641–650 of 1001 posts
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Nobody thinks those things are trivial, but they do think stopping the pandemic is more important. If I told you to leave your house because it was on fire, would you accuse me of trivializing your daily routine?
False equivalence
Wow with these comments. You going to the gym is not saving the economy. Yes, we can't shut everything down but you'd think the article was about shutting down grocery stores or the stock market. And by not doing your part, your whole community could be stunted for 2 years. Also congratulations for not caring about a 1 in 200 chance of death (pretty high by the way) because you're healthy and passing on the risk to s…
Wow with these comments. You going to the gym is not saving the economy. Yes, we can't shut everything down but you'd think the article was about shutting down grocery stores or the stock market. And by not doing your part, your whole community could be stunted for 2 years. Also congratulations for not caring about a 1 in 200 chance of death (pretty high by the way) because you're healthy and passing on the risk to s…
I travelled all over Europe past two months and I must say Europe is quite laxed. And there cases haven’t really gone up. Pretty much every outdoor cafes in Europe were open with a few exceptions and I didn’t see much difference other than people wearing masks and social distancing between tables. I think in US everything is polarized and politicized. To the point that wearing masks is somehow considered against free…
I'm not sure I follow here - what is missing on that front? They have explained why the mask recommendation changed and how they got to their initial recommendation. Not sure how much more they could do there.
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This is a gross mischaracterizatuon of the posters argument. They are claiming that, based on the information they provided, the people they’re referring to are making a rational choice. Working off of different information is a different matter. They also never claimed that covid is comparable to lightning, just that if you’re under 30 you’re more likely to be struck by lightning than die of covid (I cant speak to t…
> (I cant speak to the statistical truth of this, but that’s beside the point) Is it beside the point? It's false. Lightning kills about 50 people a year in the US [1]. It's frankly fairly rare to get struck by lightning [2]. More people under 34 have died from COVID-19 per month since April than die from lightning in a year [3] (quick note that the breakdown is 25-34). That's to say nothing of long term health impac…
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If people like you wont wear a mask or social distance and the portion that are asymptomatic pass it around you will help it spread far and wide maximizing the chances that even careful people will become ill eventually. Wearing a mask is mostly about keeping the respiratory droplets of the ill, including the 40-50% which don't have obvious symptoms from spreading around. If only the vulnerable wear masks they wont b…
I'm sorry, but I'm not willing to sacrifice a lot of my freedom to prevent unhealthy or old people to die. You could tell me that I'm wrong, but as far as I know, I'm the only one able to know how I want to live my life
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> Maybe because nobody successfully proved to these people (me included) that this sacrifice is useful. > people who are at risk of dying can protect themselves even around sick people (wearing a mask, staying at home, washing hands, ...) This makes it clear "nobody successfully proved" really means "I didn't bother to listen". The messaging on masks has long been "they reduce transmission by infected people", not "t…
I'm still surprised there is so much misinformation about this. There are two categories of masks. The first category only prevent you from spreading the disease. These include paper surgical masks, cloth masks and those blue disposable paper masks. These are only made to prevent you from spreading droplets in the air from your moth and nose. If someone with covid isn't wearing a mask this category won't do anything…
Are you saying there have been studies showing approximately 0% reduced risk of infection from wearing a paper or cloth mask?
I'd have assumed that these masks are much less effective than an N95, but I haven't seen any data showing they have no effect.
Working out in a mask is very tough. It is a difficulty enhancement. I dance in a mask at a pace similar to jogging and that is hard enough. I wouldn't want to try to do a full workout that way. That would be the first order to get ignored. Is there a way to work out safely? Complete air replacement and surface disinfection. That can realistically only be done outdoors. As a club kid who refuses to grow up, I bring m…
> Working out in a mask is very tough. It is a difficulty enhancement. I bike 25km every day wearing a full P100 respirator, the kind with replaceable cartridges that catch organic vapors, like for spraying paint. It’s fine, and not a significant burden. People complaining about masks are just that: complaining. Respirators are built for doing hard, strenuous labor in hazardous conditions. If demo crews can manage it…
The UN estimated [0][1] that between 83 million and 132 million people will go hungry around the world because of anti-COVID measures. Some of these people will die from starvation or malnutrition. Some of them will die from other preventable health problems later in life.
According to the Stop TB Partnership, a three-month lockdown followed by a gradual return to normal over 10 months could result in an additional 6.3 million cases of tuberculosis and 1.4 million deaths between 2020 and 2025. [2][3]
It's also plausible that lockdowns could lead to hundreds of thousands of additional deaths from each of HIV/AIDS [4], malaria [5], and several other diseases, though I'm not as confident about these numbers.
I am sure someone will be tempted to respond with some variant on "we could have avoided these deaths by tuning the stay-at-home restrictions more competently." Of course, that's true; but the point is that we didn't. We never do. Historically, every society that has tried to eliminate "non-essential" jobs through central planning has eventually found that even when the planners operate with the very best of intentions, they still make mistakes. Dealing with one problem causes a cascade of other subtle changes with real, harmful consequences, which are harder to mitigate when people aren't allowed to freely choose how to spend their own resources. Meanwhile, problems that are judged to be less important are forgotten, because planners can only focus on a limited number of tasks at one time. Human societies are incredibly complex. Trying to manage them from the top is like developing software using the waterfall model: it would work perfectly with perfect planning, but we all know how that works out in real life.
On a personal level: a relative passed away from cancer recently. Cancer isn't a good way to die at the best of times; and I'll be honest, she almost certainly would not have survived even with better medical treatment. But if hospitals hadn't shut down "elective" and "non-essential" care, she could have gone through a lot less pain and suffering. I am not trying to use this as a bludgeon – I understand there are also a lot of people who have suffered greatly from COVID, and of course, we should make policy based on what's best for everyone rather than a small number of anecdotes. But when I read comments saying things like "I don't know how to explain to you that you should care about other people"... let's just say that I don't know how to respond to that without severely violating HN guidelines.
[0]: https://data.unicef.org/resources/sofi-2020/
[1]: https://africa.cgtn.com/2020/07/17/who-urges-world-not-to-fo...
[2]: http://www.stoptb.org/assets/documents/news/Modeling%20Repor...
[3]: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/03/health/coronavirus-tuberc...
[4]: https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/11-05-2020-the-cost-of-...
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If people like you wont wear a mask or social distance and the portion that are asymptomatic pass it around you will help it spread far and wide maximizing the chances that even careful people will become ill eventually. Wearing a mask is mostly about keeping the respiratory droplets of the ill, including the 40-50% which don't have obvious symptoms from spreading around. If only the vulnerable wear masks they wont b…
I'm sorry, but I'm not willing to sacrifice a lot of my freedom to prevent unhealthy or old people to die. You could tell me that I'm wrong, but as far as I know, I'm the only one able to know how I want to live my life
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Dude (or dudess or whatever), Fed literally has positions in all sorts of stocks, including bankrupt HTZ. How is that not "buying the stock market"?
Wrong. Fed did not purchase a single share of HTZ. They hold two ETFs that include Hertz corporate bonds . Not stocks. Bonds. And not new issues.
There has actually been interesting speculation that the Fed will eventually buy stocks similar to the Bank of Japan over the past few decades [1] but the Fed hasn’t done it yet.
[1]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevincoldiron/2020/07/18/the-fe...
(Edit: Maybe GP was thinking that bankruptcy could lead to debt converting into equity? But even then the Fed’s holding would be indirect and the bond ETF probably wouldn’t hold onto the equity.)