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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

#251

Post by sharken »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #154
wonnage wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's frustrating when anti-lockdown folks don't differentiate between lockdown now , when the disease is basically endemic and vaccines make COVID a non-issue for healthy/abled individuals, vs. in March 2020 when there was no vaccine, a mask shortage, a ventilator shortage, no consensus on transmission (the whole aerosol vs droplets shit), and just general pandemonium.

In my experience, the reason they don't differentiate is because they're implicitly arguing against the subset of pro-lockdown folks who don't differentiate. It's easy to forget, because most of us are understandably excited to memory hole the entire debate, but as recently as last fall there were mainstream voices arguing that it wasn't safe for kids to go to school.

Where are those mainstream voices now, in the grand scheme of things claiming that it's not safe for kids to go to school is a claim not rooted in science or statistics.

But probably those mainstream voices are not that interested in either.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#252

Post by sharken »

phatfish wrote: post #156
sharken wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Or a German product ;) Although it seems they have recently gotten round to some extensive testing for an mRNA vaccine. Makes you realise how advanced the Biontech and Moderna vaccines were. https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/china-walvax-says-has-m...

Didn't know this, that is great news for all Chinese citizens.

Better late than never must be the motto China is going for.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#253

Post by bakuninsbart »

godelski wrote: post #29
jaqalopes wrote: post #8

I lived in Shanghai for 5 years and have many friends and business connects there. I would never, ever want to be seen as carrying water for the CCP--the day they abolished term limits for Xi was the day I started planning my exit. I've been following this situation for almost a month now and in one sense it's every bit as bad as it looks. An inadequate and inhumane policy being enforced by an out of touch, or perhap…

> That said, as far as I can tell it's a very unevenly distributed disaster. I think this is one of the big issues with covid overall, especially how we discuss it over the internet. It is very possible that there is a person where everyone they know around them got covid as well as another person may only know one or two people who got it and only had mild cases. There's an extremely disproportionate distribution wh…

> Also, I am highly confused by China's zero coivd policy. Just by the nature of how viruses work, that seems impossible. Even zero deaths. I understand the want to minimize (especially in an area with high population densities), but zero is an impossible number.

I'd argue it worked well for the initial phase of the pandemic. Even if you don't trust chinese data, China had little restrictions for most of 2020-2022, and by the sheer transmissibility of covid, this suggests they were very successful in keeping infections at bay. The problem is the lack of exit strategy. For a good example on how to deal with covid we can look at Singapore, which also had harsh lockdowns, rules and travel restrictions, and is now opening up again after vaccinating the vast majority of the population. Australia and NZ are also good examples of how to deal with the virus.

China can't do that though, because the elderly and vulnerable aren't vaccinated, and the chinese healthcare system is already strained without a pandemic. There's really not much they can do at the moment unless they find a way to massively increase vaccinations with effective vaccines, which proves hard when the population most vulnerable tends to have doubts and reservations on the vaccines.

I'd also like to mention that the way Europe and the US dealt with the initial two years of the pandemic was absolute shit. Healthcare workers were worked to death, sometimes literally, and we lost hundreds of thousands of people, while still restricting ourselves in some futile, some sensible ways.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#254

Post by lambdaba »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #175
lambdaba wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 scie…

> 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. American life expectancies are still significantly higher than Chinese ones. Now, that could just be correlated to healthcare resources (America spends a lot, Chinese spends much less and much of it is wasted on pseudo medicine), but environmental factors…

I just looked it up and the difference is about 2 years? Apparently the difference is spending is 15x or more. I also think many Americans are kept in a bad state of health for a long time in this healthcare system, and that older Chinese might have a slightly lower life expectancy while also being in better health.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#255

Post by mikem170 »

sofixa wrote: post #229
nradov wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No that's incorrect. You appear to have made a category error. Protecting against a virus isn't a valid reason for violating the fundamental human right of free assembly. And no, there is no human right to be protected against the risk of disease.

> Human rights include the right to life and liberty Literally the first one is to life. https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/human-rights#:~:text=Hum... .

But is it ok to take away others' rights?

The UDHR you linked to mentioned freedom from detention, freedom of movement, the right to peacefully assemble, to work, leisure, and education, and to participate in cultural life. All of these rights were negatively impacted by lockdowns which many people did not agree with.

In the example of the pandemic: Would it have been better to offer support for the vulnerable (people with a 1 in 10 chance of dying if they caught it), rather than punish those who were not vulnerable (people with a 1 in 100,000 or greater chance of dying).

When is it ok for one person's rights to come at the expense of others? Is it ok for a few politicians to decide to impose on a bunch of unwilling people to do something they don't want to do? Should we lockdown every year for the flu, because some people will die? Should we allow the majority to force their views on the minority becuase they believe it is for the greater good?

I don't believe so. Not when there are other options.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#256

Post by somewhereoutth »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #199
somewhereoutth wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that Covid is not another common cold virus. Even with vaccination, its effects can be at least as severe as the flu - however it is as contagious as the common cold. We are yet to see what repeated infection brings - but given it is inherently a systemic disease, affecting not just the respiratory system but also the vascular system, and the high prevalence of long Covid, it would not be unreasonable to be co…

That is true so far, but remember that pathogens do not intrinsically have fixed disease characteristics. The nature of disease is a contextual matter of both the pathogen and host populations. You have to put on your Hegel hat and really think long and hard about the ramifications of that. Examples: - mRNA vaccinated population + Omicron is not as bad - Without being surrounded by lots of ongoing chicken pox to keep…

However a virus is a delivery device that precisely codes elements for self-replication, for structural form, and for pathogenesis. This last is the intrinsic disease causing component, though exactly how badly the interaction goes for an individual is dependent on the context of their immune system and general physiology. Apparently the 1918 H1N1 influenza virus had a particularly nasty pathogenic component, that mercifully has not been seen in the typical seasonal flu.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#257

Post by lobocinza »

munch117 wrote: post #233
lobocinza wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. CCP stats doesn't pass Benford's law.

Source? First hit on DDG, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7487520/ , says: We find Chinese confirmed infections match the distribution expected in Benford’s Law and are similar to that seen in the U.S. and Italy. That's infections, not deaths, and so doesn't necessarily disagree with what you said. But I still need your source.

I based it on this.

https://kevinbasset.medium.com/i-used-benfords-law-to-analyz...

Tough both are reporting on old data which tells nothing (good or bad) about the current situation.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#258

Post by mikem170 »

munk-a wrote: post #161
version_five wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 strug…

I think there's a problem with assuming that basic libretarian thinking is about freedom though. I personally value my and others' freedom to not be murdered over the freedom to murder people. There are an awful lot of unjust laws that can color people's view on acting as a society - but there are also quite necessary forces in there to make sure that people have the ability to live good lives. My central philosophy…

> I personally value my and others' freedom to not be murdered over the freedom to murder people.

I personally think that the rule should be "don't impose on others".

The murder example you used is an imposition on another person. Telling someone that they can't impose on someone else is not an imposition, it is preventing an imposition.

There can be problems if we allow the majority to impose whatever they want on the minority. It seems that many people seem are ok with that, as long as they are in the majority.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#260

Post by whimsicalism »

djrogers wrote: post #159
whimsicalism wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, any crunching of the numbers shows that China has effectively averted 3 million dead of their own population due to covid - assuming equal quality of care with the US. I generally attribute that to the lockdowns, do people have another explanation?

Any crunching of what numbers? You and I have no idea how many Chinese people have been infected or died of COVID. As recently as earlier this week the Chinese Gov’t was claiming 130k infections in Shanghai with zero deaths. Are those the numbers you’re trusting, or were you counting the pyres visible on satellite photos from areas that had ‘no COVID’ according to the CCP?

Source on the 130k number?

If 3 million people had died in China of covid, they wouldn't be able to hide it. Even if they could hide that level of deaths, that level of covid spread would be obvious from antibody tests from peoe traveling from China.

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