Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces • Hacker News Board

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#31

Post by mywittyname » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:37 AM UTC

staunch wrote: post #14

nlh wrote: post #9

I predict we’re going to look back at ourselves in a few years and find a few things particularly egregious, much as we look back at “smoking is good for your health!” ads from the 1950s: 1. Our early guidance that masks don’t help (because we needed to save the real masks for healthcare workers); and 2. Our collective obsession around Mar-Apr 2020 with surface disinfecting. The shortage on Clorox wipes, the obsessiv…

1. Was just a flat out lie by various public health officials that they justified for the greater good. It was probably the biggest and easiest-to-prevent mistake of the pandemic, and it certainly cost many lives. 2. It still makes sense to wash hands, use gloves, and wipe down anything coming into your house that was recently touched by strangers. There's no good reason to allow a known vector, even if it's lower ri…

It should have been illegal for health officials to knowingly lie to the public.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#32

Post by nibsfive » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:38 AM UTC

jacobkg wrote: post #27

Serious Question: I have been super paranoid about surfaces for the past year. Disinfecting groceries, quarantining packages, washing hands after touching the mail or opening takeout, etc. This is pretty draining. Should my takeaway be that all of these precautions are unnecessary?

Yes, rounds to totally pointless. Don't be indoors with people is >90% of the risk.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#33

Post by minikites » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:38 AM UTC

nlh wrote: post #9

I predict we’re going to look back at ourselves in a few years and find a few things particularly egregious, much as we look back at “smoking is good for your health!” ads from the 1950s: 1. Our early guidance that masks don’t help (because we needed to save the real masks for healthcare workers); and 2. Our collective obsession around Mar-Apr 2020 with surface disinfecting. The shortage on Clorox wipes, the obsessiv…

>Our early guidance that masks don’t help (because we needed to save the real masks for healthcare workers)

I see this mentioned a lot, is this really a big factor? Did a ton of people genuinely begin the pandemic by believing officials and then after a few weeks start to disbelieve officials? That just doesn't make sense to me. I mostly see this issue used as a bad faith cudgel to justify not wearing a mask now, but someone acting in bad faith would have picked another excuse if it wasn't this one.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#34

Post by sjg007 » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:40 AM UTC

timr wrote: post #20

DanBC wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who on that list is a "renown epidemiologist"?

Sunetra Gupta is a professor of epidemiology at Oxford University: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunetra_Gupta Jay Bhattacharya is a professor of Medicine at Stanford University, and a long-time researcher into public health policy: https://profiles.stanford.edu/jay-bhattacharya Martin Kulldorff is a professor of medicine at Harvard University and Brigham and Women's Hospital, with a long history of research into epi…

There are plenty of dumb "smart" people. Most of those tend to be professors for some reason.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#35

Post by timr » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:40 AM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #23

timr wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration said anything of the sort. This kind of çomment is unhelpful and uncharitable. It's an ad hominem attack.

Here's Bhattacharya in the WSJ: https://www.wsj.com/articles/is-the-coronavirus-as-deadly-as... > An epidemic seed on Jan. 1 implies that by March 9 about six million people in the U.S. would have been infected. As of March 23, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 499 Covid-19 deaths in the U.S. If our surmise of six million cases is accurate, that’s a mortality rate of 0.01%, assum…

You are unfairly mis-representing the piece. They make a number of different calculations to estimate the IFR, based on observations available at the time. They then say the following:

> This does not make Covid-19 a nonissue. The daily reports from Italy and across the U.S. show real struggles and overwhelmed health systems. But a 20,000- or 40,000-death epidemic is a far less severe problem than one that kills two million. Given the enormous consequences of decisions around Covid-19 response, getting clear data to guide decisions now is critical. We don’t know the true infection rate in the U.S. Antibody testing of representative samples to measure disease prevalence (including the recovered) is crucial. Nearly every day a new lab gets approval for antibody testing, so population testing using this technology is now feasible.

> If we’re right about the limited scale of the epidemic, then measures focused on older populations and hospitals are sensible. Elective procedures will need to be rescheduled. Hospital resources will need to be reallocated to care for critically ill patients. Triage will need to improve. And policy makers will need to focus on reducing risks for older adults and people with underlying medical conditions.

> A universal quarantine may not be worth the costs it imposes on the economy, community and individual mental and physical health. We should undertake immediate steps to evaluate the empirical basis of the current lockdowns.

They're very clearly making point estimates to contrast with the prevalent IFR estimates of the time (~2%), which we now know were entirely wrong.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#36

Post by garyrob » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:40 AM UTC

jacobkg wrote: post #27

Serious Question: I have been super paranoid about surfaces for the past year. Disinfecting groceries, quarantining packages, washing hands after touching the mail or opening takeout, etc. This is pretty draining. Should my takeaway be that all of these precautions are unnecessary?

I'm the same way. My logic is: It may be very rare that it's a problem, but if it does happen that someone with the virus coughs on my groceries, mail, etc., then it's dangerous, even if it isn't a risk just due to them touching those things. I'd rather not take the risk.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#37

Post by evan_ » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:40 AM UTC

timr wrote: post #20

DanBC wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who on that list is a "renown epidemiologist"?

Sunetra Gupta is a professor of epidemiology at Oxford University: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunetra_Gupta Jay Bhattacharya is a professor of Medicine at Stanford University, and a long-time researcher into public health policy: https://profiles.stanford.edu/jay-bhattacharya Martin Kulldorff is a professor of medicine at Harvard University and Brigham and Women's Hospital, with a long history of research into epi…

From the Wikipedia link you posted:

> She is one of the primary authors of the Great Barrington Declaration, a widely-discredited paper[15] which advocated a focused response to the COVID-19 pandemic based on levels of individual risk.[16][17] The World Health Organization, as well as other numerous academic and public-health bodies, have stated that the strategy proposed by the Declaration is dangerous, unethical, and lacks a sound scientific basis.

Cool!

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#38

Post by timr » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:41 AM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #29

timr wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sunetra Gupta is a professor of epidemiology at Oxford University: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunetra_Gupta Jay Bhattacharya is a professor of Medicine at Stanford University, and a long-time researcher into public health policy: https://profiles.stanford.edu/jay-bhattacharya Martin Kulldorff is a professor of medicine at Harvard University and Brigham and Women's Hospital, with a long history of research into epi…

Gupta: "I think that the epidemic has largely come and is on the way out in [the United Kingdom]", in May 2020. Renowned people can still be full of shit. > All of the authors are respected academics in the field of medicine, health policy and epidemiology. s/are/were

> Renowned people can still be full of shit.

And this tone is certainly rational and charitable.

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#39

Post by seppin » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:41 AM UTC

Capira wrote: post #4

A group of renown epidemiologists from Stanford, Oxford and Harvard demand: "Those who are not vulnerable should immediately be allowed to resume life as normal." http://gbdeclaration.org/

Heard immunity. At this point. Seriously?

Re: Coronavirus is in the air – there’s too much focus on surfaces

#40

Post by gxqoz » Wed, Feb 03, 2021, 2:42 AM UTC

One thing I'm curious about is whether all this extra "deep cleaning" is going to have other negative health consequences. i.e. from increased indoor concentrations of the chemicals used to do the cleaning.