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The plans to reopen the economy are scary

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Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#121

Post by nostromo »

abfan1127 wrote: post #104
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #60

As somebody who has been tracking and interested in this story since late January, the one thing I can without qualifications is that whatever seems true now will change in a few weeks' time. In general the outlook has gotten better as the data got better and we were able to compare notes, although there have been some setbacks, too. I don't think we'll ever, ever get back to "normal" as this is the pandemic we've be…

what do you mean "nobody has ever lived through this?" We've had huge pandemics in the past: the plague, Spanish Flu, measles, polio, smallpox. I agree we should be cautious about reading long-term plans.

Thank you, this context is important. Swine flu killed between 150,000 to 575,000 globally in 2009, and almost nobody even remembers it. HIV is a recent pandemic that many living people have lived through, from discovery to treatment.

And of course the flu, which is different than SARSCoV2, kills between 250,000 and 500,000 each and every year. If you're 30 years old, between 7 and 15 million people have died from flu in your lifetime.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#122

Post by KoftaBob »

Maybe I'm just fed up with how the news has been handling this situation, but I find usage of words like "scary" in a title to be incredibly worthless. If I can't even get to the end of the title without being told how to feel, it speaks volumes about the intentions of the post.

This is just one of the numerous examples of lazy and bad intentioned attempts to use anxiety to convince readers to click the article. The entire journalism industry should be ashamed of how the absolutely miserable way in which they've handled this event.

You need to take a hard look at yourself if your industry revolves around damaging people's mental health in order to draw page views.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#123

Post by alkonaut »

What level of normalcy? Free domestic movement, business open, schools open? That will probably work with some restrictions if social distancing works. Countries are trying different levels of restrictions so it will soon be obvious what works and what doesn’t.

International travel, sports events and other large gatherings I’m not optimistic will be back to normal in 2020 unless something big changes.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#124

Post by blihp »

siscia wrote: post #40

For how much I understand the need to lower the curve and reduce the R0 of the infection, I start to see also another argument. We are basically pausing the life of younger people, indefinitely, to protect the elders. Again, since the quarantine started in my area I exist twice to buy groceries and that's all. So I understand the need and the importance of it. But should I really throw away on year of my life? Should…

You misunderstand the current exercise. The only thing these stay at home policies are designed to do is keep the healthcare system from collapsing by slowing the spread of the virus. That's it since we are way past the point of having any hope of containing it.

Sure, the immediate beneficiaries are those at highest risk from the virus. But younger people who fall on the extreme end of the symptoms would also be dying at relatively higher rates too. Have no fear, once the powers that be are confident that society won't collapse, the stay at home orders will start lifting and life will go on... including allowing people young and old to die at 'acceptable' rates from the virus.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#125

Post by grawprog »

frockington1 wrote: post #44
whatshisface wrote: post #37

He's saying that such-and-such is politically unviable, but that's what we were all saying about business shutdowns, too.

In my state (Ohio) at least, protest are starting to form on the legality and length of shutting down businesses. It's still only a handful of people but seems to be growing every day. There is a very slim chance the government can enact shut downs for long and still maintain authority

Honestly, how long are people going to be able to not pay rent for. I've already seen several businesses in my town permanently shut down at the beginning of April. This is people's livelihoods. People's source of food and shelter. Once people start losing that, authority means nothing any more.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#126

Post by mcnamaratw »

lisper wrote: post #106
siscia wrote: post #40

For how much I understand the need to lower the curve and reduce the R0 of the infection, I start to see also another argument. We are basically pausing the life of younger people, indefinitely, to protect the elders. Again, since the quarantine started in my area I exist twice to buy groceries and that's all. So I understand the need and the importance of it. But should I really throw away on year of my life? Should…

> But should I really throw away on year of my life? You don't have to throw it away. There are plenty of productive ways to spend your time. Yes, social isolation is burdensome. But it's damn sight better than being dead.

Certainly nobody is making the following fictional argument: "I'm not going to die anyway, and it's better for you to be dead than for me to be socially isolated."

Nobody is saying that.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#127

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

gumby wrote: post #86
Hermel wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder whether taking the temperature is enough when combined with social distancing? For that, it would be interesting to know what percentage of people that are infectuous have an elevated temperature. 50% might already be enough, because that means we could cut the infection rate in half just by quarantining everyone with a slight fever.

I don't really understand the point of temperature taking as asymptomatic patients are contagious (sars-cvd-2 is far from alone in this respect). This testing provides a false negative which allows vectors to mix with healthy people -- a false sense of security. You might as well not do it.

All testing has false negatives. The goal is to suppress the disease, not to ensure that nobody at all gets it.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#128

Post by IanDrake »

catalogia wrote: post #116
IanDrake wrote: post #59

As we enter summer, the question no one is asking is: Can mosquitoes transmit this virus like they do malaria?

I don't know enough about them to say for sure, but I haven't heard of any sort of virus being transmitted by mosquitoes. Malaria is caused by a parasite, not a virus.

EEE then. That's a virus transmitted by mosquitoes. Malaria was a bad example.

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#129

Post by shrimp_emoji »

jmt_ wrote: post #77
mymythisisthis wrote: post #66

Lots of business are converting to delivery. I think this is good. The warehouse style of store, prevalent since the 1960s is an outdated model. Schools are moving more courses online. Another major upgrade. The restaurant experience hasn't been rewarding for a long time. People should learn to cook at home. Experiment with fancier cuts of organic meat. Movie theaters have been terrible for decades. Sticky floors, to…

But isn't there something to be said about the kind of human experiences each of the "outdated" industries you mentioned provide? Namely schools, stores, going to movie theaters with friends, etc. People like seeing and being around other people. Some really, really don't, but most do. Moving the majority of activities indoors forever will have a negative impact on the psyche of the most people. I agree that what mos…

>Moving the majority of activities indoors forever will have a negative impact on the psyche of the most people.

So does industrialization as a whole, but I'm not for rolling that back either. Ride the ennui all the way to posthuman psyches. c:

Re: The plans to reopen the economy are scary

#130

Post by viklove »

nostromo wrote: post #121
abfan1127 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what do you mean "nobody has ever lived through this?" We've had huge pandemics in the past: the plague, Spanish Flu, measles, polio, smallpox. I agree we should be cautious about reading long-term plans.

Thank you, this context is important. Swine flu killed between 150,000 to 575,000 globally in 2009, and almost nobody even remembers it. HIV is a recent pandemic that many living people have lived through, from discovery to treatment. And of course the flu, which is different than SARSCoV2, kills between 250,000 and 500,000 each and every year. If you're 30 years old, between 7 and 15 million people have died from fl…

Coronavirus has already killed 100k, and we're still in the first quarter.
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