America is giving up on the pandemic? • Hacker News Board

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#611

Post by baddox » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:55 AM UTC

smsm42 wrote: post #373

metrokoi wrote: post #90

Quoted from a letter from 1,000 health professionals on the virus and protests [0] >However, as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission. We support them as vital to the national public health and to the threatened health specifically of Black people in the United States. We can show that support by facilitating safest protesting practices without detracting from…

> However, as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission That's a shining example of weasel speak. They don't explicitly say it's not risky - because that would be plain lying, it is obviously risky - but they are saying they are not condemning it as risky. Which most people would take as implying it's not actually risky - even though they are not saying that. They…

To me, that seems like fairly precise language. They’re saying they do not believe the risk level is sufficiently high to condemn the gatherings. It doesn’t seem much different than saying grocery store visits are not condemned as risky, while music store visits are condemned as risky. The virus doesn’t care about what you’re shopping for either, it’s just that shopping for food is more important (by their estimation) than shopping for some vinyl.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#612

Post by toasterlovin » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:56 AM UTC

whymauri wrote: post #541

cmdshiftf4 wrote: post #517

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think it's intellectually honest to compare countries with very, very low rates of firearms access to a country where firearms are available to anyone who wants one? You're comparing the USA, which has about 100k shootings per year, 36k deaths involving guns of which 33% (~12k) are homicides, to the UK which has 50-60 cases of homicide involving a gun per year. The fact is that the US police are far, far, far…

By all means, suggest a better country to draw a comparison with.

Unfortunately, the US is incomparable (in the neutral sense of the word) when it comes to most socio-economic issues. There literally is no other country that is similar to the US across more than one or two important factors.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#613

Post by gregwebs » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:56 AM UTC

Yes, and the reason why is unfortunately articles like these which only compare US states to each other or the US to Europe. If you look in these places, there is no good solution. But all we have to do is look across the Pacific Ocean.

There are many Asian countries aggressively stopping the virus without lockdowns. Their citizens are leading fairly normal lives right now except many still must wear masks everywhere. They have achieved this by contact tracing every single case and stopping all new outbreaks. But the US is still trying to learn how to do contact tracing, and without federal leadership on this it is unclear if the US will be able to get proper contact tracing working.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#614

Post by baddox » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:57 AM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #590

tootie wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't be obtuse. Of course all factors were considered. Keeping people out of offices and shops is not a public health risk. People becoming impoverished and losing health insurance is. That's why the federal government spent $2T protecting people's financial health to offset the damage. The bigger question is why health care access is tied to employment, but there's no way the current regime would consider dealing w…

No. Unemployment is generally regarded as a public health risk, beyond the immediate insurance consequences. There will moreover be people who suffer long-term impacts that these short-term payments can only partially mitigate.

That seems like a good argument to expand unemployment benefits during a global pandemic, and I suspect most public health officials would agree.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#615

Post by shibeouya » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:58 AM UTC

When I see health experts saying we can have groups of up to 12 people outside BUT protests up to 100 people, it really does not look good for the credibility of these experts.

Nobody denies that the pandemic is/was a real thing. But at that point it has been politicized ad nauseum and this is bad.

It will for sure have an impact on how much people trust experts, and general trust in experts was already bad before this. But now nobody should dare blame anyone for not believing an expert after the sham we have all seen.

Very sad that the pandemic has stopped being about science but moved to being about politics. Good luck getting compliance if there is, god forbid, a second wave or another more deadly virus in the future.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#616

Post by baddox » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:59 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #510

thisiszilff wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's a shining example of weasel speak. They don't explicitly say it's not risky - because that would be plain lying, it is obviously risky - but they are saying they are not condemning it as risky. Another excerpt from the article state: > "We created the letter in response to emerging narratives that seemed to malign demonstrations as risky for the public health because of Covid-19," according to the letter wri…

The letter is gobbledegook. Police brutality isn’t a “public health problem.” It’s a bad thing, and it may well be that reasonable people feel like protesting police brutality justifies taking the risk of increased COVID-19 transmission. (I certainly feel that way.) They’re deciding that “protesting police brutality is worth some excess deaths from COVID.” But the authors don’t want to own the fact that they’re makin…

According to what definition are you claiming that police brutality is not a public health problem?

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#617

Post by skissane » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 1:59 AM UTC

tootie wrote: post #586

bmmayer1 wrote: post #580

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand -- are keeping people out of work and isolated at home not public health risks? If non-Covid related factors are being considered in weighing against the risks of exposure they should all be considered, not only some of them, selectively.

Don't be obtuse. Of course all factors were considered. Keeping people out of offices and shops is not a public health risk. People becoming impoverished and losing health insurance is. That's why the federal government spent $2T protecting people's financial health to offset the damage. The bigger question is why health care access is tied to employment, but there's no way the current regime would consider dealing w…

> Keeping people out of offices and shops is not a public health risk

Telling people to stay at home all the time does have a negative impact on many people's mental health. It can both exacerbate pre-existing mental illness, and in some cases even cause the new onset of mental illness.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#618

Post by jsperson » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 2:00 AM UTC

Fellshard wrote: post #572

metrokoi wrote: post #90

Quoted from a letter from 1,000 health professionals on the virus and protests [0] >However, as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission. We support them as vital to the national public health and to the threatened health specifically of Black people in the United States. We can show that support by facilitating safest protesting practices without detracting from…

The analysis is quite simple: basic cynicism. Experts are incentivized to maximize results corresponding to their field /in isolation/ - with little or no trade-offs considered. This preserves their reputation, and allows them to recommend within the bounds of their knowledge. If an expert recommends religious institutions continue to hold only remote meetings, they are not going to suffer any consequences, both dire…

Thank you for stating this. I’ve spent a nontrivial amount of time recently on self analysis. To wit: am I racist because I find the doublespeak regarding quarantine/protests to be entirely illogical. Asking these questions on social media is a genuine reputation risk.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#619

Post by banads » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 2:01 AM UTC

thisiszilff wrote: post #581

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #43

I support the protests, and believe they can be done safely, but we can't forget about the virus. A quick googling gives me numbers between 300 and 1000 people dying of police violence per year. Call it 1k-2k per year. If we eliminate 50-100 years of that, we match what coronavirus has done in a couple months. However, places are starting to relax the shelter-in-place rules already, so people going out now isn't comp…

It is important to note that this isn't just about police brutality. There are a number of racial disparities that result in more black deaths. From the letter: > lack people suffer from dramatic health disparities in life expectancy, maternal and infant mortality, chronic medical conditions, and outcomes from acute illnesses like myocardial infarction and sepsis. Biological determinants are insufficient to explain t…

Indeed, white people in the US on average live 3.5 years longer than black people in the US.[1]

Did you know that an even greater health/life expectancy disparity exists between men and women?

One gender on average lives 5.1 years longer than the other.[2]

>decreased access to medical care and healthy food, unsafe working conditions, mass incarceration, exposure to pollution and noise, and the toxic effects of stress.

Likewise all of these issues affect men disproportionately compared to women.

Why is it so popular to talk about these same issues as systemic oppression against group X (relative to group Y), while ignoring or the fact that those same issues affect group XY, often to an even greater degree (relative to group XX)?

[1]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_health_in_the_Unite...

[2]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_ex...

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#620

Post by shibeouya » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 2:02 AM UTC

alkibiades wrote: post #602

smsm42 wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission That's a shining example of weasel speak. They don't explicitly say it's not risky - because that would be plain lying, it is obviously risky - but they are saying they are not condemning it as risky. Which most people would take as implying it's not actually risky - even though they are not saying that. They…

i’m 25 and this whole covid debacle and seeing how public health officials handle it has soured me on all “experts” for the rest of my life. no wonder people don’t believe in global warming, these “experts” prioritize politics over everything

Wholeheartedly agree. I'm in my 30's with scientific education, but I will never take an "expert" opinion seriously after this.

Very sad to see science shoot itself in the foot in the name of dubious politics.