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In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

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Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#41

Post by meaningjoj »

For the mathematically-minded, it is worth noting that the Asian flu had an R naught of 1.7 while Covid had an R naught of a bit more than 2.

Keeping in mind these are fat-tailed distributions. So an R naught of 2 is a estimate of a true R naught, and because using sample averages to estimate means (true R naught is a mean) is unstable (the fatter the tail, the less moments of the distribution there are), once the reported number starts getting upwards of 2, the less confidence you can have that that reported number represents the true R naught. You have know idea if the superspreaders are infecting 50 or 500 people.

At the beginning of the pandemic, we were seeing R naughts estimates at 2.5. That's shockingly high. People were right to take extreme members in the face of that kind of uncertainty.

These people enforcing their values with 20-20 hindsight when the decisions were made given limited data at the time are causing harm to our collective ability to make decisions in emergencies.

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#42

Post by elcritch »

toomanyrichies wrote: post #38
EatingWithForks wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not necessarily that they're bad it's just that they're likely not a valuable source of acquiring information outside of what supports a specific position. Like I wouldn't necessarily trust an oil baron to tell me about how global warming doesn't really exist, or I don't necessarily believe Disney's Iger to tell me about how the writing and acting strikes are entitled whining nonsense.

Never ask a barber if you need a haircut.

Wouldn't that apply to epidemiologists as well?

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#43

Post by Manuel_D »

somewhat_drunk wrote: post #30
Thoeu388 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Excess mortality....the number of deaths * from all causes* during a crisis My friend killed himself because of lockdown. I guess he is a covid victim. Very convinient.

Unless you believe that 90% of the excess deaths were not directly related to COVID, your implied point falls flat. Edit: There were 1.1 million COVID deaths in the USA alone. https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

Over the span of 3 years. To put this in perspective a typical flu year claims ~40K people each year. So Covid over this time span killed about 10X as many people as a typical flu year.

If you told people "hey, this year the flu is going to be very bad, probably killing 10 times as many people" would the average response be to close schools and many businesses for over a year? Or would the response be to limit lockdowns to vulnerable populations, rather than blanket lockdowns on most of society?

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#44

Post by coding123 »

radiator wrote: post #31
CobaltFire wrote: post #2

AIER seems to be a Conservative/Libertarian think tank that's anti-climate science, among other stances, including anti-lockdown (what this article is about). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Institute_for_Economi...

Are you implying that we should only be reading articles by Liberal/Progressive think tanks?

At this point I'm already dismissing CNN and NPR out of hand, I guess it only makes sense for it to go the other way too.

3 Years ago I was actually on the other side too. Wow what a journey.

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#45

Post by Aloha »

hristov wrote: post #33

The US government estimated that the asian flu pandemic had a CFR (case fatality rate) in the American population of 0.1 %. [1] The US government estimated that Covid-19 had a CFR in the american population of 1%. [2] So Covid was only ten times deadlier. But certainly we should have had the same response. Those "libertarian" organizations are getting less and less veiled about their hatred of humanity. Sometimes I w…

I think the lockdowns are a mixed bag, yes many people didnt die from COVID because of them - but many (smaller number) people did die of things not COVID from them.

I still think on a numbers perspective that the lockdowns saved more lives than not locking down would have - but it does not help the cause of "keeping that tool in the public health toolbox" to not acknowledge the externalities of its face - its not a completely benign policy without externalities - its just significantly less bad than the alternatives.

I think we should study this more, to try to form a consensus when a lockdown is appropriate. I think a COVID scale illness is, but when does that cease to be true? half of one? 3/4? who knows, we've not spent much time thinking about it yet.

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#47

Post by UncleOxidant »

Tagbert wrote: post #19
mcpackieh wrote: post #7

Besides the economic harm and potential developmental harm induced by closing schools for kids, I think lockdowns did incalculable social harm to society. It gave huge swaths of the population a grudge against the system, a chip on their shoulder that won't go away anytime soon. It burned up goodwill and trust for experts and politicians (who generally didn't have much to spare in the first place.) And coupling this…

There already was a chip on the shoulder of a large number of American and that has been fed and grown by certain media and social channels specifically to undermine trust in institutions and checks on power. The lockdown (that wasn't locked down) was just more fuel on that well-feed fire.

Exactly. Initially "lockdowns" (and I hesitate to even call them that here in the US, we didn't have literal lockdowns like China had where they welded doors shut on apartments) were seen as positive - "flatten the curve to help our healthcare workers and keep our hospitals from being overrun". Pretty soon, though, they started getting very negative framing from right-wing social media, etc.

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#48

Post by rewmie »

mcpackieh wrote: post #7

Besides the economic harm and potential developmental harm induced by closing schools for kids, I think lockdowns did incalculable social harm to society. It gave huge swaths of the population a grudge against the system, a chip on their shoulder that won't go away anytime soon. It burned up goodwill and trust for experts and politicians (who generally didn't have much to spare in the first place.) And coupling this…

> Besides the economic harm and potential developmental harm induced by closing schools for kids, I think lockdowns did incalculable social harm to society.

Don't confuse correlation with causality.

You had politicians abusing the covid pandemic with accusations of being a made-up conspiracy and in the process enticing hatred towards health officials who enacted standard public health policies, to the point that hardline militants even attacked them for suggesting that people should wash their hands.

After over a year of this blend of propaganda permeating society, of course you'll have the most vulnerable segment of society, overly represented by the undereducated, building up an uneducated grudge against society in general and in particular against "the system", whatever they were told to believe that might be.

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#49

Post by blacksqr »

Linked article claims that a vaccine was developed late and had minimal impact.

Elsewhere, the case has been made that the vaccine was developed and deployed rapidly before the virus took full hold, and halted the pandemic in its tracks.

https://daily.jstor.org/how-america-brought-the-1957-influen...

Re: In the Asian Flu of 1957-58, they rejected lockdowns (2021)

#50

Post by drewcoo »

For context, the US had just gone through a polio epidemic, starting ~1949.

Before Salk's vaccine was discovered and widely used (~'54) there was polio hysteria, public places were avoided, "unclean" Italians were shunned, as were cats. It was a ridiculous overreaction. Too soon for anyone to be fooled again.

Strangely, none of that is mentioned in an article about US reaction to a pandemic just three years later.

https://www.history.com/news/polio-fear-post-wwii-era

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