3 ms·

Which points do you have issues with? I think they all seemed on 'on-base'.

lvh 7y ago
By their own admission, they fail to quantify their findings. So, my issue is that they’re sound bites that a lot of people were predisposed to agree with (eg “American healthcare is bad and expensive”) and therefore unlikely to evaluate critically. People have also argued the opposite: the US is special because we have large natural borders (mostly). Or maybe the US is special because the US has a large Chinese-American population, many of whom travel regularly. Epidemiology is a science. Why listen to Twitter randos when you have specialists?
- blaser-waffle 7y ago
  Why listen to HN randos for that matter? (Counterpoint: HN has a huge selection bias for educated, technical types and a higher overall pool of talent. Doesn't mean disinformation campaigns and marketing won't work on this crowd, though)
  - lvh 7y ago
    Sure! If the thread had been posted on HN I'd raise similar skepticism :)
Spooky23 7y ago
Public Health is an actual line of business based on science. Access to health care is a factor in that unhealthy populations are more at risk of complications. The thing that makes covid scary is how it spreads, and the focus of the health authorities is intervening to slow that down. I am not an expert in the field, but I consulted for a few of them in the past. Ignore twitter bullshit with political overtones and seek out what is being said by CDC, state health departments and related researchers.
bart_spoon 7y ago
Well just about none of them are substantiated with any data. You can say things like “people in the US will avoid going to the hospital because of the bill” and it sounds right because of our perception of the US health system, but is it really? Do we have actual numbers showing this is actually the case, and if so, how extensive it will be? And do we have reason to believe those numbers will hold in this exceptional circumstance? Yes, when people believe they might have the flu, they could potentially try and wait out going to the doctor. But do we believe that in an environment where we have people so acutely aware of the coronavirus outbreak that they are buying out supplies of masks, posting long twitter screeds on potential doomsday scenarios, and side-eyeing every Asian-American with a cough, that when they start to show symptoms they still are going to get hung up on the cost of a clinic visit? The same goes for many of the other assertions, such as parents forcing their children to go school sick. Or the extremely thin premise of elderly people dying because of a huge number of parents sticking them with their sick children while they work. In fact, what data we do have seems to suggest that children barely get sick from this thing at all, or their sickness is so mild it doesn’t get diagnosed. A recent paper in JAMA found that of the first 44,672 cases confirmed in China, only 416 were in children younger than 10. In fact, only 10% were in people younger than 30.[0] It seems ridiculous to entertain scenarios where elderly people all die off because overworked parents foist their parental duties onto them. It’s also worth stating that a lot of these concerns are not unique to the US. Many of them also apply to other countries like China and Japan, which are already in the midst of their outbreak. Yes, author is only comparing the US and Europe, but that seems like a useless comparison given that the number of infections in both regions is so small and contained right now. And finally, the author fails to account for reasons why the US might be better off than Europe. As is often pointed out on this site, usually in a negative context, the US is far less dense than Europe. Fewer people are living in tightly packed urban communities, and more live in suburban and rural areas. Far fewer rely on public transportation. That means far fewer opportunities to come across someone contagious. And the US has some measure of protection in its borders. Except for Canada and Mexico, we can only be accessed via plane or boat. Most of the EU has open borders, meaning that it will only be that much more difficult to coordinate quarantines and control measures. [0] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2762130?guestAccessKey=bdcca6fa-a48c-4028-8406-7f3d04a3e932&utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_content=tfl&utm_term=022420 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2762130?gu...

lvh 7y ago

By their own admission, they fail to quantify their findings. So, my issue is that they’re sound bites that a lot of people were predisposed to agree with (eg “American healthcare is bad and expensive”) and therefore unlikely to evaluate critically. People have also argued the opposite: the US is special because we have large natural borders (mostly). Or maybe the US is special because the US has a large Chinese-American population, many of whom travel regularly. Epidemiology is a science. Why listen to Twitter randos when you have specialists?

blaser-waffle 7y ago
Why listen to HN randos for that matter? (Counterpoint: HN has a huge selection bias for educated, technical types and a higher overall pool of talent. Doesn't mean disinformation campaigns and marketing won't work on this crowd, though)
- lvh 7y ago
  Sure! If the thread had been posted on HN I'd raise similar skepticism :)

Spooky23 7y ago

Public Health is an actual line of business based on science. Access to health care is a factor in that unhealthy populations are more at risk of complications. The thing that makes covid scary is how it spreads, and the focus of the health authorities is intervening to slow that down. I am not an expert in the field, but I consulted for a few of them in the past. Ignore twitter bullshit with political overtones and seek out what is being said by CDC, state health departments and related researchers.

bart_spoon 7y ago

Well just about none of them are substantiated with any data. You can say things like “people in the US will avoid going to the hospital because of the bill” and it sounds right because of our perception of the US health system, but is it really? Do we have actual numbers showing this is actually the case, and if so, how extensive it will be? And do we have reason to believe those numbers will hold in this exceptional circumstance? Yes, when people believe they might have the flu, they could potentially try and wait out going to the doctor. But do we believe that in an environment where we have people so acutely aware of the coronavirus outbreak that they are buying out supplies of masks, posting long twitter screeds on potential doomsday scenarios, and side-eyeing every Asian-American with a cough, that when they start to show symptoms they still are going to get hung up on the cost of a clinic visit? The same goes for many of the other assertions, such as parents forcing their children to go school sick. Or the extremely thin premise of elderly people dying because of a huge number of parents sticking them with their sick children while they work. In fact, what data we do have seems to suggest that children barely get sick from this thing at all, or their sickness is so mild it doesn’t get diagnosed. A recent paper in JAMA found that of the first 44,672 cases confirmed in China, only 416 were in children younger than 10. In fact, only 10% were in people younger than 30.[0] It seems ridiculous to entertain scenarios where elderly people all die off because overworked parents foist their parental duties onto them. It’s also worth stating that a lot of these concerns are not unique to the US. Many of them also apply to other countries like China and Japan, which are already in the midst of their outbreak. Yes, author is only comparing the US and Europe, but that seems like a useless comparison given that the number of infections in both regions is so small and contained right now. And finally, the author fails to account for reasons why the US might be better off than Europe. As is often pointed out on this site, usually in a negative context, the US is far less dense than Europe. Fewer people are living in tightly packed urban communities, and more live in suburban and rural areas. Far fewer rely on public transportation. That means far fewer opportunities to come across someone contagious. And the US has some measure of protection in its borders. Except for Canada and Mexico, we can only be accessed via plane or boat. Most of the EU has open borders, meaning that it will only be that much more difficult to coordinate quarantines and control measures. [0] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2762130?guestAccessKey=bdcca6fa-a48c-4028-8406-7f3d04a3e932&utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_content=tfl&utm_term=022420 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2762130?gu...