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Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

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Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#771

Post by MengerSponge »

marcell wrote: post #763
oramit wrote: post #722

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually chose stomp over eradicate because I wanted to imply that there would still be some left but that it would be a manageable amount. That's interesting that you took it the opposite way; I'm sorry for the confusion. I agree, eradication was probably impossible in the United States. What I thought we all agreed on at the start of this thing was to lock down so we could "flatten the curve". Remember that? Whil…

Well if you take eradication off the table, then you have to assume the entire susceptible population will eventually get the virus. So I guess, I don't see the benefit of "stomping" the virus down to some small level. It was at a very small level back in February, and then grew. If we get it back down to that small level, it will just grow again. There's no benefit to locking down for 3 months to have it grow in Jul…

Effective testing and contact tracing is sufficient to dramatically reduce the spread of the virus.

If we're a year away from a vaccine or treatment, then we don't need to burn down society to stop it this month. But if we act in a way that causes millions of infections, we're inflicting unnecessary harm on thousands.

We've also learned more about how to keep people alive and how to slow the spread of the virus since February, so it's useful to postpone that exponential growth as long as possible.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#772

Post by theonething »

wegs wrote: post #750
theonething wrote: post #744

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you believe keeping schools closed is better than reopening? Have you looked into the research? Most of my findings indicate that the benefits of opening safely outweigh the the risks and the adverse effects of school closure (to the children, families and society) outweigh the benefits. Just one quote out of many: > Weighing the health risks of reopening K-12 schools in fall 2020 against the educational risks…

That's not research. That's opinion pieces from research organizations. There's a question of values, which is a personal question. I don't want the moral weight of risking that my child catch COVID19 and cause someone else to die. If I were a teacher, I wouldn't want to be in a position where a mistake I make can make people die. I can run the numbers as well as the next guy, and I know the risks. I don't want my sc…

I agree that a large part of it is a personal/cultural decision. I wouldn't frame it as pro reopening school people prioritize schooling over life though. That sounds pretty bad and doesn't seem fair.

Whenever I get into a car and drive, I risk death and injury to myself, my passengers and other people on the road.

I weigh the risks and benefits and make a decision that driving is worth the risk. Does that mean I value the convenience of driving over life? I don't think so.

And for the record. I'm actually undecided on the issue of reopening schools. Like many people, I assumed not reopening was obviously the rational and sane choice. But when I looked into it, I found differing data and opinions from scientific sources so it made me reconsider.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#773

Post by fanimalmanimal »

marcell wrote: post #763
oramit wrote: post #722

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually chose stomp over eradicate because I wanted to imply that there would still be some left but that it would be a manageable amount. That's interesting that you took it the opposite way; I'm sorry for the confusion. I agree, eradication was probably impossible in the United States. What I thought we all agreed on at the start of this thing was to lock down so we could "flatten the curve". Remember that? Whil…

Well if you take eradication off the table, then you have to assume the entire susceptible population will eventually get the virus. So I guess, I don't see the benefit of "stomping" the virus down to some small level. It was at a very small level back in February, and then grew. If we get it back down to that small level, it will just grow again. There's no benefit to locking down for 3 months to have it grow in Jul…

If you keep the infection rate low enough you can keep the hospitals from being over capacity and also delay infections until after a vaccine is developed and administered, thus preventing the infection. Both of these states would have the benefit of reducing the total number of deaths. When the lockdown talk started, I thought that was the point.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#774

Post by dehrmann »

selectodude wrote: post #640
jedberg wrote: post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Their outcomes are pretty similar, in terms of deaths per capita, to the United States. Except that they are all now on downward trajectories while being more open (as opposed to the US, which is on an upward trajectory). Travel is allowed in Europe. Schools are open. Bars are open. And they are still on a downward trajectory.

And furthermore, there are locations in the United States that have handled the virus pretty well and are powerless to stop people from coming up there and messing it all up. “Mike, from Old Town, who did not want to share his last name, ordered a vodka Red Bull before getting back in line with friends at Old Crow Smokehouse’s curbside bar. He had just gotten back from a vacation in Dallas, Texas, with a friend, wher…

> What the hell are we supposed to do about that with zero national plan?

Looking at California, a state where borders are mostly in remote areas that aren't especially porous (compared to NYC/NJ), there's still be a huge surge, and nothing points to borders being the reason. It's mostly state and county-level policy. States around NYC seem to have stomped it down relatively well, despite there being three states involved.

The US is huge and diverse, so you're not going to get a "national plan." The best you can hope for is guidance.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#775

Post by thephyber »

mistermann wrote: post #384
thephyber wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want an increase in mask supply, you have to either allow the pricing mechanism to do its job, or force people to make masks. Those aren't the only options. Some mask manufacturers could scale up manufacturing as long as they had a medium/long term contract to make the investment worth it. The current administration keeps blaming the previous one for drawing down on the federal PPP supply without replenishin…

> The current administration keeps blaming the previous one for drawing down on the federal PPP supply without replenishing it (dubious claim), so there was exactly zero reason for this[1] to happen. The claim is "dubious", so ( therefore ) there was exactly no reason for this to happen? https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dubious - "questionable or suspect as to true nature or quality" https://www.merriam-web…

The "dubious" claim (I was imprecise and meant to credit it to the president's quote, not the "without replenishing it") was basically affirmed by your Politifact link.

More importantly, the current president didn't spend the first 3 years in office replenishing the stockpile and didn't take an offer from a former mask manufacturer very early in the outbreak to increase the production rate.

[1] https://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/nation/2020/04/02/trump...

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#776

Post by sdenton4 »

marcell wrote: post #763
oramit wrote: post #722

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually chose stomp over eradicate because I wanted to imply that there would still be some left but that it would be a manageable amount. That's interesting that you took it the opposite way; I'm sorry for the confusion. I agree, eradication was probably impossible in the United States. What I thought we all agreed on at the start of this thing was to lock down so we could "flatten the curve". Remember that? Whil…

Well if you take eradication off the table, then you have to assume the entire susceptible population will eventually get the virus. So I guess, I don't see the benefit of "stomping" the virus down to some small level. It was at a very small level back in February, and then grew. If we get it back down to that small level, it will just grow again. There's no benefit to locking down for 3 months to have it grow in Jul…

Time does wonders. We have much better knowledge of treatment options than we had in March, which makes a real difference in lives lost. And eventually, we might (might!) get vaccines. So the longer the curve is flat, the more time we have to learn and craft better interventions.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus...

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#777

Post by isthispermanent »

samatman wrote: post #668
marcell wrote: post #540

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we didn't follow through with the lockdown nationally to actually stomp the virus This statement implies that there's a way to completely eradicate the virus, eg. if everyone in the world stays locked in their homes for 6 weeks, then the virus will be eradicated. That's not realistic, the level of coordination required to make that happen does not exist. So eradicating the virus was never on the table, no matter ho…

It appears to have worked for New Zealand, though notably, not anywhere else, even Australia. So you can argue that it was infeasible, and I would have to agree with you. But you can't argue it was impossible.

Not infeasible no, I agree.

But, if you want to know what draconian policy really is, you can look at NZ. That place is no joke. It's state-managed isolation or a quarantine facility for at least 14 days and until you test negative.

There are a bunch of reports of people breaking out of these facilities after having been there for more than a month. Just zero chance this would work in America.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#778

Post by LanceH »

gruez wrote: post #588
Zpalmtree wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you misinterpreted what he was suggesting - it is meaningless to say that Hillary won the popular vote because neither party were trying to win the popular vote - you win the presidency by winning the electoral college. If instead the president was chosen by popular vote, both parties likely would have campaigned differently.

>I think you misinterpreted what he was suggesting - it is meaningless to say that Hillary won the popular vote because neither party were trying to win the popular vote - you win the presidency by winning the electoral college. This is a non-sequitur. Whether or not that metric (popular vote) has a bearing on the results of presidential election is irrelevant to the statement of whether he won in that metric. Furthe…

You don't win a metric.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#779

Post by int_19h »

prof-dr-ir wrote: post #729
int_19h wrote: post #621

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social distancing isn't really contentious in US (other than the subset of the population that believes that COVID is hoax). "Stay home" is one of those things that are on every list of recommendations, but it's completely non-viable in practice because of the way US handles healthcare in work context. Keep in mind that there is no federal requirement for paid sick leave, and only 13 states mandate it. Consequently,…

Those are some very good points, thank you. The lack of paid sick leave makes me both sad and worried. My guess is that changing that situation, even temporarily, could make a big difference in containing the pandemic. I could not find a reliable source that ascribes Japan's relative success to masks. Some ideas are discussed in https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53188847 . The advice from Japan's ministry of health…

In Japan, it's not that the government forced everybody to wear masks - it's that people just did that, with nearly 100% conformance.

We aren't certain that it's masks. But they did little else (e.g. no lockdowns or travel restrictions); so it's either masks, or something unknown. Occam's Razor says masks are more likely.

There are other anecdotal cases about mask efficiency. E.g. there is a hair salon in US where two hairdressers got COVID, and they served 139 clients in 8 days, before testing positive; one was symptomatic for the entire period, the other one for 5 days. Per company policy, they wore mask consistently while working with clients.

During that time period, they infected 4 people - but all of these were their family or roommates. None of the clients they serviced developed symptoms then or within a month, and of the half who consented to testing, none tested positive.

Besides, we do have good reasons to believe that masks are efficient just based on physics and biology alone. We do know that masks are definitely effective at stopping saliva droplets, and we do know that droplets definitely spread COVID. So even if it has other vectors (e.g. aerosols), masks would still reduce the overall viral load, and thus chances of infection.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#780

Post by vondur »

strgcmc wrote: post #615
watwut wrote: post #593

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Complete eradication is not what Europe nor China are doing and have better results.

This. And maybe we shouldn't trust China's reported data, but Europe is almost doing miraculously well if you compare to the USA. Not going for eradication, but containment. With containment, everything else is possible (healthcare system not overloaded, economy can be opened up, schools can reopen, etc.). The US has capitulated completely, and even containment isn't really on the table nationally; on a state-by-stat…

Where in the US is the health care system overwhelmed?
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