Okay, so? What next? This situation is not sustainable. I have not heard a single government entity commit to an actual plan.
I have no doubt that the governor and various county officials are well-intentioned, and that the risk of an actual dictatorship developing is basically 0.0%, but the fact is that these are the same actions a dictator could take to (for instance) suppress a revolution. Stay in your home - no meetings of any kind - no travel beyond 5 miles - only essential employees report to work.
So you value your ‘freedom’ over managing real risk?
Then you won’t mind signing this,I the undersigned, since I value my freedom over my safety, agree to allow every person that sheltered in place to have access to medical treatment ahead of me if I get coronavirus disease.CMC fnord!
And now people are asking that we do incalculable damage to the nation’s creative and productive capacity in order to reduce their personal risk while they (literally) sit on the couch.
If I were the only one affected, I could put up with the shelter in place orders. If I knew that I could come out the other side and return to the society we left. But I’m horrified by the thought that we will emerge to a devastated economic wasteland that exacerbates everything already wrong with the American economy and permanently destroys the American dream for millions. I can live with staying at home for months, if that’s what it takes, but that’s not the only thing at stake. I can’t live with another Great Depression, which would have repercussions lasting decades.
The argument is that not doing everything possible to control the virus will lead to a devastated economic wasteland anyway (who wants to go out to shop or eat, even if everything is open, while the news is filled with contagion everywhere and bodies piling up?), so why not take the option that has a chance of saving lives?
Or are want to consider “security” as a free variable to be applied to whatever the current issue is, thereby creating a catch all aphorism to be used against anything they don’t approve of.
What is perhaps more amusing, is that the quote is taken out of context, and seems to actually mean nearly the opposite of what is assumed.
Sorry, I’m letting myself get a bit carried away with something of a theoretical argument.
I totally accept the need for shelter in place lasting a few months. Beyond a few months, I think the rationale deteriorates rapidly without a more focused and evidence-based strategy, which I see no sign of anyone developing.
I’m a little freaked out by stories I am reading in the local media of government officials obviously leaving the door open for this to last indefinitely, and am astonished that no one seems to be asking for them to explain their thinking or consider the consequences above a 3rd grade level.
I don’t think anyone disagrees that simply sheltering in place without any further guidance is viable. But, as I wrote above, we are in a bit of a hiatus right now. Demanding the next step be outlined “right now” is sadly unrealistic. If you could somehow force the issue, all it would do is force an uninformed, and almost certainly bad, choice. Which is worse.
There is little that can be sensibly done until there is more knowledge to provide guidance. That knowledge is actively being gathered, it isn’t just wishful thinking hoping it will magically fall from the sky. But it takes time. Lack of press releases and media coverage does not mean inaction.
Where I think almost all governments are being very careful (finally, after quite a few missteps) is to avoid early optimism that is later dashed. Better to have some frustrated people waiting than to be rushed into making an overly rosy prediction and messing up, only to have to enforce the lockdown thy were trying to lift. This is new territory for everyone. Messing up is not an option.
I’m confused here. Are you advocating for the hospitals to be all filled up or the opposite? It seems to me a hospital at 100% capacity would be a bad thing because then they have no room if still more patients arrive. Unless you are advocating mass infection of everyone?? Surely that can’t be right… That’d be a LOT of dead folks.
Even if we were to adopt a strategy of working toward herd immunity backed up hospital capability for those that become critically ill as a result, it is impossible to get there by a simple release of restrictions. Why? Because one thing we are sure of - the infection spreads exponentially. Once there is a new cohort of infected they cannot be allowed to mingle, otherwise we have gained nothing, the numbers will go back to doubling each two days, and lots of people will be dead very quickly. We have a hard limit on the number that can be handled in hospital. We know that even amongst healthy young people there are those for which things go badly wrong, and they become critically and some die. I was advocating this approach at one point, but for the moment, it is clear it is untenable. In the USA, given the wide prevalence of co-morbidites - much obesity, much type-2 diabetes, and so on, you would not want to be too sure you would not be getting into serious trouble really quickly. (It seems that you don’t need to have serious issues with co-morbidities - this isn’t a matter of the virus just pushing someone quite ill over the edge, it is other way around, your not too serious co-mordibity is what pushes you over the edge when you have the virus.)
The problem with the exponential increase in infections is that it is extremely hard to regulate with the levers we have. Tweaking social isolation parameters alone does provide useful fine grained control. You are either winning and infections are dropping, or you are losing ad they are rising exponentially, there is maybe a razor thin middle ground. Nobody believes you can manage a population on this edge. It is just too unstable, even if you knew where it was.
Any hospital admission is not good news if you have Covid-19. The odds are pretty grim. It isn’t a matter of - seriously sick - go to hospital - get treated - go home. The chances are it is - seriously sick, go to hospital - get worse - go to ICU - oxygen - get worse - get ventilated - die. Only half of those that are put on ventilators make it. If you need ICU, you have a one in four chance of leaving feet first.
Just imagine if the vaccine had a death rate of one for every thousand. There would be riots in the streets if the government mandated vaccination with it. Herd immunity via community infection is worse.
A slight reduction in the number of ICU beds needed is not “empty hospitals.” We seem to have flattened the curve thanks to the stringent measures you descry.
We don’t know what the numbers will be like in a few weeks. We don’t know how much testing we can do in a few weeks. We don’t know if the models predicting a surge are correct. We’ve never been through this before. Why do you think anyone can give you a solid answer? I’m sure they are working on all sorts of measures for when we can reopen, but it would only confuse people.
I heard a report ask Trump what metrics he’d use in deciding on when to reopen, and he said “The metrics are in my head.” You don’t want our leaders to be like him, do you?
I doubt anyone tracked those people. We know from Florida that this kind of thing does add to more cases. Not closing the parking lots would just make the problem bigger and bigger as people naturally congregated.
I’ve heard plenty of rationale. Shelter in place, limit the spread, prevent the number of cases from overwhelming the health system. Which has worked.
I’m not sure what kind of democracy you want. The legislature could rebel, but they aren’t, thank Og. You want a referendum on closing down? Scheduled three months from now? This is science. The virus doesn’t care how we’d vote.
If you made shutting down voluntary, there would definitely be bosses who would demand people come in, and their competitors would be forced to follow suit.
In war time we don’t get to vote on military strategy either.
Let’s look at the data.
My kids are working from home and earning money. You can have visitors, assuming you want to risk it. I’ve been in plenty of meetings. I don’t know why a 5 mile limit, as I said my town doesn’t have one.
No one is saying we have to eliminate risk, just reduce it to reasonable numbers. We can go to the grocery. We can go to a restaurant for takeout. We can go to the hardware store. We can’t go to the movies or theater and be in a room with hundreds of other people. We’re reducing the spread, not eliminating it. And the more people exposed, the higher the risk there is when you have to be around other people.
We all die - but we don’t need to years early because of some people feeling cooped up.
In some COVID simulations my SO is working on it is showing a Easter bump, which is the effect of just relaxing and getting together just one time according to some models, would lead to a uptick of infections in the upcoming weeks.
We’re in agreement, pretty much, except that I think the models are going to tell us when we can stop this, just like they told us it was necessary. Cuomo is explaining his thinking at way above a third grade level. Explaining the details of the models is not going to work. I doubt the politicians understand them in depth, which is not a knock at them if they accept the consensus of advice from those who do.
Give a date and there will be a backlash if you take it away. Look at Trump and Easter.
It’s real easy to say the war will be over by the summer, but that never works out.
Deniers and disbelievers are invited to gather together in remote locations and celebrate exuberantly as in Poe’s MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH. No exit until the virus has burnt out. Party like it’s 1666!
LA people are breaking the quarantine. Last night, for the first time in a month, people were walking up and down my street in groups laughing and partying like the old days. LA will either prove that social distancing works and must continue or that the worst of this is over.
