7 ms·

So this is awaiting all countries, in all likelihood? I mean what's the difference between Italy and Switzerland? Or Germany? Or the United States?

missosoup 7y ago
The united states is going to fare a lot worse. Their president is actively contradicting his own experts and essentially encouraging people to go on spreading the disease. It's going to be a clusterfuck.
- reaperducer 7y ago
  People in other countries put too much weight in what the president says, Trump or otherwise, because they don't fully understand that there is an entire system of government that can fully function with or without the president. I won't go so far as to say that the position of the president is a figurehead, but it's been more than a little advisory for several generations. I watch a lot of BBC, NHK, and DW, and see it all the time. I don't blame the foreign journalists. If you're an overseas news organization working in America, of course the president is going to be fully staffed. But few orgs go much beyond that. Because of this, the European view of how America works is very simplified.
  - pbourke 7y ago
    In this case the President has weaponized the virus as a political issue. A sizeable number of people in the country don't believe that it's a serious issue and won't until their local hospitals are literally overrun. Maybe even not then. I believe you are seriously underestimating the effect of chaff being thrown into the air over this issue on a number of fronts. It makes it much, much harder to have people follow public health advice or put pressure on lawmakers to pass the necessary appropriations that will be required to address the situation.
  - akiselev 7y ago
    > there is an entire system of government that can fully function with or without the president. Except when a major global catastrophe hits, like a pandemic, the response requires massive coordination across local, state, and federal levels. What he says now may not be so relevant but the president's lack of appoints to key executive branch positions within the CDC and the rest of the healthcare apparatus (including eliminating health related positions from the National Security Council, one of the most important multi-agency coordination bodies) has drastically hampered the COVID-19 response effort. People from other countries more often tend to underestimate the sheer scale and complexity created by a local-state-federal separation of powers weighed down by over two hundred years of judicial baggage and thousands of miles of geography. In a crisis like this, even figuring out who has legal jurisdiction and authority is complicated. Doing it without an effective executive body, whose job is to navigate and command that mess, is far more difficult.
    - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
      Just look at the testing for an example. There's absolutely no reason we couldn't be doing 10 times as many tests as we are; there's just nobody sitting at the top insisting that test capacity must be available and demanding that everyone do what they can to make it happen.
  - jfkebwjsbx 7y ago
    As if European countries worked differently...
    - Rebelgecko 7y ago
      Are there any presidential republics in Europe?
      - Marsymars 7y ago
        Belarus?
        Rebelgecko 7y ago
        I'm not sure how much that counts since my understanding is that the president's decrees are essentially laws, and when the judicial branch said that was unconstitutional the president just ignored them. Not exactly a lot of checks and balances.
        dragonwriter 7y ago
        That absolutely is a (strong) Presidential Republic, a term which does not depend on checks and balances (though some Presidential Republics feature that trait.)
        Rebelgecko 7y ago
        I thought that in a presidential republic the head of state can't write laws themselves?
      - I-M-S 7y ago
        France
      - mr_toad 7y ago
        France, for one, has a directly elected president with executive power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_France https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_France
  - trophycase 7y ago
    True, but the president also appoints a lot of officials as well.
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    > I won't go so far as to say that the position of the president is a figurehead, but it's been more than a little advisory for several generations. That's cute, but in the real world the US Presidency has gotten much stronger over time, not become “more than a little advisory”.
- soneil 7y ago
  He seems to just treat everything as an us-vs-them argument. I get the impression he's facing an issue where there is no "them" and trying to figure out how to win this argument. It should be almost irrelevant to the discussion, but by now he has enough appointees in various departments for the problem to grow roots.
  - Polylactic_acid 7y ago
    This is pretty much how Australia is run right now. Although when there is no "Them" to blame the government makes up total nonsense and if that gets called out they say "This is has always been a problem and nothing could be done about it. 'they' would have handled it even worse than we did"
  - j79 7y ago
    Not only is it the President, but also the media like Fox News. They're downplaying the severity and pushing a narrative that the left is stoking fears of coronavirus and secretly hoping for a stock market crash to win the elections. You end up with supporters of the President even denying coronavirus exists or a conspiracy of the left. Truly frightening. https://www.politicususa.com/2020/03/07/trump-supporters-are-now-claiming-coronavirus-doesnt-exist-and-nobody-has-died-from-it.html https://www.politicususa.com/2020/03/07/trump-supporters-are...
- newtoday 7y ago
  I've only started seeing good measures being taken in the last 5 to 7 days as the confirmed cases are rising, but only at the state government level. Currently, I'm sure I can't just show up at the hospital and say I want tested. In Michigan, they just launched michigan.gov/coronavirus last week, and have commercials on the radio to inform citizens.
- rawoke083600 7y ago
  We use to have that mentality in South Africa a few years ago where our medical minister "Doctor Beetroot" told patients HIV is not that bad and they should just shower and eat garlic and beetroot ! Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/dec/16/dr-beetroot-dies-south-africa https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/dec/16/dr-beetroot-di...
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
Curzel 7y ago
Well, depends on the number of cases and the effected area. If Milan is affected in Italy, you are guaranteed the virus will spread anywhere, it's a key place after all. There is also a psychological factor to count in of course... Social and ALL other media have been flooded with the virus 24/7 since the first confirmed case. It generates good views, everyone wants a piece of that, and now we have this nation-wide phicosys
- atleta 7y ago
  I wouldn't call it a psychosis, because in this case people are right. If you look at the numbers [1] it went 10x in 10 days in Italy. Despite the counter measures. Now it's only 7.3k if the efficiency of the counter measures don't increase, it will be 73k in 10 days, 730k in 20 and probably 7M in a month. With 20% requiring hospitalization. Which simply cannot be managed at this scale. (Probably not even at the 730k mark.) [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/
  - soneil 7y ago
    The hospitalisation part really is key here. At this point stopping it really isn't on the cards. We need to slow it enough that hospitals can keep up. 7M people catching it next month, vs 7M people catching it over the span of a year, are two very different 7M's. The rate is far more problematic than the actual number.
    - asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
      Why does everyone keep saying stopping it is impossible. It is literally happening in front of us in China.
      - llamataboot 7y ago
        There aren't many countries with the capabilities of China in that regard. Though ones that get out front much earlier (SKorea, Japan mostly so far, Vietnam) seem to be doing alright
jfkebwjsbx 7y ago
What do you mean "in all likelihood"? It is a guarantee, and it has been since 1 month ago. Italy was first because someone has to be first. People, even informed audiences like HN's, are just fooling themselves and thinking wishfully.

missosoup 7y ago

The united states is going to fare a lot worse. Their president is actively contradicting his own experts and essentially encouraging people to go on spreading the disease. It's going to be a clusterfuck.

reaperducer 7y ago
People in other countries put too much weight in what the president says, Trump or otherwise, because they don't fully understand that there is an entire system of government that can fully function with or without the president. I won't go so far as to say that the position of the president is a figurehead, but it's been more than a little advisory for several generations. I watch a lot of BBC, NHK, and DW, and see it all the time. I don't blame the foreign journalists. If you're an overseas news organization working in America, of course the president is going to be fully staffed. But few orgs go much beyond that. Because of this, the European view of how America works is very simplified.
- pbourke 7y ago
  In this case the President has weaponized the virus as a political issue. A sizeable number of people in the country don't believe that it's a serious issue and won't until their local hospitals are literally overrun. Maybe even not then. I believe you are seriously underestimating the effect of chaff being thrown into the air over this issue on a number of fronts. It makes it much, much harder to have people follow public health advice or put pressure on lawmakers to pass the necessary appropriations that will be required to address the situation.
- akiselev 7y ago
  > there is an entire system of government that can fully function with or without the president. Except when a major global catastrophe hits, like a pandemic, the response requires massive coordination across local, state, and federal levels. What he says now may not be so relevant but the president's lack of appoints to key executive branch positions within the CDC and the rest of the healthcare apparatus (including eliminating health related positions from the National Security Council, one of the most important multi-agency coordination bodies) has drastically hampered the COVID-19 response effort. People from other countries more often tend to underestimate the sheer scale and complexity created by a local-state-federal separation of powers weighed down by over two hundred years of judicial baggage and thousands of miles of geography. In a crisis like this, even figuring out who has legal jurisdiction and authority is complicated. Doing it without an effective executive body, whose job is to navigate and command that mess, is far more difficult.
  - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
    Just look at the testing for an example. There's absolutely no reason we couldn't be doing 10 times as many tests as we are; there's just nobody sitting at the top insisting that test capacity must be available and demanding that everyone do what they can to make it happen.
- jfkebwjsbx 7y ago
  As if European countries worked differently...
  - Rebelgecko 7y ago
    Are there any presidential republics in Europe?
    - Marsymars 7y ago
      Belarus?
      - Rebelgecko 7y ago
        I'm not sure how much that counts since my understanding is that the president's decrees are essentially laws, and when the judicial branch said that was unconstitutional the president just ignored them. Not exactly a lot of checks and balances.
        dragonwriter 7y ago
        That absolutely is a (strong) Presidential Republic, a term which does not depend on checks and balances (though some Presidential Republics feature that trait.)
        Rebelgecko 7y ago
        I thought that in a presidential republic the head of state can't write laws themselves?
    - I-M-S 7y ago
      France
    - mr_toad 7y ago
      France, for one, has a directly elected president with executive power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_France https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_France
- trophycase 7y ago
  True, but the president also appoints a lot of officials as well.
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  > I won't go so far as to say that the position of the president is a figurehead, but it's been more than a little advisory for several generations. That's cute, but in the real world the US Presidency has gotten much stronger over time, not become “more than a little advisory”.
soneil 7y ago
He seems to just treat everything as an us-vs-them argument. I get the impression he's facing an issue where there is no "them" and trying to figure out how to win this argument. It should be almost irrelevant to the discussion, but by now he has enough appointees in various departments for the problem to grow roots.
- Polylactic_acid 7y ago
  This is pretty much how Australia is run right now. Although when there is no "Them" to blame the government makes up total nonsense and if that gets called out they say "This is has always been a problem and nothing could be done about it. 'they' would have handled it even worse than we did"
- j79 7y ago
  Not only is it the President, but also the media like Fox News. They're downplaying the severity and pushing a narrative that the left is stoking fears of coronavirus and secretly hoping for a stock market crash to win the elections. You end up with supporters of the President even denying coronavirus exists or a conspiracy of the left. Truly frightening. https://www.politicususa.com/2020/03/07/trump-supporters-are-now-claiming-coronavirus-doesnt-exist-and-nobody-has-died-from-it.html https://www.politicususa.com/2020/03/07/trump-supporters-are...
newtoday 7y ago
I've only started seeing good measures being taken in the last 5 to 7 days as the confirmed cases are rising, but only at the state government level. Currently, I'm sure I can't just show up at the hospital and say I want tested. In Michigan, they just launched michigan.gov/coronavirus last week, and have commercials on the radio to inform citizens.
rawoke083600 7y ago
We use to have that mentality in South Africa a few years ago where our medical minister "Doctor Beetroot" told patients HIV is not that bad and they should just shower and eat garlic and beetroot ! Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/dec/16/dr-beetroot-dies-south-africa https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/dec/16/dr-beetroot-di...
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

Curzel 7y ago

Well, depends on the number of cases and the effected area. If Milan is affected in Italy, you are guaranteed the virus will spread anywhere, it's a key place after all. There is also a psychological factor to count in of course... Social and ALL other media have been flooded with the virus 24/7 since the first confirmed case. It generates good views, everyone wants a piece of that, and now we have this nation-wide phicosys

atleta 7y ago
I wouldn't call it a psychosis, because in this case people are right. If you look at the numbers [1] it went 10x in 10 days in Italy. Despite the counter measures. Now it's only 7.3k if the efficiency of the counter measures don't increase, it will be 73k in 10 days, 730k in 20 and probably 7M in a month. With 20% requiring hospitalization. Which simply cannot be managed at this scale. (Probably not even at the 730k mark.) [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/
- soneil 7y ago
  The hospitalisation part really is key here. At this point stopping it really isn't on the cards. We need to slow it enough that hospitals can keep up. 7M people catching it next month, vs 7M people catching it over the span of a year, are two very different 7M's. The rate is far more problematic than the actual number.
  - asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
    Why does everyone keep saying stopping it is impossible. It is literally happening in front of us in China.
    - llamataboot 7y ago
      There aren't many countries with the capabilities of China in that regard. Though ones that get out front much earlier (SKorea, Japan mostly so far, Vietnam) seem to be doing alright

jfkebwjsbx 7y ago

What do you mean "in all likelihood"? It is a guarantee, and it has been since 1 month ago. Italy was first because someone has to be first. People, even informed audiences like HN's, are just fooling themselves and thinking wishfully.