Just doing some poking around and had clear up some misinformation. You even had me convinced for a second there. — NOS4A2

That's real progress. You have glimpsed for a single second what removing propaganda beliefs from your mind looks like.

Perhaps there is hope for you yet.

I don't have much time at the moment, lot's to do to reorganize my organization's strategy in light of the pandemic. However, I live in a Nordic country precisely because public policy, institutions, individuals in those institutions, and culture are the most resilient to this sort of event, which has been viewed as inevitable by the community that does the relevant systems analysis of global stability.

I moved here over 10 years ago (before the 2008 financial crash, that I also knew was coming and was discussing on the previous forum in 2006; although a big risk, clearly solvable by printing money, but one never knows). Why build something long term somewhere if the location is not resilient to global disruptions that are mathematically guaranteed?

Now at that time I lived in Canada, which has a lot of the same institutions and cooperative culture as the European countries ... but is next to the US with lot's of interdependence. Additionally, at that time, there was a conservative government in Canada with a "crazy light" version of the tea-party beliefs, so I could also not be sure those institutions would remain for long. So, on the whole, not a risk worth taking (unless my goal was to "fight the good fight" in Canada, which it isn't, I have have much more important things to do, and a stable home-base is a critical criteria to be able to do my work over the long term in order to accumulate the value).

I provide this little anecdote as food for thought of the advantages of unbiased critical thinking: strategic decisions can mitigate adverse events literally decades away. Because I live in a Nordic country, I have few worries in this situation. There has not even been any panic buying; plenty of toilet paper still at the shop yesterday, and I bought only one package as I would normally do. Why? Because everyone here knows society will continue to function pretty well even in severe crisis because the government design makes sense and is filled with high-competence individuals running all the institutions we could possibly want in this situation; if there is a resource shortage, critical resources will be distributed in a reasonable way in a timely and organized manner, and neighbors will help each other out for the small stuff rather than, say ... hmm, I don't know, riot because of running out of money without any of the institutions that are needed to be already in place to take care of vulnerable members society in good times (because of a moral duty to them) and in bad times (because the breakdown of society isn't good for anyone, and forcing a lot of people to live "on the edge" is ripe pickings for social breakdown when a strong gust pushes them over; rioting and crime are a completely reasonable response if there is no reasonable social contract to point to, only coercive submission to sign the dotted line; and the riots and the crime, will be coming quick, since young hooligans fear not the virus but will find it very interesting that a lot of old people are suddenly "away from home" and the authorities are distracted, followed by marshal law not far behind and lot's of gun injuries to treat on-top of the virus; but we'll see how crime plays out in the US compared to the Nordics, we'll need to check in on this later too). If I'm right, there's not really any safe place to be, which is why, the time to "get the hell out of dodge" was over a decade ago as to be able to build up new social relations in a more stable place. Yes, I've paid higher taxes, especially for a CEO of a corporation compared to my counterparts in the US (remembering even the taxes they do pay and aren't hidden in offshore arrangement, a large part goes to inefficient imperial financing even if you want empire, such as storing new tanks in the desert or paying mercenaries absurd fees, so this must be discounted in a fair analysis; for in terms of defense, mandatory conscription is effective and inexpensive) ... but, since I don't run a fortune 500 country I can't go to some bunker on a island, and so I believe many of my counter-parts will soon be of the opinion that it's difficult to put a price on a reasonable government design -- that they weren't "long term greedy" enough.

But let's check in on these predictions in a few weeks time.

As for you're "clearing things up".

You are confusing "words" with "other words" that aren't the same thing.

The Fortune article I cite, yes does refer to a budget cut for the CDC in 2019 that is also in your graph. Note that 2019 is before 2020, the year we are now in. Also note that "cutting the budget" to get rid of non-corrupt people, and then increasing the budget as a favour to the cronies now in charge is classic corruption tactics. Trump has been increasing the budget deficit to a trillion, so the "fiscal responsibility" of republicans is not really the issue, the issue is corrupt use of all that money, which requires, from time to time, getting rid of competent managers through temporary budget measures.

But that's not the important part for people who know how to think.

Just because Ziemer’s position was discontinued does not mean everyone who was part of the team was fired or that all of the functions of the directorate ceased. According to reporting by the Atlantic and the Washington Post, some team members were shifted to other groups, and others took over some of Ziemer’s duties. An NSC spokesman at the time said that the administration “remains committed to global health, global health security and biodefense, and will continue to address these issues with the same resolve under the new structure. — NOS4A2

For a critical thinker, the obvious implication Rear Admiral Ziemer quitting is that he is protesting mismanagement, such as, perhaps, the head of the CDC and FDA being replaced by sycophants.

It's not just a budget question. Mismanagement is much worse than budget cuts; and the implication of Ziemers (without a hand-off to a replacement) is that the whole thing is starting to stink, and he won't be apart of it.

Now, Fortune can't say this because there's Ziemer didn't go into the behind the scenes details (he will certainly be doing that at a congressional hearing sooner or later), but it's assumed by critical thinkers that competent people quitting an organization unexpectedly is an extremely negative sign.

Likewise, any critical thinker does not conclude that "his team being disbanded" is easily mitigated by moving some of those people elsewhere and adding "defend against global pandemic" to various job descriptions.

A team is more than the sum of it's parts.

Furthermore, the Fortune article is specifically talking about running out of budget of the pandemic program. That a program loses budget does not mean that the institution as a whole loses budget, the money can be put elsewhere (in thing like, oh I don't know, corrupt handouts to friends).

I don't know why you want to cover Trump's ass on this issue, but I can assure you it's just too big on this occasion. The crisis has been clearly developing since January, and only a few days ago Trump seemed to believe that keeping people on the cruise ship would have some impact on the "numbers" (rather than being a drop in the exponentially expanding bucket), that the numbers staying low by a gimmick of keeping people on a ship was a good plan, and that saying such a stupid analysis of things out loud doesn't just betray total ignorance and incompetence and "losing grip on the situation" but also a complete lack of caring for the people on-board.

He went from downplaying it as similar magnitude as the flu ... to banning all flights from Europe (too late for containment) and calling an emergency.

If you read my comments because "you were almost convinced", remember that I started when containment was still possible and the "official policy" ... but, true to critical thinking form, I accurately predicted that containment was actually abandoned as a policy since policy makers thought "letting it burn through the population" would, yes kill a lot of people, but keep things normal and the stock market humming; because, under normal circumstances, sacrificing people's health for the stock market is completely usual and ordinary decision to make (because the cause and effect are sufficiently separated that a large portion of the population can be made to believe poison isn't bad, maybe even good for them ... or, at least, the free market feeding people poison is good for investors, maybe even some God given right).

Read my first comment I posted here carefully:

"In my view Trump has now secured the essential state power mechanisms (why he's now so happy on TV) thanks to unquestioning loyalty of the Republican base that have kept all the Republican senators and congress members in line, and avoided a revolution of the moderate Republicans teaming with the Democrats to impeach him.

So great for Trump. And a great day for Trump supporters for sure.

However, supporting an incompetent statesman who falls in love with dictators is not necessarily a good future for any American, including Republicans. When a real crisis comes, history has shown that governments filled with loyal sycophants simply lose their grip on the situation."
— boethius - April 2018 - Re: Kavanaugh and Ford — boethius

Two years ago I predicted Trump was totally secure against impeachment removing him as he clearly had the Republican party by their sweaty balls as well as having the few women senators in there "grabbed by the pussy". This prediction has already proved to be correct.

I also predicted: "supporting an incompetent statesman who falls in love with dictators is not necessarily a good future for any American, including Republicans" and that "governments filled with loyal sycophants simply lose their grip on the situation".

So, let's check-in in a few weeks what you think of these predictions after this "foreign virus" hits closer to home.

I haven't said anything at all about radically reducing the human population deliberately, or anything about how such a thing (done in what most would think an acceptable way) would be possible or even desirable. So, it looks like it isn't I who is failing to follow the conversation. — Janus

I have more time now, as I've solved my organizational strategy problems.

What you haven't followed about this conversation is that we have been discussing an evolving situation. When we started, containment measures were still possible to significantly slow the global spread of the virus. You were arguing that "stopping flights", the obvious and effective tool to maintain a global containment strategy, would have higher costs than benefits.

Obviously, in hindsight it's easy to change your position to "oh, oh, yes it would have been useful then, I wasn't saying stopping flights would not be a reasonable cost to pay to stop the pandemic. But when we started discussing, stopping flights was still feasible to slow the pandemic. If that was your position, why didn't you say so? (hint: it wasn't your position)

Moreover, we were discussing my point that flights should have been stopped even before then when it was still possible to mostly contain to China, even in December when the first cases of a new SARS virus was known (that China covered it up as long as possible, which is just even more reason to ban all flight as soon as we do know as we shouldn't trust China to tell us the extent of the problem; they fooled us once with SARS-1, now fooled us again with SARS-2! how is that possible!! but this isn't aimed at you, but the bureaucrats who thought letting China have their way about lights would be better for the stock market anyway). That the sooner flights are stopped to maintain containment, not only the better for containment, but the better for the air industry as things can continue more normally elsewhere (compared to continuing flights, letting containment fail, and create the situation now where there are flight bans and collapse in air travelers on top of the far more devastating affects of global and simultaneous pandemic).

So, what were your points about the economic cost of stopping flying actually about? Which windows, starting in December when the first cases were known, until now was stopping flying a bad idea due to the economic costs of that and when was it a good idea? And please cite yourself saying so when we started discussing this topic.

Or rather, your position was clearly stopping flights was a high cost and it was reasonable to let flights continue, as you did not realize what the pandemic meant. Now that you do, you've reconfigured your belief system to believe that you can plausibly switch positions without it being obvious.

But it is obvious, it's bad faith, and simply foolish to not just admit you were wrong about stopping flights something to be economically worried about. You should admit that my position that stopping the flights has a very small, easily managed cost, compared to the benefits of maintaining containment as long and as well as possible.

So, when exactly, when we started discussing, did you mention that you were "for stopping flights" in a containment strategy, but are only advocating keeping flights open once containment has failed (which it had not yet done when we started discussing) and it's too late to have significant impact now.

So, you're certainly now against Trump's ban of flights from Europe?

As for the depopulation.

My position is that there's no "feasible" way to depopulate, I was clear the first time and re-explained a second time.

So when you say:

On the other hand, if it were decided to simply euthanaze 80 or 90 percent of the population how exactly do think that would adversely affect the natural environment? — Janus

My question is "how do you feasibly do that?"; how do you feasibly euthanaze 80 or 90 percent of the population.

Now, your original comment was:

The basic problem, that which is creating the conditions for runaway capitalism, industrial farming practices, resource depletion, soil, land and ocean degradation and pollution, is overpopulation. — Janus

When you say "the basic problem" that implies that that's the basic problem to solve; that action should be taken about the basic problem, which you are proposing is population.

My counter argument was that of Impact = Population x Technology x Affluence, we cannot feasibly act on population, but we can on Technology and Affluence. I.e. that the basic problem is technology and affluence, not population.

Now if by "problem" you mean "something that can't feasibly be solved" and therefore is simply a condition and not a problem. I completely agree that a high population is a necessary condition to get to high impact with our current technology and affluence configurations.

Of course, if you don't really understand what you're saying nor really understand what I say in response, I'd say that's not following the conversation doubly so.

Re-read carefully out exchange from the beginning and try to remember that the situation when we started is not the situation we have now. At what point do your points about "stopping flying would have terrible economic implications" make any sense. Are you saying that now Trump banning flights from Europe will have those terrible consequences? Or not now but if he did it last week or next week? Or are you arguing that flights shouldn't be banned only before the crisis started and then only after the crisis is resolved, but that for sure flights should have been stopped in a reasonable containment strategy? I.e. you agree with my position all along.

There is a row in the UK about the government's explicitly stated strategy of doing little in the way of interventions, with the aim of establishing a heard immunity.

I know that they are being advised by some of the world's top epidemiologists, but there is a growing suspicion that the government is limiting the strategy to one of a number of models provide by them. The model of blunting, or smoothing out the peak of the epidemic while accepting that at least 80% of the population will become infected anyway. In the aim that this degree of infection will generate a heard immunity and subsequently smooth out any following peaks.

Many people consider this a gamble, a risky strategy, which in the light of the lack of understanding of the virus could go horribly wrong in the initial peak of infection.

The charge against the government is that they have been advised about the fragile state of the economy and the critical degree of underfunding and recruitment crisis (Brexit) within the health system. That they are scarred of such collapse during the critical Brexit period and rather have adopted this strategy to put the strain on the risk of hundreds of thousands of old people instead. Well they are all going to die soon anyway.

Make Britain great again.

It was interesting to see what they ran out of. Bread, eggs, toilet paper, and rice were all gone. Seafood, canned beans, yogurt, and cheese were plentiful. I bought some precooked hot wings, which is my staple survival food during coronavirus scares. — Hanover

Man I was hoping the toilet paper thing sparked a bidet renaissance; ever since I went to Japan I've been hoping that bidets become a standard thing everywhere, but alas, we're stuck with paper :rage: — StreetlightX

Oh there too? What on Earth is it with people hoarding toilet paper? Happened here too. It's not a cholera epidemic. It's just crazy.

My prediction is that no one here will die or lose a close family member to the virus. If they do, I'll look like a dick for saying this, but that's the risk I'm willing to take, putting my nice guy reputation on the line. — Hanover

In all seriousness, that is what probability theory would say. It is quite likely that it's going to be rather rare (but not impossible) to get down with a serious corona infection (needing hospital level care) with the precautions and the attitudes now taken. Of course everybody now having flu symptoms will be careful. And as flu is quite common, we will have our corona-scares.

I've said that it's unlikely that the virus will kill one million people in the World. The pre-emptive measure now taken after the swineflu pandemic simply are so dramatic. Just for comparison (that we have a scale on how deadly diseases are) heart disease and cancer combined kill about 1,2 million annually only in the US. If you would make the prediction, Hanover, of no one here will die or lose a close family member to heart disease or cancer, you would by 0,99+ probability be wrong.

If the first wave of the epidemic in China has infections is really going down now by extremely drastic measures and you have deaths in the thousands in a country of 1 billion, that's is few. If (when) it jumps ten times after one year from now, that's still few.

In a way it does show we do value human life.

A couple days ago I was joking about people might start fighting over toilet paper but it has become a reality..

Shoppers charged over toilet paper brawl | Nine News Australia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1nEnOmC6IQ

How Costco is Handling Panicked Coronavirus Shoppers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsF6ezLOMC4

Effects of Coronavirus Panic Reach Far and Wide
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pAcWPZRVSo

Any thoughts on how this whole toilet paper craze got started? By now it's clearly a self-reinforcing cycle. But at some point, someone must have figured that the one thing they'll need in case they are cut off from supplied is toilet paper. Lots of toilet paper.

What happened to your post?

We're over the peak of toilet role panic now.

Any thoughts on how this whole toilet paper craze got started? — Echarmion

Once something is going off the shelves and we use it on a daily basis, the hoarding starts.

I think people are 1) afraid of a Italian / Chinese style lock down and 2) if they do get flu symptoms, the best thing is to have this self-imposed quarantine and not go to daily shopping. And then there's the "collapse of civilization" crowd...

We're over the peak of toilet role panic now. — Punshhh

Sounding like Trump few weeks ago on the corona issue. But ultimately people will have enough of toilet paper. :razz:

Once something is going off the shelves and we use it on a daily basis, the hoarding starts. — ssu

Yeah, but how did it start going off the shelves in the first place? I understand what is happening now, in terms of the psychology involved, but I don't get how it started.

Any thoughts on how this whole toilet paper craze got started? By now it's clearly a self-reinforcing cycle. But at some point, someone must have figured that the one thing they'll need in case they are cut off from supplied is toilet paper. Lots of toilet paper. — Echarmion

I believe it is partly caused by people feeling like they no longer have control over their lives and (at least for now) they have some control what they can buy it seems like "buying toilet paper" has become an outlet for people to funnel their energy into instead of biting their nails or grasping at pearls, although I'm pretty sure they are doing that now. It might also help to know that during the Spanish Influenza people where given shots that only vitamins in them (ie a placebo) in order to help remove some of the anxiety people where experiencing since they didn't have a vaccine at the time.

Yeah, but how did it start going off the shelves in the first place? I understand what is happening now, in terms of the psychology involved, but I don't get how it started. — Echarmion

Although I think observation is valid, there is also a numbers explanation that toilet paper takes up a lot of shelf space with little value density, so things are optimized to be "just enough" in both the front and the back storage ... and the regional storage as well. So, even a slight up tick due to people "stocking up" creates a depletion of toilet paper first in certain locations, which then causes the run on toilet paper in other locations as word gets around, and then social media drives the phenomena globally. A reddit poster clued me into this; toilet paper dynamics was not something I previously identified as a global important phenomena, but I've been trying to lean quick.

However, there's also a symbolic explanation that people realize the shits hitting the fan, metaphorically, and the toilet paper buying is a symbolic talisman of sorts that offers some protection.

I too apologize for my snarkiness.

I know that they are being advised by some of the world's top epidemiologists, but there is a growing suspicion that the government is limiting the strategy to one of a number of models provide by them. The model of blunting, or smoothing out the peak of the epidemic while accepting that at least 80% of the population will become infected anyway. In the aim that this degree of infection will generate a heard immunity and subsequently smooth out any following peaks. — Punshhh

I disagree here. I think you're giving BJ too much credit. You've let him wank your chain, if only a bit, which is preventing you from fully penetrating the thin veil separating the world view of the noble steeds from the common ass.

Framed this way they have "taken responsible and serious measures, well informed" and yes "it's a gamble, but there are risks either way".

This narrative is quite clearly being constructed now simply as a cover up to the initial incompetence of downplaying it.

If you read what Boris and co. were saying before, they are quite clear in their theory that "it's only a bad flue". UK was first to officially abandon containment, with the explicit logic that "it's not so bad", they were quite proud of their heroic complacency in favour of the economy.

I think a better explanation is that Boris and co. simply weren't alarmed by the prospect of "old people dying" and so minimized it, and by the time they did learn from the experts why it shouldn't be minimized: oopsy too late. Sowy, so, so sooowwy.

They are trying to transition towards the inevitable by pretending to make an intermediate step designed to make the previous mistakes look like well intentioned thought-out policy.

The theory I have been developing here, is that the neoliberal ideology is not equipped to deal with a situation where lives cannot be sacrificed for the stock market. Usually they can, because most conflicts between people's lives and the stock market are over a long enough period of time for propaganda to intervene. Why isn't everyone killed then? @NOS4A2 might ask innocently. Well, everyone may very well be killed for the stock market, the century is still young, but why it hasn't happened yet is because there is an optimum between keeping people alive in order to be consumers, sick consumers needing long term medical products ideally, and unregulated business to maximize externalities and thus profit (the world functions fairly close to this optimum).

These people are not only corrupt but lazy. To slow a pandemic requires "being on it" and not "seeing how it plays out elsewhere". Yes, they did hear expert advice, but my guess is their reply kept on being "yes, yes, let's meet again in a week and see where things are. No, no, we're not doing something drastic, run along now". No one had a model that inaction would actually be worse for the stock market, so they assumed the denialist propaganda was an adequate position as -- well, if anything their own base believes it, and what's true or false normally doesn't matter to their base -- and "letting old people die to reduce pensions and health care costs" generated on the right was actually true, so is, wink wink, a fiscally responsible thing (they forgot that it's important to tell the difference between truth and their own bullshit from time to time).

I think it's a conspiracy started by the international toilet paper conglomerate to raise toilet paper prices. I suspect toilet paper operatives have been mass purchasing to create the hysteria.

I heard that the toilet paper craze started in Australia, where a newspaper staged a scene of empty shelves. In fact they had taken the toilet paper off the shelves and stacked it behind the camera.

I use an electric mop on my buns. Extra scrubbing power.

Yeah, but how did it start going off the shelves in the first place? I understand what is happening now, in terms of the psychology involved, but I don't get how it started. — Echarmion

What also might be feeding the toilet paper frenzy is the news and social media talking about the toilet paper frenzy. Many items have been sold out for weeks now (ie dust mask, hand sanitizers, gloves,etc) which in and of themselves isn't that newsworthy but the idea of a run on toilet paper is pretty comical and gives some insight into how crazy the situation might be if out of all things for a store to run out of. Only in a zombie apocalypse (or some other apocalypse for that matter) would there be a need for people to stock up on 4 to 6 months worth of toilet paper. Also if one has that much toilet paper on hand but no food or water I don't think all that toilet paper will be that useful. However since most people can't afford to stock on half a year worth of food,water, medical supplies they might be able to buy half a years worth of toilet paper.

So in the end it may be a exacerbating feedback process that is fueled by social media, news, panic buying and the fact that people can afford to buy months worth of toilet paper whether they need it not plus the fact as pointed out by boethius that a pallet of toilet paper isn't really that much so even if just a few people start buying extra toilet paper then a store quickly runs out. However the same can be said of dust mask, hand sanitizers, gloves since such items where not commodities that where often needed before the corona virus outbreak.

I heard that the toilet paper craze started in Australia, where a newspaper staged a scene of empty shelves. In fact they had taken the toilet paper off the shelves and stacked it behind the camera. — Punshhh

A prank like that is almost as bad as shouting "fire" in a movie theater considering the state of the world we live in nowadays but it would be still a little humorous if it is one of the things that started all of this.

For instance, CNN just published a piece entitled "What does Britain know about coronavirus that the rest of Europe doesn't?" which is (for critical thinkers) basically pointing fun at UK leaders at oblivious morons.

They then just changed the headline on the front page, however, to "UK is taking a big gamble on Coronavirus".

Why the change? because someone executive got a swift "that's not the narrative you fool!".

Anyways, when even CNN can't help themselves to pointing out the transparent inconsistency of UK's policy changes.

Flanked by the country's chief scientific and medical advisers, the Prime Minister announced that his government was moving to the "delay" phase of its plan to tackle the outbreak, and warned Britons that they were facing their "worst public health crisis for a generation" and should be prepared "to lose loved ones before their time."

And yet, faced with such grave prospects, would the UK be taking the same stringent precautions as other affected countries? No, was the answer. At least not for now. — CNN

As the UK will soon realize, "delaying" requires measures to actually achieve. You can't just say "delay" in order to cause a delay.

But many prominent members of the medical community are unconvinced by the government's approach. Doctors on the front line of intensive care units have warned about the potential lack of respirators, as seen in Italy and China when cases peaked there, and said that if staff become sick themselves, access to experienced labor could become a problem.

The editor-in-chief of the influential journal The Lancet criticized the UK's response to the crisis. "To avoid an unmanageable catastrophe in the UK, we need to be honest about what seems likely to happen in coming weeks. We need urgent surge capacity in intensive care. The NHS is not prepared," Richard Horton tweeted Thursday.

"I am not being alarmist. What is happening in Italy is real and taking place now. Our government is not preparing us for that reality. We need immediate and assertive social distancing and closure policies. We need to prepare the NHS. This is a serious plea." — CNN

So, I don't think "listening to the experts" but "taking a gamble" is what's been going on, but rather incompetent inaction, perhaps to cover up and spin as best as can be done the latest pedophile scandal left little room for other government issues, and now that this pesky virus thing is a crisis (which blame will inevitably fall on those in charge) those in charge are desperately trying their propaganda tricks anyways, prepare their base to believe their "loved ones" died for a noble cause and everything was taken "seriously, very seriously" at every step.

It's perfectly consistent that the leader that brought "Get Brexit Done" thought it was a good idea to "Get Virus Done".

It is attractive to believe that people with a lot of power who say and do obviously stupid things are "actually smart" and don't actually believe obviously stupid things and, maybe ignore long term risks that "we don't know about for sure" but certainly would be capable and astute faced with short term risks to the entire system and their political careers. However, it's an all or nothing epistemology; to sell lies one must believe those lies even if one knew they were lies in the beginning. Propagandists always fall victim to their own propaganda time and time again throughout history: the pandemic is the low probability and high impact systemic risk these people have been pointing their propaganda at for decades, painting anyone who points out these sorts of "vulnerabilities" as "alarmist", which of course generally works as the risk is low so doesn't likely manifest right away, but, over time, leads them to believe their propaganda is actually true and that capitalism really does "work efficiently".

Jost now

Live: Spain prepares for lockdown as WHO question's UK's "herd immunity" strategy — theguardian

Turns out the pandemic experts haven't heard of this approach as a "reasonable gamble".

Why? because it's completely made up by propagandists to try to cover their asses.

The calculation is that after realizing they messed up, and people's loved one's dying for preventable reasons will result in a lot of anger, the best plan is to try to point blank tell people "their loved ones will perish" so that later they can say: "we told you, difficult thing this governing, too complex to explain to you lot, but we did tell you this would happen; but you didn't listen! should have washed your hands if you wanted to save your grandmama's!"

Jost now

[qutoe=theguardian]
Live: Spain prepares for lockdown as WHO queston's UK "herd immunity" strategy


Turns out the pandemic experts haven't heard of this approach.

Why? because it's completely made up by propagandists to try to cover their asses. — boethius

...Says some who doesnt even do a basic Google search before posting ignorance like this.

I did a Google search for "coronavirus vs other outbreaks" (which isn't a search for "herd immunity" specifically), and the very first link mentioned heard immunity:
https://www.healthline.com/health-news/how-deadly-is-the-coronavirus-compared-to-past-outbreaks

The fact is that previous flu pandemics have had higher death rates more more deaths than coronavirus, yet the media (and others) has fanned the flames, causing hysteria within the ignorant portion of the population.

It seems like most people see life through a political prism, which is a shame. It's why we have threads like this pointing fingers at each other rather than China - where all this shit comes from. No one questions a communist/socialist govt that has a fetish for population control and where the older population places a big burden on a socialist healthcare system and are therefore expendable.

The fact is that previous flu pandemics have had higher death rates more more deaths than coronovirus, yet the media (and others) has fanned the flames, causing hysteria within the ignorant portion of the population. — Harry Hindu

More deaths at a comparable time in those respective outbreaks? Or are you comparing final deaths of previous flu pandemics with early stage of this pandemic?

If that's the case, google can't help you.

Did you even read the link I posted?

Here's the reality folks. If Italy had acted sooner, this may not have happened. Death rate there stands at 6%. — Baden

The reality is:

the Italian population is the oldest in Europe, with about 23 percent of the inhabitants age 65 or older — and with a median age of 47.3, compared with 38.3 in the US, according to Live Science, which cited the New York Times.

Many of those who have died in Italy were in their 80s and 90s, a segment of the population that is more susceptible to the ravages of COVID-19.

The overall death rate depends on the demographics of a population, Aubree Gordon, an associate professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan, told Live Science. — NY Post

https://nypost.com/2020/03/12/heres-why-the-coronavirus-death-rate-is-so-high-in-italy/

Did you even read the link I posted? — Harry Hindu

Did you read the link you posted?

Or did you just assume it supported your conclusion that

The fact is that previous flu pandemics have had higher death rates more more deaths than coronavirus, yet the media (and others) has fanned the flames, causing hysteria within the ignorant portion of the population. — Harry Hindu

Which the link doesn't support.

To make the claim that those pandemics have "more deaths than coronavirus" you need to know how many total deaths there will be. We do not know at this stage.

Sars-1 and Ebola are much worse in terms of death rates, sure, but those pandemics were contained by an effective containment strategy -- what I argued when I joined this discussion was a good idea and a policy failure to not pursue containment when it was still feasible, at least for many regions.

The only comparable case on the list is the Spanish flue, which killed 50 million people, maybe more, and was highly disruptive. Also, because there wasn't international air traffic in 1918, that pandemic spread much slower, from region to region, and didn't affect everyone simultaneously. This pandemic is better than the Spanish flue in that it doesn't affect children, but maybe much worse in the second order systematic affects because it is happening simultaneously globally due to not stopping air travel when it would have had a chance to feasibly contain, and even if containment ultimately failed then the pandemic would have spread asynchronously with much more time to prepare, understand, as well as "most" of the global economy functioning as normal at any given time.

So what's your link supposed to establish? Obviously not the total deaths of Coronavirus that you claim will be less than those, as you have no clue what total deaths will be and your precious link does not provide this fact -- as it's in the future and facts are about the past.

So what does it support? That eventually we'll get herd immunity; that's not in discussion here -- although we do not yet know if immunity is long term for this virus, people could get it again which was another reason for containment. Or do you just want to say "pandemics happen"; agreed, yes they do happen.

Yes, "herd immunity" will happen one way or another, but the UK's position that "getting herd immunity quickly" is a strategy, is not a strategy; it's a propaganda play to portray their incompetence as some sort of plan all along.

In a few days they'll do like everyone else and lock down, and they'll say "well, our gamble didn't work, but it was a jolly good try".

For people interested in the subtler aspects of propaganda.

The article links to has a little "fact check" checkmark; all the authority anyone needs of course.

Yet states:

And some early reports say COVID-19 may have a higher death rate than the seasonal flu. But we may soon find out it’s less deadly than initial reports since so many people with COVID-19 have mild symptoms or are asymptomatic and therefore don’t see a doctor and are largely unaccounted for. — Healthline

Take notice that the two sentences aren't logically connected.

Yes, it has been reported that it's more contagious and has a higher death rate than the seasonable flu.

Yes, the reported death rates maybe lower when we have more information on total deaths to total true infections.

No! The second sentence does not actually state the coronavirus could end up being less deadly than the seasonable flu! No expert says so. All information and all credible models show way higher death rates than the seasonable flu.

The danger of the coronavirus pandemic is not individual chance of death, as this article attempts to portray to try to calm people down, but the systemic effects of overwhelming health systems and governments forced to act to lower the infection rate to something manageable.

Overwhelming the health system not only radically increases the death rate as people die due to lack of treatment, but also causes deaths of other conditions and injuries due to lack of care available, and also causes long term damage to health system -- killing some doctors and nurses, weakening others long-term even if recovered, creating a backlog of everything that can be postponed even if very suboptimal for health outcomes to postpone those scheduled appointments and treatments.

There are also short term systemic affects that go beyond the health system. Criminals may take advantage of the situation to go on a crime spree. People that do not accept triage decisions may lose it. Vulnerable populations that cannot deal with the disruption may riot.

Then there are the longer term economic consequences. Bailing out everyone at the same time to try to reboot the system may cause hyperinflation in a combination of eroded trust in institutions and a new economic situation that is fundamentally different.

Harry Hindu It seems like most people see life through a political prism, which is a shame. It's why we have threads like this pointing fingers at each other rather than China - where all this shit comes from.

That one is funny. Guys lets stop pointing fingers please, lets all point them to China. Let's castigate the Spanish for the Spanish flu and the Mexicans for the Mexican ones, lets point to the gays for aids and the Napolitans for the ubiquitous pizza hut.

Shoppers charged over toilet paper brawl | Nine News Australia — dclements

I'm selling leaves in a ziplock bag for $10.

If you don't have a response and capitulate on the above issues, then let's move on to others.

I have a question for you.

Given that bailouts are a collectivist socialist scheme, both to individuals and businesses, and given that "Covid-19 isn’t the first threatening disease that’s surged around the world — nor will it be the last." as the article you linked concludes, would you agree that it would be more efficient to let any individual and any business that can't deal with the pandemic fail? Either bankruptcy or homelessness, both in terms of paying for treatment, if not insured or underinsured, or then dealing with the economic downturn.

Given that pandemics are a given, isn't it the responsibility of each individual and business to prepare for what is certain? Clearly only a fool wouldn't. Why should businesses and individuals that are healthy financially and can weather this storm, subsidize those that can't? Wouldn't you agree those that can absorb the shock without government assistance should get a recompense for their wisdom of being able to pounce on more market share or then increase their individual competitiveness in the job market?