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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

#161

Post by ronyfadel »

numpad0 wrote: post #134

First: SARS-CoV-2 is the virus, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome-CoronaVirus-2. COVID-19 is COronaVIrus Disease-2019 which is the disease caused by CoV-2. Second: Flattening the curve isn't about shortening any duration. The Y axis is the number of infected. In the Red Line scenario, like packets overflowing a buffer, patients above the dashed line will (have to) be medically neglected. Rest assured, our immune syst…

Since it seems deadlier than the common flu at the moment, I personally would prefer to “schedule” my infection by waiting for a vaccine.

I’m in Latin America where it isn’t spreading as fast (my best guess is warm weather), and I’m planning to wait it out until it’s warmer in the northern hemisphere or a vaccine comes out.

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

#162

Post by DonHopkins »

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…

Except that the head of the US Government just makes up random shit on twitter. So yes, the government does just make up random shit like him.

And there most certainly are many things the government can do about it. How about Medicare for all people, and for all diseases?

Republicans Want Medicare for All, but Just for This One Disease. Everyone’s a socialist in a pandemic.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/11/opinion/coronavirus-socia...

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

#163

Post by imustbeevil »

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 has 11x Denmark's population and 4x it's confirmed cases, so it seems like doing nothing worked better.

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

#164

Post by toolz »

avip wrote: post #107
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…

Nothing in your analysis makes any sense. First, there's no "no pandemic" case. Not anymore. Second, your conclusion says that "politicians choose (1)" but that is not the case at all - almost every country in Europe, Asia, middle east had taken measures, with varying severity, and significant economic cost. Last but not least, the whole framing is extremely simplistic and follows the "politicians are evil" reddit-li…

The original post probably uses pandemic in the colloquial sense, not by the WHOs definition which seems widely disagreed on. Remember the last WHO pandemic was the swine flu, which turned out to be more mild than the seasonal flu.

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

#165

Post by rsynnott »

the8472 wrote: post #93
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…

> 4a) pandemic, action, it works -> government was "right", saved lives, spared the economy -> reelected This is too optimistic. If it works then people see a tiny death rate and a shutdown forced by the government. The greatest success will look like an overreaction.

Yes, this is y2k/ozone hole syndrome. Arguably financial crisis, too; that would have been a lot worse without the quite extreme government intervention round the world, but it generally didn’t work out well for the politicians involved.

That said, a lot of governments are taking serious measures and apparently not counting the electoral cost.

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

#166

Post by TravHatesMe »

avip wrote: post #107
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…

Nothing in your analysis makes any sense. First, there's no "no pandemic" case. Not anymore. Second, your conclusion says that "politicians choose (1)" but that is not the case at all - almost every country in Europe, Asia, middle east had taken measures, with varying severity, and significant economic cost. Last but not least, the whole framing is extremely simplistic and follows the "politicians are evil" reddit-li…

I would say it follows a "politicians act in their own best interest" logic. People with jobs in other industries have similar behavior, but I suppose the politicians have greater impact on society, so most people rally around the cynical view of politicians.

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

#167

Post by tomatotomato37 »

_jal wrote: post #103
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…

> So, politicians choose (1), no action, as the most likely winning scenario. I have serious doubts about this model, but will play along. What explains: (a) The exceptions - some countries are acting and doing well. Others are doing better after a delay. (b) Past, more aggressive actions - many countries, the US included, have responded much more quickly and competently to acute disease crises.

Politicians are humans with imperfect immune systems too. It's hard to be logical and play realpolitik when getting it wrong kills you or your family

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

#169

Post by alfromspace »

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…

Wait, been I've been told "you can't just shut down travel", and that closing borders doesn't work, for reasons that are completely self-evident. So I'm utterly mystified that there are virtually no cases and 0 deaths in countries like Russia and Mongolia that closed their borders.

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

#170

Post by JdeBP »

Far more enlightening than reading some inexpert web log with wobbly hand-drawn graphs with unmarked axes is to read the actual after-the-fact analyses of the measures taken against the 1918 Influenza pandemic. People learned from history, what actually did not work. It influenced what they did the next time around, in the 1920s.

Don't read some Belgian web developer's web log.

Read the likes of Ethical and Legal Considerations in Mitigating Pandemic Disease: Workshop Summary published by the National Academies Press in 2007 (ISBN 9780309107693 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK54167/).

Read “Destroyer and Teacher”: Managing the Masses During the 1918–1919 Influenza Pandemic (Nancy Tomes. Public Health Rep. 2010. 125(Suppl 3) 48–62. PMC2862334. PMID 20568568. https://dx.doi.org/10.1177/00333549101250S308 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2862334/)

Tomes is particularly enlightening on the internal conflicts between government public heath departments.

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