnchristopher »

While it's true our federal government hasn't issued orders but only advice the local and provincial authorities have the power to prevent some things from happening. And they are using it: some classes or schools are getting shut down, some away trips are being cancelled.

But I agree, everything's fine in Belgium :D. The virus is likely to have taken a detour to avoid Belgium, like the Chernobyl cloud did.

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#54

Post by lm28469 »

fxtentacle wrote: post #43

TLDR: It's cheapest to let old people die, so that the young can continue working. A very cruel view on humanity, but I would be surprised if these thoughts hadn't crossed our politicians minds. Also, many initiatives by young people (e.g. limiting climate change, re-structuring society to be more equal-opportunity) are being blocked by old people who wish to preserve the status quo. So there is a general dislike by…

If you do that in the US you'd lose 60% of politicians and 90% of presidential candidates.

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#55

Post by Rastonbury »

tomp wrote: post #31

I think it's a different reason. Let's analyze the outcomes from game theory perspective, along two dimensions: virus becomes pandemic or not, and governments do something or nothing. 1) no pandemic, no action -> government was "right", avoided wasting money -> reelected 2) no pandemic, action -> government was "wrong", wasted a lot of money, damaged the economy, inconvenienced the lives of the population -> voted ou…

That's now how game theory works, the pandemic is not another player who is 2nd guessing the government or vice versa.

Instead governments are weighing the probabilities (think a probability tree, according to your scenarios) you kind of point to this in your conclusion.

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#56

Post by AllegedAlec »

seszett wrote: post #48
AllegedAlec wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After the last elections on 26 May 2019, the winnings parties have been unable to form a coalition, so there is no real cabinet at the moment which has the power to do the things that need to be done.

We do have a government though (quite a few of them even, but the federal government is the one that matters here) with all the power needed to do whatever it deems necessary. And the federal government has said that indoor meetings with more than 1000 persons are "not recommended". The Brussels government has cancelled those, the Walloon cities don't have events of more than 1000 persons planned in the near future,…

> We do have a government though (quite a few of them even, but the federal government is the one that matters here) with all the power needed to do whatever it deems necessary.

Really? Because I seem to have read that budget deficit is getting out of hand because there is no federal government to fix it.

Also, yeah, fair enough. There are a handful of other governments that technically could take a decision, but as you said: it's easy to say: "well, this is a federal decision, so we won't do anything".

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#57

Post by tomp »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #50
tomp wrote: post #31

I think it's a different reason. Let's analyze the outcomes from game theory perspective, along two dimensions: virus becomes pandemic or not, and governments do something or nothing. 1) no pandemic, no action -> government was "right", avoided wasting money -> reelected 2) no pandemic, action -> government was "wrong", wasted a lot of money, damaged the economy, inconvenienced the lives of the population -> voted ou…

But all their experts have been telling them that (1) cannot happen, for quite some time. Another explanation is that government don't realize how much their words and actions have an effect on people's behavior, or they only focus on the worst possible effects ("what if people don't understand or react badly?"). In which case, they downplay the danger only to delay their decision. Because they're afraid of themselve…

> But all their experts have been telling them that (1) cannot happen, for quite some time.

No, the experts are subject to the same game-theoretic play... e.g. WHO declared it a pandemic only yesterday. The only ones who suggested the correct action (ban all flights from China already during Chinese New Year) are the ones with no skin in the game / no decision-making power / no relevance, who are therefore not subject to the game.

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#58

Post by michaelt »

fxtentacle wrote: post #43

TLDR: It's cheapest to let old people die, so that the young can continue working. A very cruel view on humanity, but I would be surprised if these thoughts hadn't crossed our politicians minds. Also, many initiatives by young people (e.g. limiting climate change, re-structuring society to be more equal-opportunity) are being blocked by old people who wish to preserve the status quo. So there is a general dislike by…

I find it hard to believe there's a significant number of people who would cheer the deaths of their own parents and grandparents?

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#59

Post by xenonite »

johnpowell wrote: post #34
aetherspawn wrote: post #12

Had an interesting thought earlier. Seeing as a majority of deaths are in the range 60 years and above, and very little of the casualties affect younger (working) people, from the governments POV the virus will do well to decrease the disproportionate number of older pension receivers and nursing home residents in comparison with the dwindling number of young people working and paying taxes. In other words, the gover…

You assume that the government cares about expenditures. Old people vote. So it would be in your best interest to keep the people that voted you into office alive.

I second this. Because of this I don't understand why the German government is not acting more drastically in terms of isolating old people. Especially the current CDU/CSU/SPD leadership was largely voted by the elderly.

Sources:

https://www.bpb.de/nachschlagen/zahlen-und-fakten/bundestags... (Zweitstimmenergebnis)

https://www.bpb.de/politik/grundfragen/parteien-in-deutschla...

Re: Why some governments appear not to be acting on the Covid-19 threat

#60

Post by nhumrich »

tda wrote: post #33

Just a little thought experiment: If the current wisdom is actually that almost everyone will be infected eventually, wouldn't it (ignoring any ethical issues) be wiser to deliberately infect medical personnel as soon as possible, so the 5-10% of infected that need IC treatment can actually get it, before the medical system is overrun by the infected general population. In a few weeks, all doctors are immune (or dece…

Potentially, yes. But, only if by being infected, it would mean you were now immune, which isn't the case with covid-19. Reinfections have happened.
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