A case for ending lockdown • Hacker News Board

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#241

Post by ashtonkem » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:41 PM UTC

dangus wrote: post #226

rootusrootus wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you tell that to everyone, as soon as they open their mouth with a thought, or only the folks who suggest we should ease the lockdown sooner? It would be interesting on HN if we developed a habit of interrogating everyone for their credentials and shouting them down immediately if they're just another software engineer.

I think your parent commenter literally said “yes” to your question. It didn’t sound like an interrogation, it sounded more like a brick wall of “this conversation is over.” There are definitely diplomatic ways to say this to people or change the subject.

People get the polite one the first time, and the undiplomatic “I’m not interested in your opinion” the second time.

When people ask me, I usually say “I have no idea, we’re all stuck on this ride until the end”.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#242

Post by logicchains » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:42 PM UTC

lkrubner wrote: post #223

kaolti wrote: post #205

Going back to the basics on this one. Has any government presented a cost benefit analysis of all the available options to address this situation? Like most things in life this isn't black and white, so where is the analysis of the pros and cons, worst case projections, etc of not doing anything / going into lockdown / other alternatives. I for one have not seen it. Shouldn't such an analysis be the basis of any deci…

" Shouldn't such an analysis be the basis of any decisions we make? " No. We can decided to make decisions based purely on the morality of the decision. Given a death rate somewhere between 1% and 3% the question becomes whether we will accept that many deaths, without taking action. There is no need for a cost/benefit analysis, as we can decide the issue entirely on a moral basis.

You can't know the morality of the action without modelling all the consequences. Morality is a complex thing, and certainly cannot be determined by just a single number (number of deaths from the virus avoided).

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#243

Post by im3w1l » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:42 PM UTC

wheelerwj wrote: post #176

> I’m a software / site reliability engineer okay, thanks. Seriously, the list of scientist and medical organizations advising through this period is so long, I don't know why anyone who isn't at equally experienced tries to counter-claim their insights. I'm not saying we shouldn't do our own research and arrive at our own conclusion, but if you arrive at a different conclusion, you're almost certainly the one whose…

There are two things that non-experts can contribute in a discussion.

The first and most important is "who is the expert". Out of all epidemiologists and government bodies saying different things, who should we listen to?

Secondly, people have other expertises that may be relevant. Experiments have demonstrated that getting people with a lot of different perspectives together can produce better decisions. I recognize that I'm not an expert in respiratory diseases. But I'm pretty good with mathematics, including graph theory and statistics and differential equations. Someone else may know a lot about how supply chains or small businesses are affected by various policies. Or they may be experts in the psychological effects of various levels of isolation.

I also want to mention shouldn't necessarily underestimate the armchair analyst. It's possible to learn a lot on your own. This ties in with the first point I made above, about who is the expert. Evaluating people based on credentials is one way. It's easy and low effort. Taking into account conflicts of interests and track records will improve your evaluation quality a lot. And for most people it's probably not worth their time to evaluate how credible an armchair analyst is.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#244

Post by xienze » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:43 PM UTC

ausbah wrote: post #183

grumple wrote: post #165

The premise of this post is extremely flawed: > Weeks and months later, facts on the ground show that the purported collapse of the healthcare system did not occur. Yes, because we locked down population centers quickly. That's the whole point. ICUs have still been over capacity though. Without the lockdowns, it's obvious we'd have a lot more dead people the past month. > Moreover, this was not due to success in seri…

this is a good example of people saying the response was overblown, because the response had its intended effect

Then why, after lockdowns were in place, did we build all those field hospitals and ventilators that never got used? I suspect it’s because we expected the “with-lockdown” numbers to be far worse than they actually ended up being. In other words, there was an overreaction, only the degree to which we overreacted is in debate.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#245

Post by rootusrootus » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:44 PM UTC

docdeek wrote: post #128

> Encourage at-risk groups to self quarantine, and utilize testing to protect them...Those with obesity and COPD Author suggests self-quarantine for the obese instead of quarantine/lockdown for everyone. The CDC suggests that +42% of the US adult population is obese [0]. Are we really going to isolate or quarantine 4 out of 10 US adults and imagine the economy can get back on track? [0]: https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/d…

> The CDC suggests that +42% of the US adult population is obese

For what it's worth, this is the same CDC that suggests that the level of obesity that increases COVID risk is BMI 40+ [0], which is more like 6-7% of the US population.

[0] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precaut...

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#246

Post by shkkmo » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:44 PM UTC

ryankemper wrote: post #67

cjhopman wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's more random stream of consciousness about this: > Pareto Mitigation: An evidence-based approach I love how this uses "evidence-based" as a dogwhistle followed by proposing an approach without providing any sort of evidence about the efficacy of the approach. > Those who have lost their jobs tend to be those workers who are in a lower socio-economic bracket and have jobs that do not allow one to “work from home…

> This is maybe the strangest section. Why does this just talk about a hero culture related to real scientists? Do we think that people are more likely to think some nerdy scientist is a hero rather than our heroic manly president? This seems like it should be a point in support of lockdown to me (tbh, it seems like it shouldn't be a point at all, it's just an attempt to discredit experts). Sorry to bombard you with…

> basically all I meant is that we tend to elevate these figures (Fauci in this case) up as "heroes" and therefore act like they are infallible and thus you cannot express an opinion that contradicts them. That is what I was arguing against.

What you should do is take the time and effort to educate yourself before contradicting them, (such as about basic things like how herd immunity interacts with R0 in a pandemic) and you should present caveats and disclaimers that are online with your own lack of experience, expertise and knowledge.

There might potentially valuable insights in your article, but their value is overshadowed by the way you present all your ignorance with confidence and surity.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#247

Post by xienze » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:47 PM UTC

merpnderp wrote: post #227

grumple wrote: post #165

The premise of this post is extremely flawed: > Weeks and months later, facts on the ground show that the purported collapse of the healthcare system did not occur. Yes, because we locked down population centers quickly. That's the whole point. ICUs have still been over capacity though. Without the lockdowns, it's obvious we'd have a lot more dead people the past month. > Moreover, this was not due to success in seri…

NYC, while under pretty extreme lockdowns still likely had 25% of its population infected as of over 2 weeks ago. If the serological surveys are correct, we know two things, it spreads rampantly even under harsh lockdowns and the IFR (infection fatality ratio) is likely I tend to think we should stay locked down to slow the spread if that's even still a thing given how fast it has spread in NYC. But on the bright sid…

NYC was famously late to the lockdown party. But even absent that, the lifestyle of the average New Yorker is very different from pretty much every other American. Way more opportunities for infection just going about your day-to-day life. E.g., just going to the store/office involves passing by hundreds of people as you walk to the subway, wait on a crowded platform, sit on a crowded train, etc.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#248

Post by legulere » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:48 PM UTC

merpnderp wrote: post #227

grumple wrote: post #165

The premise of this post is extremely flawed: > Weeks and months later, facts on the ground show that the purported collapse of the healthcare system did not occur. Yes, because we locked down population centers quickly. That's the whole point. ICUs have still been over capacity though. Without the lockdowns, it's obvious we'd have a lot more dead people the past month. > Moreover, this was not due to success in seri…

NYC, while under pretty extreme lockdowns still likely had 25% of its population infected as of over 2 weeks ago. If the serological surveys are correct, we know two things, it spreads rampantly even under harsh lockdowns and the IFR (infection fatality ratio) is likely I tend to think we should stay locked down to slow the spread if that's even still a thing given how fast it has spread in NYC. But on the bright sid…

How do you come to the conclusion of IFR likely <.5%? I’ve seen it consistently reported as 0.5-1.5%.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#249

Post by atian » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:48 PM UTC

Is anyone else having trouble reading this writing? I've gone through it multiple times but I really cannot extract any point being made other than eager aside references.

The title is not fitting at all for the content.

Re: A case for ending lockdown

#250

Post by ModernMech » Thu, Apr 30, 2020, 1:49 PM UTC

wegs wrote: post #137

ryankemper wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. That was helpful. So then, it does seem that if we successfully contained the virus, and then avoided infection spread until a hypothetical future vaccine is developed, that we could avoid the number of infections required by some amount. Just to tie it back to the broader lockdown vs not lockdown debate, we could probably say that a successful full containment strategy+vaccination could decrease the net area…

Well, here's the problem: The statements your making are quantifiably incorrect throughout the article, and by large amounts. The article sounds authoritative, but it's not. It's the definition of Internet misinformation. I think getting your opinion out there is important, but to be honest, the article needs a heck of a lot more in terms of disclaimers, and much less in terms of confident statements and grandstandin…

> 1) The economic costs of ending the lock-down may be astronomical. This is especially true with what we learn about COVID19 and lung damage (or potentially other organ damage). If even a small fraction of the population is on long-term disability, the costs go up super-quickly.

I have a feeling a lot of people advocating ending the lockdown are doing so on the basis that only old and infirm people die, as if the other option is either an asymptomatic infection or a quick recovery from something flu-like.

But I’ve witnessed some very serious infections, so this colors my perception and pushes me toward continuing lockdowns. To your point, the disease can be debilitating foR relatively young, healthy people. Have you ever gotten the flu and then had to re-learn how to swallow after spending a month in the hospital?

Yes corona is mostly deadly to older people, but even for those who do not die there are negative health outcomes which impact their ability to work and take care of themselves. What is the economic impact of that? Why is it not factored into the cost/benefit analysis of opening up?