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How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

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Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#271

Post by tooltalk »

robocat wrote: post #42
ddrmaxgt37 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to be clear, Taiwan did not have huge flows of mainland Chinese soon after the outbreak though. They closed the border to all travelers with PRC passports in mid-February. They did take some drastic measures that have worked.

> They closed the border to all travelers with PRC passports in mid-February And before that they had plenty of people coming in from China with active Covid infections - returning from New Year including people from Hubei. The US enacted their travel ban to China on 31st Jan, yet that hasn’t helped the US... Now Taiwan is getting cases from other countries (returning citizens and foreign migrant workers) e.g. yester…

South Korea kept their door open pretty much until this week as many expats returned home with the virus from Europe and Americas.

IIRC, most early US cases came from Iran and Italy.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#272

Post by tim333 »

tooltalk wrote: post #270
robocat wrote: post #7

Another effing article that completely ignores Taiwan... I’m no taiwanophile, but why is it that a first-world democracy with a successful strategy against Covid is being completely ignored by media? https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2762689 Taiwan has huge flows of Chinese people, yet no outbreak. Maybe it’s a good thing they are not recognised by the WHO?

Sure, what about Taiwan? Is there anything that Taiwan did which was significantly different from what South Korea or Singapore did to prevent the wide spread of the virus?

One interesting thing is rather than stop flights from Wuhan they had inspectors ride on the flights and check the passengers mid flight and then quarantine anyone questionable on arrival.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#273

Post by rsync »

dylz wrote: post #258
rsync wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did this researcher get the anonymized mobile phone location data points from ? Also, I think it's important to clarify that: "Every cell phone user has to be tracked so the cell network knows how to route their calls ..." ... would be more accurate if we said: "Every cell phone has to be tracked ..." Many pieces of the cellular network have no idea who the handset (or other device) is assigned to, or who is us…

As a note for readers: to get a mobile SIM in South Korea of any kind, you pretty much need identity verification.

You've missed my point.

Of course the telecom itself, for many purposes - not the least of which is billing - needs to know a personal identity behind a SIM card.

What I am saying is that individual cell sites - and other pieces of the cellular infrastructure - are only indirectly (or not at all) connected to personal identity of the mobile subscriber. Call routing can be done just fine without any idea of subscriber identity in meatspace.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#274

Post by tim333 »

bagacrap wrote: post #213
royroyroys wrote: post #25

A physician from Korea recently did an AMA on Reddit and said: 'It is hard for anyone to predict what will happen in the future in this volatile situation. However, South Korean experts think that if the situation doesn't get better within the month, it will last up to 6 months. If the situation exacerbates within 6 months, it's apparent that this will become a much more difficult scenario than previously imagined. T…

honest question: why do we keep looking to physicians for guidance? They are highly trained in case by case treatment but not epidemiology. They are not taught to make population wide predictions about the future, they just diagnose and treat. They have access to some anecdata and that's about it. Professors, epidemiologists, and medical researchers have a lot more training and practice in the arena we care about.

In general they have some idea what they are on about re diseases. Also they tend to be fairly down to earth in that they deal with patients directly rather than abstractions.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#275

Post by avmich »

ardy42 wrote: post #172
0x38B wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, that same article says "As a reminder, you don’t need to wear a mask unless you are sick"...

> "As a reminder, you don’t need to wear a mask unless you are sick"... But of course, you may not know that you're sick... so wear a mask.

Mask obstructs airflow. After some hours spent without fresh air somebody gets a headache.

Your mileage may vary, of course.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#276

Post by llarsson »

throwaway_pdp09 wrote: post #201
llarsson wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then your browser does a shitty job of telling Twitter that. Properly blocked JS gives you a link to "legacy" Twitter, which works perfectly without JS. At least viewing, which is all I do. Does this link work for you? https://mobile.twitter.com/jeremyphoward/status/124289437844...

I've never been able to use it. I get sent to a "do you want to use legacy twitter?" thing, I click Yes and it just gives me the same screen again, every time. Happens I proxy through squid - it might have something to do with that. If I go direct (no proxy) it works. Interesting. At least I can get to it, and will read your link this evening. Thank you.

Until I started blocking JS using uBlock Origin, my blocking must have been incomplete. Because I also saw that screen and it never worked. Now, it does.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#277

Post by learnstats2 »

iso1631 wrote: post #155
learnstats2 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Statistics is not the only purpose of testing! If physical distancing is successful in reducing the reproduction number (R0), you will then want to track, trace and isolate every case to prevent further outbreaks when you relax the rules. That means a lot of testing.

OP said "better understanding of the virus' properties, like the distribution of symptoms, severities, and mortality rate" Random and self-selecting testing doesn't seem to offer much in that. Imagine going to a Nics game and asking everyone there who they support, chances are you'll get a lot of Nics fans. How does that give you a better indication of mortality rate or severity if you have no idea how many people ac…

> If the population assumes they've tested positive, and acts like they are

That is a fair point, and I agree that testing is most important when there are a limited number of cases - a stage which was essentially missed by Western governments but hopefully will have another opportunity.

I don't agree that populations are acting like they have tested positive, though, or can do that en masse.

If you know yourself to be positive, you should ideally be taking stricter measures - like having people leaving food at your doorstep.

Only people who are not infectious should be involved in food and resource distribution.

In order to enact that, you would need to actually test.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#278

Post by tooltalk »

tim333 wrote: post #272
tooltalk wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, what about Taiwan? Is there anything that Taiwan did which was significantly different from what South Korea or Singapore did to prevent the wide spread of the virus?

One interesting thing is rather than stop flights from Wuhan they had inspectors ride on the flights and check the passengers mid flight and then quarantine anyone questionable on arrival.

what's the difference between checking them in mid-air versus at the port of arrival?

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#279

Post by robocat »

tooltalk wrote: post #278
tim333 wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One interesting thing is rather than stop flights from Wuhan they had inspectors ride on the flights and check the passengers mid flight and then quarantine anyone questionable on arrival.

what's the difference between checking them in mid-air versus at the port of arrival?

I am guessing, but:

1. They can make someone with a temperature wear a mask immediately, reducing transmission to others on the plane, and containing them on arrival.

2. It avoids crowding and possibly cross-contamination on arrival at a testing station.

3. It prevents delays for passengers.

Re: How South Korea Reined In The Outbreak Without Shutting Everything Down

#280

Post by nullc »

KarlKemp wrote: post #100
cyphar wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was a coordinated (dare I say "propaganda") campaign by US and other government officials in order to try to avoid mask shortages[1]. A noble goal, sure -- but the net result is that people are now misinformed about the efficacy of masks. The evidence very much shows that wearing masks can reduce community transmission rates of SARS-like viruses -- up to 70% even with just plain surgical masks[2]. And even if yo…

Scott Alexander has a good post on this, and he convinced me of a “good faith” explanation for the recommendations against (or, more accurately, “not in favor of”) face masks: https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/03/23/face-masks-much-more-t...

His explanation does not explain statements like https://twitter.com/Surgeon_General/status/12337257852839321...
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