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Perhaps that's why there's no point declaring a pandemic. If you do, some prepare, some panic, the panicking ones clog the ICU and the virus spreads like wildf

Perhaps that's why there's no point declaring a pandemic. If you do, some prepare, some panic, the panicking ones clog the ICU and the virus spreads like wildfire, the ICU can't keep up. If you don't, nobody prepares, everybody's sprung upon and taken by surprise, the stampedes oversubscribe ICU capacity in much the same way as above. At the end of the day I think the two variables all of this boils down to are infrastructure capacity limits and individual survival rates - and that no relevant models exist that can readily catalyze this specific set of circumstances with confidence. IIUC, what models do exist are not precise/disambiguating enough. So it all comes down to unresolvable clique interpretation. Officials can't work with that. :(

jacquesm 7y ago
The difference is that we can recognize that containment has failed and start planning accordingly. I don't think any rational authority is at this point still arguing that this will be contained to within the borders of those countries now affected. So you might as well accept that we do indeed have a pandemic on our hands, which will have substantial economic impact but need not have a substantial toll in terms of lives lost. Waiting with that declaration is the same as what the authorities in Wuhan did initially: they hoped it would blow over. But viruses do not care about our politics. And if we do not take relatively drastic measures to stop community spreading then the impact will be much higher, both economic and in terms of lives.
- maxerickson 7y ago
  There's a lot of options between "ignoring it" and "declaring a global pandemic".
  - jacquesm 7y ago
    Such as?
    - maxerickson 7y ago
      Lots of examples in the news... Or do you somehow think there is currently no response?
      - jacquesm 7y ago
        The response so far seems to have concentrated on containment. That has - you could argue this - failed. The next logical step is to declare a pandemic, according to the CDC there are now cases in 32 countries with confirmed community spreading in about half of those. Note that a pandemic is only related to the geographical spreading in combination with the risk factors (highly contagious, relatively high mortality rate). Anyway, this thread will be obsolete before the week is out, I would be highly surprised if WHO/CDC will not do this in the next couple of days. The only way they can avoid doing it is if the number of cases and the number of countries affected will go down.
        maxerickson 7y ago
        Eh, I was wrong, it essentially has already been declared a pandemic, in as much as that happens anyway: https://www.afro.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus-covid-19 https://www.afro.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus-covid-19 "On the advice of the Emergency Committee, the WHO Director-General, declared the COVID-19 outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC)."

jacquesm 7y ago

The difference is that we can recognize that containment has failed and start planning accordingly. I don't think any rational authority is at this point still arguing that this will be contained to within the borders of those countries now affected. So you might as well accept that we do indeed have a pandemic on our hands, which will have substantial economic impact but need not have a substantial toll in terms of lives lost. Waiting with that declaration is the same as what the authorities in Wuhan did initially: they hoped it would blow over. But viruses do not care about our politics. And if we do not take relatively drastic measures to stop community spreading then the impact will be much higher, both economic and in terms of lives.

maxerickson 7y ago
There's a lot of options between "ignoring it" and "declaring a global pandemic".
- jacquesm 7y ago
  Such as?
  - maxerickson 7y ago
    Lots of examples in the news... Or do you somehow think there is currently no response?
    - jacquesm 7y ago
      The response so far seems to have concentrated on containment. That has - you could argue this - failed. The next logical step is to declare a pandemic, according to the CDC there are now cases in 32 countries with confirmed community spreading in about half of those. Note that a pandemic is only related to the geographical spreading in combination with the risk factors (highly contagious, relatively high mortality rate). Anyway, this thread will be obsolete before the week is out, I would be highly surprised if WHO/CDC will not do this in the next couple of days. The only way they can avoid doing it is if the number of cases and the number of countries affected will go down.
      - maxerickson 7y ago
        Eh, I was wrong, it essentially has already been declared a pandemic, in as much as that happens anyway: https://www.afro.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus-covid-19 https://www.afro.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus-covid-19 "On the advice of the Emergency Committee, the WHO Director-General, declared the COVID-19 outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC)."