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Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

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Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#81

Post by f430 »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #35
f430 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Would the U.S. ever take a similar approach? Would the US ever admit their exceptionalism is perhaps flawed? Would the Europeans ever admit their exceptionalism led to ignoring Taiwan's alarm bells? I highly doubt it. They are not stupid, they know what's going on in China and they are not telling everybody else because they are worried of losing credibility as leaders. Almost all of our current response assumes th…

Overall yes, but exactly what you mean by "China" here is highly ambiguous.

China as in Communist China

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#83

Post by m_mueller »

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #74
m_mueller wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think about what that implies regarding the difference a competent government makes. Half a million dead, maybe even more, in the US alone. Granted, Taiwan was in some way lucky to have had SARS to get the acceptance needed to install their emergency law, but still, others had too and did scratch. Switzerland even gave up its stockpile of pandemic supply two years ago.

Are Germany and Italy equally or more incompetent to USA?

If you just compare to continental countries that are very interconnected (lots of travel, import+export), I'd say Germany is doing a bit better but still not as successful as you'd wish. I think it really shows when the highest executives have a higher scientific education.

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#84

Post by m_mueller »

timr wrote: post #57
sradman wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also carefully managed the quarantine of the first set of returning travellers. They were sent home with a kit that included a thermometer and a set of surgical masks to use and public health officials contacted them daily via SMS and/or voice.

Yes, they are strict about their quarantine. It's much easier to do that when you don't have to quarantine millions of people. Consider that we know that the virus was spreading in the US in January (via Europe), and there's phylogenetic and blood-screening evidence that it was here as early as late 2019. Even the strictest quarantine wouldn't have helped much at that point.

You would not have to quarantine millions if governments had acted decisively like Taiwan. I think Taiwan shows the endgame, how to eradicate. For an idea in how to deal with mass community spread, listen to Michael Mina.

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#85

Post by zbrozek »

maxerickson wrote: post #71
zbrozek wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things like the "where do I get masks" map don't seem antithetical to personal privacy the way a contact tracing tool is. That's pretty low-hanging fruit that we didn't appear to make any attempt to pick.

Contact tracing isn't antithetical to personal privacy. I suppose you can say it compromises absolute personal privacy, but so does someone seeing you in a store, so it's not very interesting. Singapore has certainly decided to show how bad it can be, but the root of that is an authoritarian mandate, not the contact tracing itself.

Good luck convincing many people in the US of the same. I'm certainly not convinced. As you point out, Singapore has already abused the system. If some abuse is technically possible, it's probably already happening.

But there's a lot of room outside of "do nothing" and "omnipresent perfect surveillance" to do good things with civic technology, including non-pandemic stuff. Why aren't all public records online and searchable through a single engine? Or all forms editable and submittable? Or budgets and financial reports navigable or comparable? I'd love to be able to know how some random municipality is going to gouge me before I move there.

There's loads of room for good solutions for these and tons of other pain points. But as far as I can tell, American government is scared of letting go so the private sector can develop these things. And it's not imaginative or technically competent enough to want or develop this kind of stuff on its own. Or maybe it's not organized or unified enough?

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#86

Post by [deleted] »

timr wrote: post #57
sradman wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also carefully managed the quarantine of the first set of returning travellers. They were sent home with a kit that included a thermometer and a set of surgical masks to use and public health officials contacted them daily via SMS and/or voice.

Yes, they are strict about their quarantine. It's much easier to do that when you don't have to quarantine millions of people. Consider that we know that the virus was spreading in the US in January (via Europe), and there's phylogenetic and blood-screening evidence that it was here as early as late 2019. Even the strictest quarantine wouldn't have helped much at that point.

[deleted]

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#87

Post by kalleboo »

f430 wrote: post #56
vkou wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Almost all of our current response assumes the Chinese Communist Party is capable of being transparent and honest. Actually, all of our current response, up to this point assumes that if we half-ass our response to the pandemic, it will go away. "What China is doing" has largely stopped being relevant to anyone outside China in early/mid-February. As of today, China could have zero people testing positive, or a bil…

A simple litmus test here is: "Do you genuinely believe at face value China's statement that this virus originated from outside China" If the answer is yes, then you also believe the statement "China has zero cases since it stopped reporting them". Our responses are based on the numbers reported by the CCP, if you realize that there is now tens of millions of suddenly deactivated phone plans in a country where the sm…

> if you realize that there is now tens of millions of suddenly deactivated phone plans in a country where the smartphone is integrated into everyday life

China is the land of the dual-SIM phone, to the point where Apple even made a special iPhone for them that takes dual SIM cards. People have a second SIM for work, or for their mistress, or just for cheaper calling rates to their family. During a lockdown where you're not working (=not making money) and you're stuck at home with your family (and free calling over WiFi), why wouldn't you cancel your second SIM?

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#88

Post by timr »

m_mueller wrote: post #84
timr wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they are strict about their quarantine. It's much easier to do that when you don't have to quarantine millions of people. Consider that we know that the virus was spreading in the US in January (via Europe), and there's phylogenetic and blood-screening evidence that it was here as early as late 2019. Even the strictest quarantine wouldn't have helped much at that point.

You would not have to quarantine millions if governments had acted decisively like Taiwan. I think Taiwan shows the endgame, how to eradicate. For an idea in how to deal with mass community spread, listen to Michael Mina.

Taiwan has not eradicated the virus. Their quarantine systems are good, but not perfect:

https://thediplomat.com/2021/01/taiwan-tightens-pandemic-mea...

While they have certainly come closer than most places, the downside of this approach is that it comes at a debilitating economic cost (edit: for most countries...Taiwan specifically may be able to get away with it for a while because they're a manufacturing hub), and literally any minor slip up can lead to the virus spreading like wildfire through the population.

Again, considering the vast differences in scale and complexity here, it's pushing the bounds of credulity to claim that the United States could do something similar. Even a "science-following" state like New York can't conduct a quarantine of remotely similar strictness.

Pretty much the only equivalent thing the US might have done would be to stop all immigration in January. Neither political party would have supported such a thing.

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#89

Post by m_mueller »

timr wrote: post #88
m_mueller wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would not have to quarantine millions if governments had acted decisively like Taiwan. I think Taiwan shows the endgame, how to eradicate. For an idea in how to deal with mass community spread, listen to Michael Mina.

Taiwan has not eradicated the virus. Their quarantine systems are good, but not perfect: https://thediplomat.com/2021/01/taiwan-tightens-pandemic-mea... While they have certainly come closer than most places, the downside of this approach is that it comes at a debilitating economic cost (edit: for most countries ...Taiwan specifically may be able to get away with it for a while because they're a manufacturing hub), a…

> debilitating economic cost

citation needed. Their internal economy works normally, they never had any lockdown. Far lower impact than those states that just let the virus go rampant every couple of months, followed by months of lockdown.

And yes, you could eradicate with this strategy, if enough places would adopt it and work together. I'd imagine a list of trusted covid free countries that can reintroduce bilateral travel without quarantine.

Re: Bringing civic tech to Taiwan's coronavirus pandemic response [audio]

#90

Post by timr »

m_mueller wrote: post #89
timr wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taiwan has not eradicated the virus. Their quarantine systems are good, but not perfect: https://thediplomat.com/2021/01/taiwan-tightens-pandemic-mea... While they have certainly come closer than most places, the downside of this approach is that it comes at a debilitating economic cost (edit: for most countries ...Taiwan specifically may be able to get away with it for a while because they're a manufacturing hub), a…

> debilitating economic cost citation needed. Their internal economy works normally, they never had any lockdown. Far lower impact than those states that just let the virus go rampant every couple of months, followed by months of lockdown. And yes, you could eradicate with this strategy, if enough places would adopt it and work together. I'd imagine a list of trusted covid free countries that can reintroduce bilatera…

> they never had any lockdown

...and that's largely irrelevant in a tiny country whose economy is mostly making stuff for the west. As I said, they've stopped essentially all international travel. They've benefitted from the US-China trade war, and have been able to boost exports:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/taiwan-shrugs-off-pandemic-to-d...

> Taiwanese manufacturers have been relocating back home from China over the last two years, lured by subsidies and hoping to dodge tariffs and other complications from U.S.-China tensions over trade and technology. The resulting boost to production capacity has put Taiwan in a good position to meet voracious demand for electronics as work-from-home professionals place orders for additional computers, monitors and smartphones, analysts said.

> Domestic consumption was still holding back the island’s economy in the third quarter, but much less than before. Private consumption contracted 1.5% from a year earlier in the third quarter, compared with a slump of nearly 5% in the previous quarter, according to the statistics bureau.

My point was that if you do the same thing in the US, it would be a debilitating economic cost.

> And yes, you could eradicate with this strategy, if enough places would adopt it and work together.

And if ifs and buts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a very merry Christmas. String enough speculative hypotheticals together, and you can justify anything.

Again, very few countries can adopt such a strategy. It's a strategy that works...tenuously...for an island country with the population of a single US state, who can afford to be isolated from the world for a year or more. Hawaii tried the same approach, and it nearly bankrupted them in a few months:

https://www.npr.org/2020/10/20/925795410/facing-economic-dev...

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