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Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

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Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#81

Post by 01100011 »

the_snooze wrote: post #68
01100011 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Properly done with what the consensus opinion was at the time the decisions were made, or properly done in hindsight and colored with political bias? It's weird to me how quickly folks forgot the depth of our ignorance during the beginning of covid. Do you remember when we all started washing our groceries when we got home because we weren't even sure if covid survived on surfaces? Remember when we were desperate to…

>We probably kept it all going too far for too long. That's where I've landed looking back on it. The first month or so of staying home, being overly cautious, and "flattening the curve" made sense given the unknowns. But limiting outdoor gatherings in some contexts but not others (no-go on outdoor parties, but George Floyd protests are fine), keeping kids in Zoom school through 2021, and continued neuroticism even a…

Remember when it was forbidden to take off your mask on a plane... unless you were eating? Somehow food killed the virus. There was a lot of stupidity.

But I'm also hearing from people who are convinced of a vast conspiracy and believe we knew day one that the lockdowns were a bad idea(see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Barrington_Declaration). But we didn't know. It's tempting to cherry-pick the well reasoned opinions of a minority of experts especially when it backs up your worldview but I'm not having it.

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#82

Post by yieldcrv »

kelnos wrote: post #73
yieldcrv wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> During May 2022, Western Australia experienced sharply rising cases amongst the highest per capita cases seen anywhere in the world throughout the pandemic. Just delaying it to 2022 according to those same articles, as it had already exited the evolutionary fit population’s memory everywhere else in the world

I feel like delaying it isn't a bad move. There were no vaccines or known effective treatments available in early 2020, health services were unprepared and became overwhelmed, and no one knew even simple things about the virus, like how it was transmitted. In 2022, I'm sure pretty much any region would be much better prepared to get hit by COVID-19 for the "first" time.

yes, as they were in 2021 as well.

my main observation is that it was too long for most of the population and your standard has no limit.

most places did not improve their hospital capacity and infrastructure. some conjecture about the virus was answered but thats it.

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#83

Post by ingohelpinger »

alex1138 wrote: post #43

[flagged]

100%, the amount of legitimate comments, including mine, being flagged or removed without a trace is just astonishing, also getting "you are posting to fast" notices is just another prove for the ongoing censorship.

EDIT: the thread went from Nr. 2 to Nr. 115, lol.

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#84

Post by alex1138 »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #57

It's disappointing to see how comments on this topic always center around whether masking worked or not and whether it was a lab leak or not. These just aren't that important in the grand scheme of things. It's like we got in a car crash and instead of taking about how we can be safer drivers we're debating which brand of crutches is best. I wish we'd zoom out a bit and look for some more impactful questions to ask.…

Lab leak matters when studying viral transmission (and general characteristics of the virus), especially if it's been enhanced via gain of function research

It also matters when the basic doctor-patient relationship is interfered with

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#85

Post by PaulKeeble »

dailykoder wrote: post #14

I still desperately want to know the current (scientific) state of wearing a mask. On the one side we have people that say 'our bodies need to learn again to fight against viruses' and the other side which wants you to put on a mask even if you have the smallest sign of a common cold. - Though, I do understand the fear of people who have/had long covid, MCFS or do know people who have, but I don't know what conclusio…

I really depends on the masks. The cloth masks with a couple of layers aren't very effective because Covid is airborne in the sense the particles of liquid it persists in are typically 1-5nm in size and hang on the air and it survives for hours like that depending on the conditions. We know that N95/99/FFp2/3 standards block this very well and a number of studies done in places like a hospital in Cambridge showed they were extremely effective, maybe 100% effective at avoiding infections. The challenge is with these masks is they require a bit of knowledge on fitting and testing they fit correctly. Just drop shipping them into a random village didn't work and people have a tendency to do dumb things like breaking the seal to scratch their nose or taking it down to talk.

But when worn and used correctly they are extremely effective, the physics and engineering on which they are based has never been in doubt.

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#86

Post by defrost »

logicchains wrote: post #62
alex1138 wrote: post #43

[flagged]

Science has meant that for over a decade since it started deplatforming any scientist who studied the link between race and intelligence. And before anyone says "why does it matter, only racists would care about that", it matters because some social scientists are claiming that the disparity in outcomes for different races across society is due to society being unfair/biased, but such outcomes would be expected even…

Who could possibly doubt The Bellend Curve?

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#87

Post by dullcrisp »

alex1138 wrote: post #78
friend_Fernando wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have a look at the actual posts to realize why they were flagged. Had they not been, this page would be less than 5% non-cranks. Even as it is, it's hard to break 10%. Sadly, this seems to have become a flamebait/trollbait/crankbait topic.

Maybe, but depends on what each person considers cranks This is one topic where the establishment view is mostly wrong and people broadly engaging in censorship are on the wrong side of history, period

I don’t think complaining about flagging in general is helpful here. Science hasn’t ever meant that all viewpoints are equal. That would just be chaos.

It’s also not decided by popular vote, but if you want peer review instead, then you’ll have to read a peer-reviewed journal rather than Hacker News comments.

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#88

Post by alex1138 »

dullcrisp wrote: post #87
alex1138 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe, but depends on what each person considers cranks This is one topic where the establishment view is mostly wrong and people broadly engaging in censorship are on the wrong side of history, period

I don’t think complaining about flagging in general is helpful here. Science hasn’t ever meant that all viewpoints are equal. That would just be chaos. It’s also not decided by popular vote, but if you want peer review instead, then you’ll have to read a peer-reviewed journal rather than Hacker News comments.

I wouldn't claim all views are equal either, but people are mighty quick to jump on how misinformation is defined (even when that's been proven wrong) here, I don't equate it to many other things

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#89

Post by NicholasGurr »

the_snooze wrote: post #68
01100011 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Properly done with what the consensus opinion was at the time the decisions were made, or properly done in hindsight and colored with political bias? It's weird to me how quickly folks forgot the depth of our ignorance during the beginning of covid. Do you remember when we all started washing our groceries when we got home because we weren't even sure if covid survived on surfaces? Remember when we were desperate to…

>We probably kept it all going too far for too long. That's where I've landed looking back on it. The first month or so of staying home, being overly cautious, and "flattening the curve" made sense given the unknowns. But limiting outdoor gatherings in some contexts but not others (no-go on outdoor parties, but George Floyd protests are fine), keeping kids in Zoom school through 2021, and continued neuroticism even a…

A lot of the contradictory nonsense was simply a result of the election year. As such, cynical people in power were aware they could make recommendations that would be unhelpful to the incumbent president’s re-election. Low economic activity AND civil unrest were both great factors for getting Trump out.

Re: Covid 5 years later: Learning from a pandemic many are forgetting

#90

Post by g-b-r »

sfblah wrote: post #24
dailykoder wrote: post #14

I still desperately want to know the current (scientific) state of wearing a mask. On the one side we have people that say 'our bodies need to learn again to fight against viruses' and the other side which wants you to put on a mask even if you have the smallest sign of a common cold. - Though, I do understand the fear of people who have/had long covid, MCFS or do know people who have, but I don't know what conclusio…

My advice is to look at studies done before 2020 when it became political. My research suggests that, while masks probably do something, it's very hard to measure the exact impacts. The prevailing wisdom before 2020 was that masking the public for viruses didn't do anything. For medical professionals, very strict masking protocols were needed to get any assurance of safety.

The prevailing wisdom before 2020 was that almost no virus was airborne; and you needed to assume new ones weren't, lest all hell break loose.

That's how we got the pandemic.

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