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The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

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Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#141
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether or not global lockdowns would have worked, I prefer a world in which you can get covid to one in which the government can confine you to your house. You're welcome to move to China if you prefer the latter approach - or just confine yourself to your house yourself...

In fact I have mostly confined myself to my house. I can work remotely and we have an income sufficient to rely on instacart and delivery for food. We go out for walks in the neighborhood but we avoid going in stores or restaurants except on rare occasions. We've taken one vacation (during the lull before omicron became a thing) and we'll try and take another vacation this summer but, otherwise, we're trying our best…

> I don't think your comments about moving to China are at all productive to the dialog though.

I want to address this. Why is it not productive? One great thing about the world is that we have different jurisdictions that value different things, so they can compete and like minded people can potentially get together somewhere and live as they want. Many people are moving to Florida e.g. because of its approach to covid. If you want the opposite, and your initial comment I understood to basically be support for China's approach, there are jurisdictions you can go to that provide that. It's better for you because your priorities are supported, and it's better for people in other places with different priorities. What's not productive is trying to lobby the government to force everyone around you to behave the way you want them to.

Seriously, if you support China's approach, and value it more than what you're getting in Canada, move to China, don't try and make Canada any more authoritarian

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#142
One of my family member is living Shanghai who has not taken any vaccine yet due to contraindications. Not to mention that there are millions of elders living in China who are not suitable for taking vaccine.

I am very concerned if an authoritative gov aiming for "zero-covid" would push and mandate every citizen to be vaccinated. But I saw all these comments bashing gov on "why lockdown", "why not just take vax", "why not herd immunity" without deeping into questions - which is not much different from "Let them eat cake”.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is the lack of an endgame. For better or worse, Covid is endemic in Europe and the continental US[0]. All it takes is one false-negative test at the border[1] and a tourist or business traveler could easily create tens of millions of potential infectees (airport -> subway -> secondary city) to requisite additional lockdowns of tens of millions of people. [0]And quite probably large parts of Asia, includin…

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Combined with their refusal to use western vaccines. If your only goal is to protect your citizens then there doesn't seem to be a good rational to make that decision; this situation is at least somewhat political.

I'm curious if this will keep occurring during the N months it takes for them to develop and test efficacious mRNA vaccines and deliver them to a significant portion of the population.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I'm sure there are other factors, including pollution etc. But wrt. to Covid the main risk factors seems to be blood sugar / blood pressure problems. Possibly because these are most correlated with immunosupression, various deficiencies, possibly immunosupressive medication (to mitigate chronic inflammatory conditions) etc.

Actually, the main risk factor seems to be age, which is also why Hong Kong was hit so hard. Otherwise, I don't think we can say much about the difference between Chinese and western comorbidity risk factors...not without data anyone we are not likely to get access to.

I think that is because age is often correlated with those ailments? Wasn't there a stat about a vast majority having 4 or more comorbidities?

I agree, we won't have data, but my gut feeling, having been raised in this kind of environment, is most people are basically poisoned by such lifestyle factors. 88% percent of Americans have a metabolic dysfunction. Again, I agree we couldn't prove this in a satisfactory scientific way, just what my eyes are seeing.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#145
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fact I have mostly confined myself to my house. I can work remotely and we have an income sufficient to rely on instacart and delivery for food. We go out for walks in the neighborhood but we avoid going in stores or restaurants except on rare occasions. We've taken one vacation (during the lull before omicron became a thing) and we'll try and take another vacation this summer but, otherwise, we're trying our best…

> I don't think your comments about moving to China are at all productive to the dialog though. I want to address this. Why is it not productive? One great thing about the world is that we have different jurisdictions that value different things, so they can compete and like minded people can potentially get together somewhere and live as they want. Many people are moving to Florida e.g. because of its approach to co…

Oh, mostly because I'm a Canadian and the Canadian response to everything is dictated by its citizens determining what the government does in reaction to various stimuli. I'm not going to execute a violent coup to overthrow the Canadian government to force my personal ideals on everyone else but me expressing my ideals and trying, within the system, to tilt the responses to what works for me is, in fact, the Canadian government working as designed.

Canada is an abstract concept - just like Florida - it isn't authoritarian or freedom loving as an inherent property, it is responding to the will of its populace. I personally think my ideals would help Canada be a safer and more prosperous country, so why should I say "screw all these guys" and jump ship... I'd prefer to stay and try and make my neighbors safer. That said, I'm actually a US-Canadian dualie so it is an adopted home.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#146
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if the world had been on board with a zero covid policy we probably would've weathered the pandemic much better - but convincing western nations to adopt that approach and their populace to actually accept the approach would have been a job and a half. My feeling through most of COVID (as someone in BC, Canada) is that the government is trying their best to minimize the amount people leave their homes while a…

Whether or not global lockdowns would have worked, I prefer a world in which you can get covid to one in which the government can confine you to your house. You're welcome to move to China if you prefer the latter approach - or just confine yourself to your house yourself...

You already live in a world where the government can confine you to your house. They likely already did.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#147
post #104
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are assuming their reported death numbers are accurate. You are also assuming the deaths caused by these policies won’t end up exceeding that number. Neither assumptions are backed by evidence.

That's exactly my concern too - right now China's response looks great on the world stage... but the pandemic isn't over yet and China rolled out an extremely ineffective vaccine that leaves their population quite vulnerable. If this disaster spreads to other Chinese metropolitan areas it would be devastating.

Exactly this, the Chinese developed vaccine Sinovac is the primary cause of the poor COVID results.

It simply doesn't do the job well enough, but good luck trying to make the Chinese leader choose an American product.

So the stubbornness of the regime is at fault, but with no limits on terms anymore, i see only bad things for the future of China.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#148
post #15

Why are they still pursuing Zero Covid? I know the article includes some speculation on this, but what's the best explanation?

Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

And it corrupts not only itself, but also the society it commands in general. That's why you had to use a throwaway to post an obvious truth that is guaranteed to trigger karma decrementers.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#149
post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think your comments about moving to China are at all productive to the dialog though. I want to address this. Why is it not productive? One great thing about the world is that we have different jurisdictions that value different things, so they can compete and like minded people can potentially get together somewhere and live as they want. Many people are moving to Florida e.g. because of its approach to co…

Oh, mostly because I'm a Canadian and the Canadian response to everything is dictated by its citizens determining what the government does in reaction to various stimuli. I'm not going to execute a violent coup to overthrow the Canadian government to force my personal ideals on everyone else but me expressing my ideals and trying, within the system, to tilt the responses to what works for me is, in fact, the Canadian…

Fair enough, I'm canadian and the same reason I haven't moved to Florida is because I'd rather stay and try to fight people like you than just give up and move somewhere else. I think the difference is that all I want is to be left alone, while a you want is for the government to force people to do what you want (because anything else would somehow harm you and your fellow citizens), but that's a pretty classic struggle between libertarian and authoritarian.

And I guess I should add that our constitution and history make liberty and minimal government power the default here, so all of the authoritarianism that's come with covid is an attack on what was once a free country. Which is why I think it's better if you leave if you don't like it.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#150
post #96
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it more amusing that someone can think that the could CCP be seriously concerned about the long term wellbeing of the Chinese people. Surely if it disportionately affects older individuals, especially in the light of the demographic crisis China will being facing in not to distant future (and with no social security or widespread private pension schemes and limited immigration it would be reasonable that it wi…

So if the CCP truly cared about the people they'd cull the elderly. This is the quality of discussion on China these days on HN. The idea that "hey, obviously they wouldn't consider that, maybe they're not the comic-book villains I've been led to believe!" doesn't even cross your mind.

No? I didn't mean to imply that at all. Rather the opposite. If they cared about economic growth above anything else, I don't think it would a completely beyond them to do something like that (and you don't even need to get back to the times when Mao was still alive to find proof, the one child policy was a misguided crime against humanity, was it not?).

Of course engineering a virus for that purpose would be highly impractical and utterly absurd (one would hope so at least...).

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