That's interesting, I hadn't seen calculations like that. What's the cost of waiting it out for another two-ish months?
The point is: not much more than the cost of "opening up" right now. Because "lockdown" isn't magic the government can control at a whime. People aren't going to engage in a full employment economy if they're justifiably scared of dying. Or, possibly but not probably: the cost of opening up is vastly higher if we end up looking at 2-300k needlessly dead Americans.
But further lockdown can also mean more deaths from low economic activity. How do you know which deaths are worse?
Opening up does at least one thing: removes the ability for workers to claim unemployment benefits if the employer also opens up. More zero-hour contracts? You betcha.
Reduction in hours is a reason to claim unemployment.
I'm not sure what I'm supposed to see in Table 2. I see more dead than Influenza. And that's despite most everything being closed. We don't close the country for influenza. So clearly this thing is way worse .
Thanks for not even trying. What you should see if you open your eyes and your mind is that anyone under 54 is many times more likely to die from something else other than COVID. Surely even someone such as yourself could imagine a scenario where not EVERYONE needs to be locked down? Perhaps just those in the higher risk brackets?
>What you should see if you open your eyes and your mind is that anyone under 54 is many times more likely to die from something else other than COVID.
Table 2 is total deaths not the death rate. Pneumonia has killed more young people than corona because more people have gotten pneumonia than corona (so far).
Thanks for not even trying. What you should see if you open your eyes and your mind is that anyone under 54 is many times more likely to die from something else other than COVID. Surely even someone such as yourself could imagine a scenario where not EVERYONE needs to be locked down? Perhaps just those in the higher risk brackets?
>What you should see if you open your eyes and your mind is that anyone under 54 is many times more likely to die from something else other than COVID. Table 2 is total deaths not the death rate. Pneumonia has killed more young people than corona because more people have gotten pneumonia than corona (so far).
Over the same time period. So it's about as apples to apples as you can get at this point.
Also, you can calculate the death rate per million from the available chart data. This stuff really isn't that complicated...
Eh, we'll see. I happen to think the economic consequences are far worse than the health ones. Time will tell which of us is right. I bet if you were a small business owner who was going to fold your life's work because of the lockdown, instead of a privileged tech worker, you wouldn't be singing the same tune.
Are you a small business owner? You seem to have very strong opinions aligned with your take on their point of view, so I'm curious.
I'm not sure what I'm supposed to see in Table 2. I see more dead than Influenza. And that's despite most everything being closed. We don't close the country for influenza. So clearly this thing is way worse .
Thanks for not even trying. What you should see if you open your eyes and your mind is that anyone under 54 is many times more likely to die from something else other than COVID. Surely even someone such as yourself could imagine a scenario where not EVERYONE needs to be locked down? Perhaps just those in the higher risk brackets?
First of all, these are the deaths for other causes since early February, while the covid deaths are heavily back-loaded over the past three weeks. Second, these are the deaths WITH a nationwide shelter-in-place, if we had not done that, the deaths would be much higher. Third, the death rate for your average 30-year-old in the average week is pretty darned low, so this will indeed add to it. Fourth, what do you propose to do to keep Americans over 60 from dying when they catch covid from their live-in family members, their caregivers, or the clerk at the bank?
“Opinion polls have generally shown a bipartisan majority of Americans want to remain at home to protect themselves from the coronavirus, despite the impact to the economy.” I’ll trust public opinion with my next health decision, it’s always spot on.
The point of that is to counteract the claims of politicians that Americans want to return to normal. They don't. Health officials have been saying to stay home all along. It's politicians that are saying it's ok not to. I don't know about you, but I'd rather take advice from health officials instead of politicians.
I'm not saying health officials are wrong, but they're rightfully focused primarily on health implications. Politicians should be responsible for determining policy -- balancing economic, legal, and health considerations after listening to experts.
It's remarkable that people are begging their governors to take away their civil liberties. Table 2 is all a rational person should need to see to realize the quarantine is the work of fear-mongering by politicians and the media: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/index.htm (For those who need an explanation - over the last two months, the data compiled in this chart shows that for people under 54, they are v…
Fear mongering? You can literally see the exponential growth just looking at the number of digits in the first column of table 1!
You know 7,600 people die every day in the US right? 2.8M a year. We don't shut anything down for those.
Im not saying COVID isn't a big deal. I'm saying the response was an overreaction. We need perspective on the actual severity. If the serological studies coming out are accurate, the total number of deaths is likely ~250k max. That's an alzheimers + suicides. National policy needs to be driven by statistics not emotion.