The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe • Hacker News Board

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#121

Post by pbourke » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:44 AM UTC

sto_hristo wrote: post #95

threeseed wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lockdowns work. End of story. Melbourne, Australia had a 4-month lockdown which turned an exponentially-rising 500+ cases a day scenario into elimination. Saving thousands of lives. No other place has managed to do something similar and it shows hotel quarantine of foreign arrivals, aggressive contact-tracing, mandatory mask-wearing, social distancing and lockdowns work. The Swedish laissez-faire approach does not.

Australia is big and sparely populated compared to other countries that implemented full lockdowns. Also, it's summer down there, with heat waves, etc. All of this diminishes virus' ability to spread. It's very situational. Australia is not doing anything more special than other countries. You gotta look into the meaning of these numbers and just the value. Lockdowns do work, technically speaking, but not in the long…

It was winter in Australia when they locked down in August, and the outbreak’s epicenter was Melbourne, which is a large city.

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#122

Post by josephg » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:44 AM UTC

freeone3000 wrote: post #100

josephg wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When did you start? Because of the incubation period, covid numbers are effectively delayed 2 weeks. That is to say, there's a 2 week delay between the time your government changes policies and when you see the effect of those policies on covid case numbers. It took us awhile too - after they brought the lockdown into effect our numbers kept going up for awhile - which was terrifying. But the numbers trended down eve…

December 26th, in order to not get in the way of Christmas celebrations. Since our numbers dropped by half, they're looking to reopen on the 8th.

Looking at the case numbers, that looks pretty similar to the numbers here in Victoria. You're down from a peak of 3000/day on Jan 9, (as predicted, a couple weeks after your brought your lockdowns into effect) down to 1600/day.

Looks like the policy is working and you'll hit 0 if you keep it up for a few more months. Why are you stopping?

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#123

Post by ldx77 » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:44 AM UTC

__blockcipher__ wrote: post #32

kiba wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. If it means I can actually go to the gym and workout, meet my friends, etc. I am tired of wearing the god damn masks, having to worry about my elderly parents, Are you tired of the god damn pandemic? I know I am. Because we already have no freedom.

Ethics of mandates aside, there’s no strong evidence that universal cloth masking in a community setting reduces transmissions, and many theoretical mechanisms by which they could worsen transmission (increased aerosol generation, deeper breaths to maintain o2 homeostasis leading to more absolute aerosols, improper handling->contamination, altered social behavior, having to speak louder or closer). So, I would argue…

The people in charge certainly seem to think that our lives can be put on hold indefinitely.

For me the most annoying thing is the idea that lockdown is somehow "saving" lives. People who are dying from COVID would have died from something else 2-3 years from now. These are old, sick people, whose lives are (mostly) behind them.

If I was an 80 yo and my grand-kids were put in prison to allow me to live a couple more years, I would be even more angry than I am right now.

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#124

Post by gridspy » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:45 AM UTC

icelancer wrote: post #112

mkl wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible to close borders without being on an island. I (in NZ) don't think the the island factor is essential. The USA has more active military personnel than almost any other country, enough to make closing borders pretty easy compared with many other places.

>> I (in NZ) don't think the the island factor is essential. Why are the countries consistently being cited for doing good jobs in this thread seem to be island nations? Exclude AUS and NZ from the analysis and there are very few landlocked countries doing a good job without very authoritarian measures that are unlikely to be legal in the countries doing poorly.

Probably because our (NZ) governments are simpler. The entire New Zealand government is probably more similar to a state legislature than it is to the US govt.

The UK could have also succeeded but the government didn't have the will to even try early on. Now they are only willing to take half measures.

Also, we DID (NZ, AUZ) have a small advantage since we had less inbound infected for a few weeks early on due to distance. But then again, other nations (US, UK, ...) didn't even try to pursue an elimination strategy.

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#125

Post by threeseed » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:45 AM UTC

icelancer wrote: post #94

josephg wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Australian here, living in Victoria (where we had a second wave and a strict lockdown that took us to 0). They didn't round up the whole country and put us in prison (!?). The rules we had were: - Stay home. The only allowed reasons to leave our homes were essential supplies (eg visiting the supermarket), caring for family, going to work (if you couldn't work from home) or exercise (eg going for a walk). Or if you ne…

Are we going to ignore the fact AUS and NZ are island nations who have nearly permanently banned international arrivals unless there's a 14 day quarantine upon entering, and sometimes that's not even allowed? The United States can't stop illegal immigration and cross-border state travel with or without a pandemic. The laws and expectations are significantly different in connected regions like the US and EU compared t…

You do know that EU countries implemented border controls last year blocking off Schengen travel ?

They could've easily continued that and added mandatory hotel quarantine.

Just like now with Macron they instead prefer to choose populism instead of tough, early, decisive action.

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#126

Post by icelancer » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:46 AM UTC

gridspy wrote: post #120

icelancer wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Shut down the highway off-ramps into towns with some sort of inter-state quarantine scheme (make this legal) "Make this legal" is a pretty hand-wavy way to say that it isn't legal and isn't likely to become legal. Restricting interstate travel is going to be very difficult to both achieve and to survive federal court challenges. Some toolkits are not available to some countries. The United States is unlikely to be…

I concur it was hand-wavy. I'd hope there was some acceptable measure you could get through the courts here in the name of health. Such a barrier is only really essential when different states have different rules. If you could get all states to agree on a lock-down it would go a long way. You might be able to set up quarantine barriers as you exit the interstate? I don't know. Personally, I think it is terms like "l…

>> I'd hope there was some acceptable measure you could get through the courts here in the name of health.

Interstate commerce clause is going to be nearly impossible to subvert in courts, much less state autonomy, and non-cooperating governors (primarily Republican, I'm sure, but Gov. Polis likely wouldn't go for it either).

>> Talk about the issues, not some made up catch all names like "libertarian"

My comment was downvoted -3 before I even mentioned the word "libertarian." COVID has a way of bringing out the authoritarians in HN.

I am not either. I see the value in authoritarian measures, I really do. I also realize they won't work in the US because of both compliance and lack of legal purchase.

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#127

Post by andylynch » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:46 AM UTC

icelancer wrote: post #89

gridspy wrote: post #82

As a citizen of New Zealand I believe a short, sharp lock-down combined with test & contact trace is the only route to zero. I think that this option is far far better than being in "half measures" restrictions for very long periods of time. When a country announces their lock-down measures I feel excited for their populace that they might finally be heading to zero. Then I read the holes in the measures: - Resturant…

>> I can't wait for other countries to simply copy the New Zealand quarantine rules When the United States of America can relocate to an island and near-permanently ban travel into the country like NZ has, we'll do that, I guess. EDIT: Ah yes, HN the libertarian paradise unless it's about COVID, then the recommendations are non-practical authoritarian measures and citing island nation success and hurling downvotes. K…

Have a look at Vietnam then, they have handled this really well. Or for ans even better comparison to the US, China. There’s a lot to criticise about the CCP including their initial response and transparency, but it seems pretty clear they are now on top of it using similar tactics.

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#128

Post by saiya-jin » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:47 AM UTC

gridspy wrote: post #82

As a citizen of New Zealand I believe a short, sharp lock-down combined with test & contact trace is the only route to zero. I think that this option is far far better than being in "half measures" restrictions for very long periods of time. When a country announces their lock-down measures I feel excited for their populace that they might finally be heading to zero. Then I read the holes in the measures: - Resturant…

New Zealand had it very easy with its geography. Same for other relatively small islands. Place like EU with its own national, often competing goals can't be effectively 100% locked out. That's what happens when you have a federation with strong independent parts.

Not that I disagree with your points, they should be the baseline for any serious covid response. Lockdown measures have so far always been watered down by politicians due to pressures from business. Business is this time acting staggeringly idiotically, prolonging the situation due to fear of complete shutdown. At the end, they get hurt much more.

Some local info - Swiss are faring quite well, while not having that many things closed, ie ski resorts work (since its outdoor activity). Not restricting traveling within country. France on the other hand is going again mental (liberté has long abandoned the place of revolution, but that's happen when you go extreme left in real world). Closing many basic things, but ie annual sales in shopping centres were going very strong till today.

I mean how fucking stupid you can be, close outdoor business giving salaries to significant part of population, and on the other side allowing large indoor gatherings of people so they can buy cheap clothes and stores can clean their stock. Even now they only close those > 20,000m2 surface.

Outdoor activities also keep many people sane and in good health, which at this point is becoming significant negative side effect of this whole situation. Most people I know, including myself, the fitness level declined in last year. That is tightly coupled with mental health. At least spring will fix things up a bit (looking forward to run in the park again, more sun, less rain).

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#129

Post by mewse » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:48 AM UTC

prox wrote: post #49

threeseed wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lockdowns work. End of story. Melbourne, Australia had a 4-month lockdown which turned an exponentially-rising 500+ cases a day scenario into elimination. Saving thousands of lives. No other place has managed to do something similar and it shows hotel quarantine of foreign arrivals, aggressive contact-tracing, mandatory mask-wearing, social distancing and lockdowns work. The Swedish laissez-faire approach does not.

Is there a good place I could read about how Australia did it?

This might be a bit low-level, but the Wikipedia page [1] has a pretty good blow-by-blow description of events.

I recommend looking at the Victoria section of that page, as Victoria had by far the largest outbreak to cope with.

For a more high-level overview, I like the BBC’s article, which talks about their opinions on the most important steps taken by the government, as well as the most critical mistakes. Note that it dates to October of last year and so doesn’t include mention of the three cases which induced a brief tightening of lockdown for a few weeks after the article was published.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Australia

[2]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-54654646

Re: The Virus Changed. Now We Must ‘Get to Zero’ or Face Catastrophe

#130

Post by lordnacho » Sun, Jan 31, 2021, 9:48 AM UTC

strogonoff wrote: post #111

lordnacho wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While it's true they have a reason to misrepresent, I think it would be fairly obvious if hospitals were overrun with patients. The great firewall is not so high that that message wouldn't come out. They had good reason to keep the prison camps in Xinjiang secret too, but that came out, and there's a lot fewer of those than hospitals.

I just don’t think many messages come out at all (considering bans on inbound travel and recent crackdowns on documentary uses of social media), and especially from outside of larger cities.

Any population of Chinese speakers in the west is going to know someone there on Wechat. I've talked to friends there as well, there's no major problem now. By contrast when things were bad in Wuhan people were reporting it.

On top of that there's plenty of foreign reporters there, and plenty of foreign diplomats who would also notice.