Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board

Coronavirus

<< < (41/143) > >>

Twoapenny:
Death rate down again now which is good but it's still much higher than it would usually be for this time of year.  It's weird how your brain gets used to things - if I'd read six months ago that 882 more people had died in the last week than would usually at this time of year I'd have felt devastated; now it feels almost unreal?  The number has reduced and that was the bit I focused on.  Self preservation, perhaps?  We are continuing to stay in, though xx

Hopalong:
It is disturbing and also fascinating, in a creepy way, that the dual infections of the pandemic virus and also the racism virus are exploding to the surface at the same time. I think amazing histories will be written about this time.

Coronavirus is exposed for its reality as people sicken and die. Terrible price to pay for ignorance and resistance to science, but it is a real price and in the aftermath, or when a new threat to public health is announced, the chances of compliance to recommendations might be increased.

hugs
Hops

mudpuppy:
Let's follow the science;
Worldwide daily deaths rose rapidly in March and then peaked in early to mid April and have declined steadily and without interruption since then.
At the same time new cases also ramped up quickly in March and then leveled off in early April and have increased at a similar rate to the decline in deaths. Declining deaths with rising cases means, necessarily, a declining death rate.
That is over two months of the death rate steadily declining worldwide. The latest CDC numbers indicate an overall infection fatality rate in the US of .26% and still declining. Reportedly a typical flu IFR is .1%. If it continues to decline it may very well end up with an IFR at or below the flu's.
Some studies indicate up to 60% of unexposed people are already immune or at least resistant to infection because they have limited immunity from the antibodies to similar coronaviruses.
In the US ~20 people under 15 years old have died of it. That is a considerably lower death rate than an ordinary flu.
Neil Ferguson, the guy at Imperial College who came up with the faulty model so many governments relied on, himself said at least 60% of the people who would die from it were not going to live out the year anyway.
Over 40% of US deaths were in nursing homes even though less than 1% of the population live in nursing homes . This was considerably exacerbated by several governors forcing nursing homes to take in infected patients who were discharged from hospitals.
We were told we had to be locked down to "flatten the curve". Honest people admitted this was only to reduce hospital loads and that it would not significantly reduce cases, but merely spread them out over time. Logically that meant we would have a slow decline in cases and possibly even uptrends as we stretched out the curve. Now when that is occurring in those places like CA and TX where the curve was flattened we're being told we need another lockdown even though there is no significant hospital pressure.
In those states which did not successfully flatten the curve like NY and NJ their cases went through the roof and have declined precipitously and are bumping along the bottom because the wave crested high and fast rather than low and slow. In the end there is little evidence either way significantly reduces overall cases or deaths.
Some goofs talk about shutting the world down until a vaccine is produced. No coronavirus has ever had a successful vaccine developed for it. SARS 1 was in 2003-4 and had a fatality rate of 10%. Sixteen years later there is still no vaccine for it. MERS had a fatality rate of ~35%. Eight years later; no vaccine.

The simple fact is this disease, once it escaped China, which occurred partly because while China shut down internal travel from Wuhan they allowed international travel from there for a month, it was probably ultimately unstoppable and will eventually become ubiquitous at least for a time. It may eventually fade away but with the millions of carriers that were headed to Italy, New York and all over the rest of the world, whether Chinese or tourists returning to their home country guaranteed it would eventually become endemic worldwide.
It is preposterous to think anyone could track and trace and quarantine the hundreds of millions of people who have already either had it or been around someone who has. And if you could you would only slow it down temporarily and meanwhile reduce our standard of living to the stone age, when diseases killed pretty much everyone the sabre toothed tigers didn't eat.
  How many lives will be lost and ruined worldwide due to the depression the overreaction caused? They can't be tidily summed up in quasi accurate death counts like Covid deaths but it is almost certain that the "cure" was worse than the disease.

The only sensible thing to have done, which many of us said from the start, was to truly quarantine and protect the most vulnerable while allowing those for whom it is no more dangerous than a bad flu to continue to live their lives and get the inevitable over with. The trillions in wealth destroyed was for nothing. And those trillions don't just buy iphones and video games. They buy food for starving people in destitute countries and vaccines and treatment for diseases that kill thousands and millions every year like TB and malaria, including and especially kids, not 90 year olds about ready to check out anyway.
In the end all of the  chicken little, safety at any cost foolishness probably made no significant change in the long term pervasiveness and toll of Covid-19 but did cause vast damage to the lives of billions and may very well end up costing not only trillions in lost wealth but more and younger healthier people their lives while saving almost no one from the Covid bug itself.
Lots of virtue got signalled by lots of big shot government dopes and nerdy little billionaires, but for the rest of us it was a lose/lose.

mud

Hopalong:
Hi Mud--
Thoughtful analysis, with lots of logic.

Only part that trips me up is:
quarantine and protect the most vulnerable while allowing those for whom it is no more dangerous than a bad flu

It's not that predictable who's in danger, because so many underlying conditions go undiagnosed. There are too many severely ill patients in their 30s or 40s for age-based assumptions to be safe ones, imo, although no question older folks are in greater danger. Articles I've read about surviving this disease when it's not just a "bad flu" are pretty compelling. Chronic severe lung damage and other aftermaths have their costs too. To each their own concern.

It's a tough call--personally, economically, morally. The biological and social pull of humans getting together will mean it continues to bounce through populations in one wave or two (or who knows) and life may never be exactly as it was.

Probably the most important thing will be what we need anyway for a host of other reasons--to look for ways to help each other, heal our communities not just medically but socially--and carry on. Pointing fingers will go on forever, because humans, but I hope that eventually becomes less exciting than finding ways to help each other. Maybe positive changes in consumption, lifestyle and economic priorities will happen. Maybe explosions in creativity and invention, eco-friendlier agribusiness, health and lifestyle habits, community support, and other humane trends will ensue.

It's good to hear you. Hope you've been well, and those you love. Start a Mud thread!

hugs
Hops

Meh:
So I heard today was the first day of a local women's low-end retailer opening up. Neighbor told me they saw a LONG line of women in queue to get in.

Personally I wish we could have a revolution where people bartered in the arts, literature, community, other things beyond filling boredom with shopping for a prize within racks and racks of junk.

I can only do my best to live my life and promote what I can I guess, i don't even do a great job of promoting culture in my own small bubble. I mean I do a little bit, not sure that everybody appreciates it. I will not give up in this endeavor!

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page