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If you are ignorant of the virus, why talk about it like this? 50% of the patients in ICU are under 50, and it causes permanent damage to your lungs and organs

If you are ignorant of the virus, why talk about it like this? 50% of the patients in ICU are under 50, and it causes permanent damage to your lungs and organs. If you don't take paranoid drastic measures, many millions will die. If you do take paranoid drastic measures, lives will be saved, and then everyone will call you crazy for taking those measures because it ended up not that bad. Just like people think Y2K was an overblown non-issue. Because it was fixed by millions of people working hard.

umvi 7y ago
> 50% of the patients in ICU are under 50 And what % of patients infected actually end up in the ICU vs. just have a sniffle and a cough for a few days? When the mortality rate is 0.2% for people < 60 years old, I just have a hard time believing that it requires the response we've been giving it. I would bet that for healthy, non-vulnerable adults (i.e. they don't have a pre-existing condition that makes them extra susceptible) the death rate is virtually 0%. I'm not saying "do nothing", but I am saying "shut down the world" is too extreme in the opposite direction.
- MaybiusStrip 7y ago
  >And what % of patients infected actually end up in the ICU vs. just have a sniffle and a cough for a few days? This data is easily available: ~20% of people who get the virus are in life-threatening condition. Thats a 1/5 chance. > I'm not saying "do nothing", but I am saying "shut down the world" is too extreme in the opposite direction. Experts disagree with you. Maybe you should ask yourself why? 1. You have a hypothesis that taking less drastic measures would result in a manageable death rates and less impact on the economy. However, Wuhan and Italy tried to deal with the virus through these less drastic measures (telling the elderly to self-quarantine, asking the population to social-distance), and the results were disastrous. Does that not invalidate your hypothesis? 2. Even if you're right, and there was a good chance we could avoid the worst of the epidemic, we know for a fact that the worst case scenario is that in the US, 21 million people will require hospitalization, and 1.7 million people will die. Saying that it's worth taking a risk on less drastic measures is the equivalent of saying it's OK to play Russian roulette because the odds are actually really good: it totally ignores the tremendously high cost of the worst case scenario. I have found that risk-analysts like Taleb have the most convincing arguments for why all these extreme measures are called for. Check out his twitter: https://twitter.com/nntaleb https://twitter.com/nntaleb
  - umvi 7y ago
    > This data is easily available: ~20% of people who get the virus are in life-threatening condition. Thats a 1/5 chance. No, it's not "easily available". There's data flying around everywhere from different countries as this situation rapidly evolves and you can torture it to tell any story you want. If the data is so easily available, couldn't you have at least linked your source? > Experts disagree with you. Maybe you should ask yourself why? The "experts" in this case have never dealt with a global pandemic of this scale before. So they are inexperienced experts giving it their best guess based on what they know about disease transmission and math. But they clearly did not factor in the effects of shutting down the global economy for 3-6 months in their quest to optimize for a single variable. I'm sure we'll have a lot of "lessons learned" after this is all over and the experts will be much more experienced the next time around...
    - MaybiusStrip 7y ago
      Sure, I was referring to this study which shows that 20% of cases were either severe or critical: http://weekly.chinacdc.cn/en/article/id/e53946e2-c6c4-41e9-9a9b-fea8db1a8f51 http://weekly.chinacdc.cn/en/article/id/e53946e2-c6c4-41e9-9... True, this is only in China. In most other countries, it's still too early to be able to collect great data because of how quickly the situation is evolving (the denominator is bound to be wrong due to delays between cases being detected and the amount of days it takes before cases evolve into severe/critical condition or death). But it's data, and you can't easily dismiss it. > So they are inexperienced experts giving it their best guess based on what they know about disease transmission and math. This isn't entirely true. The epidemics in China, South Korea have more or less been resolved, and many of the steps being taken in other countries are based on comparing the outcomes in those countries compared to ones that are failing to slow the spread of the disease with disastrous consequences (Italy). > But they clearly did not factor in the effects of shutting down the global economy for 3-6 months in their quest to optimize for a single variable. It's possible that the health experts are not taking the economical windfall into account, but the politicians enacting the laws probably are. These decisions are being made in rooms with people who, with their knowledge pooled together, most likely have more information about the disease and the economic impact of their decisions than you. Secondly, the reasoning for national shutdowns earlier rather than later is to shorten their length. As of now, local government officials are hoping not advocating 3-6 month shut down, but rather trying to avoid one by shutting down now. I remember reading the figure of 2 weeks but I cannot find it quickly now. We will see.
- asenna 7y ago
  We already have the best case (South Korea) and worst case scenarios (Italy) in front of us. Each country affected is shutting down so not to become another Italy. If you're not aware of the situation there, I really urge you to look it up - doctors are saying they're having to choose who has the best survival chance to give attention to. https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/13/opinion/coronavirus-cautionary-tale-italy-dont-do-what-we-did/ https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/13/opinion/coronavirus-c... it's all about "flattening the curve" right now, to slow it down.
djsumdog 7y ago
> and it causes permanent damage to your lungs and organs. It's too early to know this for sure. I know personally, it took over two months for my lungs to recovery from pneumonia when I was younger. People are claiming this, but we won't know for a full year of this damage is non-recoverable. But to your other point, yes a number of experts have said the really scary thing is the number of people in their 40s, who were healthy and non-smokers, who ended up on respirators in Italy and S Korea. Also, since when was "just a flu" okay? The flu is really fucking bad. Twice in my life I had a flu take me out for over a week, and from the accounts of SARS-cov2, many are reporting it as feeling much worse than a flu with chills for days after.
- umvi 7y ago
  > Also, since when was "just a flu" okay? The flu is really fucking bad. Bad enough to merit shutting down nations, bankrupting companies, and causing a global recession?
inshadows 7y ago
> Just like people think Y2K was an overblown non-issue. Because it was fixed by millions of people working hard. Y2K was an actual issue? I thought it was purely artificial issue created by computer layman. Year 2038 is an actual issue and there's really not much fuss about it, for many years.

umvi 7y ago

> 50% of the patients in ICU are under 50 And what % of patients infected actually end up in the ICU vs. just have a sniffle and a cough for a few days? When the mortality rate is 0.2% for people < 60 years old, I just have a hard time believing that it requires the response we've been giving it. I would bet that for healthy, non-vulnerable adults (i.e. they don't have a pre-existing condition that makes them extra susceptible) the death rate is virtually 0%. I'm not saying "do nothing", but I am saying "shut down the world" is too extreme in the opposite direction.

MaybiusStrip 7y ago
>And what % of patients infected actually end up in the ICU vs. just have a sniffle and a cough for a few days? This data is easily available: ~20% of people who get the virus are in life-threatening condition. Thats a 1/5 chance. > I'm not saying "do nothing", but I am saying "shut down the world" is too extreme in the opposite direction. Experts disagree with you. Maybe you should ask yourself why? 1. You have a hypothesis that taking less drastic measures would result in a manageable death rates and less impact on the economy. However, Wuhan and Italy tried to deal with the virus through these less drastic measures (telling the elderly to self-quarantine, asking the population to social-distance), and the results were disastrous. Does that not invalidate your hypothesis? 2. Even if you're right, and there was a good chance we could avoid the worst of the epidemic, we know for a fact that the worst case scenario is that in the US, 21 million people will require hospitalization, and 1.7 million people will die. Saying that it's worth taking a risk on less drastic measures is the equivalent of saying it's OK to play Russian roulette because the odds are actually really good: it totally ignores the tremendously high cost of the worst case scenario. I have found that risk-analysts like Taleb have the most convincing arguments for why all these extreme measures are called for. Check out his twitter: https://twitter.com/nntaleb https://twitter.com/nntaleb
- umvi 7y ago
  > This data is easily available: ~20% of people who get the virus are in life-threatening condition. Thats a 1/5 chance. No, it's not "easily available". There's data flying around everywhere from different countries as this situation rapidly evolves and you can torture it to tell any story you want. If the data is so easily available, couldn't you have at least linked your source? > Experts disagree with you. Maybe you should ask yourself why? The "experts" in this case have never dealt with a global pandemic of this scale before. So they are inexperienced experts giving it their best guess based on what they know about disease transmission and math. But they clearly did not factor in the effects of shutting down the global economy for 3-6 months in their quest to optimize for a single variable. I'm sure we'll have a lot of "lessons learned" after this is all over and the experts will be much more experienced the next time around...
  - MaybiusStrip 7y ago
    Sure, I was referring to this study which shows that 20% of cases were either severe or critical: http://weekly.chinacdc.cn/en/article/id/e53946e2-c6c4-41e9-9a9b-fea8db1a8f51 http://weekly.chinacdc.cn/en/article/id/e53946e2-c6c4-41e9-9... True, this is only in China. In most other countries, it's still too early to be able to collect great data because of how quickly the situation is evolving (the denominator is bound to be wrong due to delays between cases being detected and the amount of days it takes before cases evolve into severe/critical condition or death). But it's data, and you can't easily dismiss it. > So they are inexperienced experts giving it their best guess based on what they know about disease transmission and math. This isn't entirely true. The epidemics in China, South Korea have more or less been resolved, and many of the steps being taken in other countries are based on comparing the outcomes in those countries compared to ones that are failing to slow the spread of the disease with disastrous consequences (Italy). > But they clearly did not factor in the effects of shutting down the global economy for 3-6 months in their quest to optimize for a single variable. It's possible that the health experts are not taking the economical windfall into account, but the politicians enacting the laws probably are. These decisions are being made in rooms with people who, with their knowledge pooled together, most likely have more information about the disease and the economic impact of their decisions than you. Secondly, the reasoning for national shutdowns earlier rather than later is to shorten their length. As of now, local government officials are hoping not advocating 3-6 month shut down, but rather trying to avoid one by shutting down now. I remember reading the figure of 2 weeks but I cannot find it quickly now. We will see.
asenna 7y ago
We already have the best case (South Korea) and worst case scenarios (Italy) in front of us. Each country affected is shutting down so not to become another Italy. If you're not aware of the situation there, I really urge you to look it up - doctors are saying they're having to choose who has the best survival chance to give attention to. https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/13/opinion/coronavirus-cautionary-tale-italy-dont-do-what-we-did/ https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/13/opinion/coronavirus-c... it's all about "flattening the curve" right now, to slow it down.

djsumdog 7y ago

> and it causes permanent damage to your lungs and organs. It's too early to know this for sure. I know personally, it took over two months for my lungs to recovery from pneumonia when I was younger. People are claiming this, but we won't know for a full year of this damage is non-recoverable. But to your other point, yes a number of experts have said the really scary thing is the number of people in their 40s, who were healthy and non-smokers, who ended up on respirators in Italy and S Korea. Also, since when was "just a flu" okay? The flu is really fucking bad. Twice in my life I had a flu take me out for over a week, and from the accounts of SARS-cov2, many are reporting it as feeling much worse than a flu with chills for days after.

umvi 7y ago
> Also, since when was "just a flu" okay? The flu is really fucking bad. Bad enough to merit shutting down nations, bankrupting companies, and causing a global recession?

inshadows 7y ago

> Just like people think Y2K was an overblown non-issue. Because it was fixed by millions of people working hard. Y2K was an actual issue? I thought it was purely artificial issue created by computer layman. Year 2038 is an actual issue and there's really not much fuss about it, for many years.