Earlier quoted context omitted.
[citation neeeded] People die all the time. Pretending that the jury is out on the long term impacts of Covid 19 is ascientific.
I'm responding to this not for you, but for others. You should know that what you've just said indicates a disgusting train of thought not characterised by any good intention. -- The issue when talking about the long term affects is that, you're right, we don't have enough information. However that doesn't mean we should sit on our hands and do nothing. The whole point of humans recording history (and science is most…
First of all, everything coming out in the news recently should cure you of the illusion that we have any idea about the number of people infected. Estimates of an undercounting of a factor of ten in the early days in New York. An aircraft carrier with 60% of cases being completely asymptomatic. Sweden staying the course and not seeing perilous results.
It's interesting that you use the precautionary principle only towards a virus but not towards a wide scale social experiment on an overwhelming majority of the population.
The elderly certainly contribute to the economy, but if you're pretending that it's anywhere near the impact of something like global unemployment in developed countries hitting 10%, you're being obtuse.
Your description of the economy is rudimentary and shows disregard for things like organizational capital which are vital to an effective economy.
And finally, the corpus of scientific knowledge is one thing -- attempting to extract second order effects from epidemics affecting completely different populations with completely different ways and methods of interacting is an exercise in absurdity.