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It looks like to me just a comfort pill for the public. They basically acknowledged that they can't handle the crisis already. So what they gonna do? They want

It looks like to me just a comfort pill for the public. They basically acknowledged that they can't handle the crisis already. So what they gonna do? They want it to appear to be an advice from expert, to persuade the public, rationalize a forced decision. The uncomfortable truth is, the British government have weighted cost and benefit, and they have decided, the death of thousands or more is not worth the cost of near-absolute lockdown of a country, It might lead to total breakdown of the economy, full-recession, and that may cost more lives anyway. These elder people are old enough anyway, and the death rate for young is just 0.2%. (which rise to 1.3% for people elder than 50, and 6% for elder than 60 according to data from China) What does those number mean? If you and your partner's parents are elder than 60 years old, there is 25% chance, at least one of them will die. That is, very likely, you're going to hear it from your best friends that one of their parents died from COVID-19. Are you okay with that? (Under the assumption everyone will get infected anyway). And beware, these statistics are not final, and mostly from patients who received some level of medical care, although we do not yet know how many of those heavily-ill patients received intense care. Without medical care, the number could easily double, after all, it takes time to die, that's just how lung disease works.

amiga_500 7y ago
Our establishment are very detached from the hoi polloi. One need only look at WWI unarmed charges from trenches. Not sure much has changed since this time on their side. On the pleb side I think the assumption that the upper crust are competent has changed. We've just had years and years of austerity in the UK, imposing a huge toll on the most vulnerable in society. The government repeatedly said there was no money. Then they turn the taps on when it effects them. They clearly do not care about the bulk of people. Put those two together and you have the ingredients for a big uproar.
- sgt101 7y ago
  >One need only look at WWI unarmed charges from trenches. when did that happen?
  - progre 7y ago
    It didn't. Maybe poster was thinking of the Crimean war 60 years earlier where bayonet charges where tried on well defended russian positions.
ubercow13 7y ago
>Under the assumption everyone will get infected anyway Under that assumption you presumably have no choice? The question is whether that is a good assumption
- beaunative 7y ago
  Well, with no isolation whatsoever that's an likely outcome, it's not possible to know at this time since we don't really have any other country opt to use such desperate measures, and hence no stats available.
jfkebwjsbx 7y ago
> the deaths of thousands or more More like a million deaths assuming 50% UK infected and 2% death rate.
- mkl 7y ago
  50%×2% = 1%. 1%×67.5 million = 675,000.
  - jfkebwjsbx 7y ago
    Which is "like a million". Both the 50% and the 2% are very conservative.
    - Udik 7y ago
      Especially the 2% figure holds when intensive care is available. But if you plan to let millions get infected at the same time, there won't be any intensive care- there will probably be no care at all.
patrec 7y ago
Death of thousands or more??? You are living in some pleasant fantasy! Back in reality, the UK wants to infect about a cool 40M people (for the herd immunity!). Last I heard they expect 50% (20M) to get it in a 3 week interval. Meanwhile they have about 4k ICU beds, which are at close to capacity already. Assuming cocooning works so great that only 3% of people need urgent care (rather than a more likely 5-10%) and only for one week on average (again, unlikely!), that's 200k people for 4k beds for a period of 3 weeks. Surely the fatality rate for those 3% is going to be way over 60%. At which point you have close to half a million dead in those 3 weeks alone. I'd like to see numbers for a realistic scenario where this strategy does not result in something in the millions of deaths.
- m0zg 7y ago
  I guess we'll see, won't we. I mean for all the panic about Wuhan, fewer than 3.2K people died there so far, and when it all winds down, the death toll will likely be below 5K people. Probably fewer than died of flu complications in the same time frame. Given that the vast majority of the cases are not acute, probably most of their metro population was exposed to the virus, which is tens of millions of people. I know that extreme measures were taken to stop the spread (and such actions are infeasible in the West), but they did contain it: there are very few new cases or deaths. So no, there won't be "millions of deaths" or anything close to that, especially if older people are isolated.
  - mytailorisrich 7y ago
    Of course the death toll in Wuhan/China has been relatively limited BECAUSE they took drastic measures. When people start to say "all this panic for that..." it means that the measures taken have worked, not that they were unnecessary.
    - disgruntledphd2 7y ago
      Yup. The best case scenario is that restrictions are introduced, and they work so well that people complain that they were unnecessary. And remember folks, when it comes to exponential growth, the best time to act was yesterday.
Animats 7y ago
The uncomfortable truth is, the British government have weighted cost and benefit, and they have decided, the death of thousands or more is not worth the cost of near-absolute lockdown of a country, It might lead to total breakdown of the economy, full-recession, and that may cost more lives anyway. And so begins the Great Reaping. Get rid of the old and the sick, so the nation can move on, freed of the burden of caring for an elderly population that consumes but does not produce.
- bryanrasmussen 7y ago
  isn't the current government disproportionately voted in by the old? It seems somehow short-sighted this.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    They will be replaced by the next set of old. A population can always be segmented, they might just not be as old as before.
- patrec 7y ago
  The problem is they might reap much more than intended. I'd really like to see estimates of how many economically productive members of society will get caught out by the fact that sadly they can't have life-saving treatment after an accident (or will get a nasty covid infection post-op) because the health system shut down for weeks/months or gets permanently gimped (if it kills off or traumatizes enough doctors and nurses). Also, what are the chances nearly all of the recovered infected are in near mint condition post-recovery? If it turns out non-trivial numbers now have permanently reduced lung capacity or pregnant women produce a lot of wonky babies, what then?
- luckylion 7y ago
  That's not quite the point though, is it? The point is total breakdown of the economy, full-recession, and that may cost more lives anyway. The idea seems to be that you can decide: do you want thousands of deaths, or do you want thousands of death and an economic collapse?
beaunative 7y ago
I find one argument supports the delaying tactic is that lockdown won't work especially troubling: because you are eventually going to lift it, it won't work. Here's thing, it's always a matter of when, not never. Lockdowns are to buy time for vaccination. That will be the optimal solution. Unfortunately, the time when the vaccination will arrive is unclear, at the earliest time expected is 6 months, but it will more likely to take more than a year. New treatment method are also being tested, like make use of blood from those who have recovered (Apparently I do not mean to drink those like vampires do). The UK government may think it will take much longer fo find effective treatment or vaccination.
yfzhou 7y ago
Thousands already died in Italy over the last several days with less than 20,000 cases (most of those cases are still active so thousands more will die in the coming days before the lockdown even shows effect, if it is effective). You're looking at millions dead if a significant portion of the population is infected.
panda-giddiness 7y ago
> It looks like to me just a comfort pill for the public. They basically acknowledged that they can't handle the crisis already. So what they gonna do? Well, they could do what every other developed country is doing: implement social distancing measures. Social distancing can't stop the spread of the virus, but it can slow the spread down. People seem to have an impression that the case fatality rate (CFR) has some fixed value somewhere between 0.1% and 4%, and that the CFR is set in stone; but obviously there are many confounding factors, such as access to ventilators. If a sizable portion of the UK population contracts the virus all at once, the NHS will be overwhelmed and many otherwise preventable deaths will occur (see the graph near the end of this BBC article [1]). In contrast, social distancing would "flatten the curve", reducing the burden on the NHS (eg, see this interactive Washington Post article [2]). ~~~ [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-51632801 https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-51632801 [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/corona-simulator/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/corona-si...
vimy 7y ago
>These elder people are old enough anyway, and the death rate for young is just 0.2% The numbers we're seeing from The Netherlands, Italy and France show that over half the people in the ICU are between 30 - 60 years old. I'm not convinced the 0,2 % is accurate anymore.

amiga_500 7y ago

Our establishment are very detached from the hoi polloi. One need only look at WWI unarmed charges from trenches. Not sure much has changed since this time on their side. On the pleb side I think the assumption that the upper crust are competent has changed. We've just had years and years of austerity in the UK, imposing a huge toll on the most vulnerable in society. The government repeatedly said there was no money. Then they turn the taps on when it effects them. They clearly do not care about the bulk of people. Put those two together and you have the ingredients for a big uproar.

sgt101 7y ago
>One need only look at WWI unarmed charges from trenches. when did that happen?
- progre 7y ago
  It didn't. Maybe poster was thinking of the Crimean war 60 years earlier where bayonet charges where tried on well defended russian positions.

ubercow13 7y ago

>Under the assumption everyone will get infected anyway Under that assumption you presumably have no choice? The question is whether that is a good assumption

beaunative 7y ago
Well, with no isolation whatsoever that's an likely outcome, it's not possible to know at this time since we don't really have any other country opt to use such desperate measures, and hence no stats available.

jfkebwjsbx 7y ago

> the deaths of thousands or more More like a million deaths assuming 50% UK infected and 2% death rate.

mkl 7y ago
50%×2% = 1%. 1%×67.5 million = 675,000.
- jfkebwjsbx 7y ago
  Which is "like a million". Both the 50% and the 2% are very conservative.
  - Udik 7y ago
    Especially the 2% figure holds when intensive care is available. But if you plan to let millions get infected at the same time, there won't be any intensive care- there will probably be no care at all.

patrec 7y ago

Death of thousands or more??? You are living in some pleasant fantasy! Back in reality, the UK wants to infect about a cool 40M people (for the herd immunity!). Last I heard they expect 50% (20M) to get it in a 3 week interval. Meanwhile they have about 4k ICU beds, which are at close to capacity already. Assuming cocooning works so great that only 3% of people need urgent care (rather than a more likely 5-10%) and only for one week on average (again, unlikely!), that's 200k people for 4k beds for a period of 3 weeks. Surely the fatality rate for those 3% is going to be way over 60%. At which point you have close to half a million dead in those 3 weeks alone. I'd like to see numbers for a realistic scenario where this strategy does not result in something in the millions of deaths.

m0zg 7y ago
I guess we'll see, won't we. I mean for all the panic about Wuhan, fewer than 3.2K people died there so far, and when it all winds down, the death toll will likely be below 5K people. Probably fewer than died of flu complications in the same time frame. Given that the vast majority of the cases are not acute, probably most of their metro population was exposed to the virus, which is tens of millions of people. I know that extreme measures were taken to stop the spread (and such actions are infeasible in the West), but they did contain it: there are very few new cases or deaths. So no, there won't be "millions of deaths" or anything close to that, especially if older people are isolated.
- mytailorisrich 7y ago
  Of course the death toll in Wuhan/China has been relatively limited BECAUSE they took drastic measures. When people start to say "all this panic for that..." it means that the measures taken have worked, not that they were unnecessary.
  - disgruntledphd2 7y ago
    Yup. The best case scenario is that restrictions are introduced, and they work so well that people complain that they were unnecessary. And remember folks, when it comes to exponential growth, the best time to act was yesterday.

Animats 7y ago

The uncomfortable truth is, the British government have weighted cost and benefit, and they have decided, the death of thousands or more is not worth the cost of near-absolute lockdown of a country, It might lead to total breakdown of the economy, full-recession, and that may cost more lives anyway. And so begins the Great Reaping. Get rid of the old and the sick, so the nation can move on, freed of the burden of caring for an elderly population that consumes but does not produce.

bryanrasmussen 7y ago
isn't the current government disproportionately voted in by the old? It seems somehow short-sighted this.
- lotsofpulp 7y ago
  They will be replaced by the next set of old. A population can always be segmented, they might just not be as old as before.
patrec 7y ago
The problem is they might reap much more than intended. I'd really like to see estimates of how many economically productive members of society will get caught out by the fact that sadly they can't have life-saving treatment after an accident (or will get a nasty covid infection post-op) because the health system shut down for weeks/months or gets permanently gimped (if it kills off or traumatizes enough doctors and nurses). Also, what are the chances nearly all of the recovered infected are in near mint condition post-recovery? If it turns out non-trivial numbers now have permanently reduced lung capacity or pregnant women produce a lot of wonky babies, what then?
luckylion 7y ago
That's not quite the point though, is it? The point is total breakdown of the economy, full-recession, and that may cost more lives anyway. The idea seems to be that you can decide: do you want thousands of deaths, or do you want thousands of death and an economic collapse?

beaunative 7y ago

I find one argument supports the delaying tactic is that lockdown won't work especially troubling: because you are eventually going to lift it, it won't work. Here's thing, it's always a matter of when, not never. Lockdowns are to buy time for vaccination. That will be the optimal solution. Unfortunately, the time when the vaccination will arrive is unclear, at the earliest time expected is 6 months, but it will more likely to take more than a year. New treatment method are also being tested, like make use of blood from those who have recovered (Apparently I do not mean to drink those like vampires do). The UK government may think it will take much longer fo find effective treatment or vaccination.

yfzhou 7y ago

Thousands already died in Italy over the last several days with less than 20,000 cases (most of those cases are still active so thousands more will die in the coming days before the lockdown even shows effect, if it is effective). You're looking at millions dead if a significant portion of the population is infected.

panda-giddiness 7y ago

> It looks like to me just a comfort pill for the public. They basically acknowledged that they can't handle the crisis already. So what they gonna do? Well, they could do what every other developed country is doing: implement social distancing measures. Social distancing can't stop the spread of the virus, but it can slow the spread down. People seem to have an impression that the case fatality rate (CFR) has some fixed value somewhere between 0.1% and 4%, and that the CFR is set in stone; but obviously there are many confounding factors, such as access to ventilators. If a sizable portion of the UK population contracts the virus all at once, the NHS will be overwhelmed and many otherwise preventable deaths will occur (see the graph near the end of this BBC article [1]). In contrast, social distancing would "flatten the curve", reducing the burden on the NHS (eg, see this interactive Washington Post article [2]). ~~~ [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-51632801 https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-51632801 [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/corona-simulator/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/corona-si...

vimy 7y ago

>These elder people are old enough anyway, and the death rate for young is just 0.2% The numbers we're seeing from The Netherlands, Italy and France show that over half the people in the ICU are between 30 - 60 years old. I'm not convinced the 0,2 % is accurate anymore.