3 ms·

How is anybody still making this argument? "It stopped in China, so we don't need to do anything." It stopped in China precisely because they did something. D

by knzhou 7y ago

How is anybody still making this argument? "It stopped in China, so we don't need to do anything." It stopped in China precisely because they did something. Diseases don't magically stop themselves. This is on the level of thinking your dirty dishes wash themselves, because your roommate grudgingly does them.

hutzlibu 7y ago
" Diseases don't magically stop themselves." No, but they usually stop, when the immune system is done fighting them, either successfully or not. And pandemies usually stop, when enough people build up immunity, or failed doing so. Or when the disease is so deadly it kills quicker than it can spread. Which is here not at all the case. So even if nobody would be doing anything, this disease would eventually go away. It is "only" a question of how many casualties it will take. And we are discussing the cost/benefit of the measures to society as a whole. Shutting everything down has real costs, too.
- omnimus 7y ago
  What if you don't build up immunity? I've read that there it's not certain we can build up enough immunity. Everybody takes this for granted but what if your immunity lasts for two weeks?
  - hutzlibu 7y ago
    Then I would die, if there is no lung ventilator for me around. Eventual all the people vulnerable would die too. And the overwhelming rest would live on.
    - sizzle 7y ago
      Right, until we either go extinct as a species or natural selection affords us the ability to fight it off and that new impervious population survives and thrives, thus passing on the immunity to new generations of humans.
      - hutzlibu 7y ago
        "Right, until we either go extinct as a species or natural selection affords us the ability to fight it off" And since the majority has no or very mild symptons ... it is not really likely to go extinct
- surewhynat 7y ago
  Mutations. You don't want many people getting it because there is a higher chance it will mutate.
  - baud147258 7y ago
    It has already mutated, the strains present in Europe aren't the same as the ones in the US and aren't the same as the ones in China

by knzhou 7y ago

hutzlibu 7y ago

" Diseases don't magically stop themselves." No, but they usually stop, when the immune system is done fighting them, either successfully or not. And pandemies usually stop, when enough people build up immunity, or failed doing so. Or when the disease is so deadly it kills quicker than it can spread. Which is here not at all the case. So even if nobody would be doing anything, this disease would eventually go away. It is "only" a question of how many casualties it will take. And we are discussing the cost/benefit of the measures to society as a whole. Shutting everything down has real costs, too.

omnimus 7y ago
What if you don't build up immunity? I've read that there it's not certain we can build up enough immunity. Everybody takes this for granted but what if your immunity lasts for two weeks?
- hutzlibu 7y ago
  Then I would die, if there is no lung ventilator for me around. Eventual all the people vulnerable would die too. And the overwhelming rest would live on.
  - sizzle 7y ago
    Right, until we either go extinct as a species or natural selection affords us the ability to fight it off and that new impervious population survives and thrives, thus passing on the immunity to new generations of humans.
    - hutzlibu 7y ago
      "Right, until we either go extinct as a species or natural selection affords us the ability to fight it off" And since the majority has no or very mild symptons ... it is not really likely to go extinct
surewhynat 7y ago
Mutations. You don't want many people getting it because there is a higher chance it will mutate.
- baud147258 7y ago
  It has already mutated, the strains present in Europe aren't the same as the ones in the US and aren't the same as the ones in China