4 ms·

Now is the time for extreme caution. We can laugh about how it was an overreaction later.

guscost 7y ago
I’ve talked to a lot of folks in the past few weeks who aren’t laughing at all over what might be an overreaction. It’s making their lives very hard. If it turns out this is indeed an overreaction, they’re going to be totally pissed off, and I’m probably going to agree with them. You’re free to laugh all you want, but it’s a privilege that you probably don’t appreciate.
- basscomm 7y ago
  >I’ve talked to a lot of folks in the past few weeks who aren’t laughing at all over what might be an overreaction. It's a no-win situation for a lot of people with a certain mindset. If we take extreme measures and the infection is worse than predicted, then they'll say that everyone should have done more. If we take extreme measures and 'flatten the curve' enough so that the hospitals aren't overwhelmed and the number of deaths is lower than expected, then they'll say that all those measures were an overreaction to something that turned out to not be that bad. Even though that was the desired outcome of taking those extreme measures in the first place. There is also a worryingly-large number of people that will insist that everything is overblown, everything is fine, et cetera, until they (or someone they know personally) is impacted. Until then all these things are happening to 'someone else' and can be ignored.
  - guscost 7y ago
    You’re not even acknowledging the third possibility: if it doesn’t turn out “that bad” and the extreme measures don’t make much of a difference. This is the possibility I would be super pissed about, not the other two. Unfortunately, in either “not that bad” outcome it’s going to be very hard to prove which one it is, which of course won’t stop a bunch of folks from parading around and bragging about how they saved the world. I’ve seen this pattern more than once in my short time alive. But assuming what we all hope, that one of the “not that bad” scenarios plays out, the difference this time will be that many millions of lives will have been directly ruined because of those extreme measures.
dnautics 7y ago
There's an overreaction budget that when you exhaust goes into 'boy who cried wolf' territory.
- guscost 7y ago
  Yep, this is another huge potential problem. If we just wasted everyone’s tolerance for collective action on a nasty cold, that’s pretty fucking stupid.
  - dnautics 7y ago
    don't forget that we are also using tolerance on other, non-pandemic things, like school shooting drills, wars on terrorism, etc.
dmix 7y ago
When people are losing jobs at a higher rate than the worst recession in the modern era, while kids miss out on critical education time, and everyone is basically self-imprisoned in homes I think it’s fine to constantly question if we are overreacting. Even if that answer is mostly no, we’re not. Emergency funding will only go so far and once we get past a month of extraordinary measures the serious pain hitting millions of people will be a guarantee. Even in countries with far wider safety nets than the US, none of them are designed to handle this sort of unprecedented event. Then we see Hong Kong announcing 50 new cases in a single day [1] after getting down to zero for an extended period. The only certainty is that there will be no easy answers. Which I think the OP posts downplays in their ‘data driven’ recommendations. [1] https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3076113/coronavirus-highest-risk-yet-new-covid-19 https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/artic...
- Mikeb85 7y ago
  In Canada right now jobs are being lost at a higher rate than the worst recession of all-time...
- hackeraccount 7y ago
  This exactly. Medicine is all about the dosage. If we are overreacting than we're not helping people extra - we're actively hurting people.

I’ve talked to a lot of folks in the past few weeks who aren’t laughing at all over what might be an overreaction. It’s making their lives very hard. If it turns out this is indeed an overreaction, they’re going to be totally pissed off, and I’m probably going to agree with them. You’re free to laugh all you want, but it’s a privilege that you probably don’t appreciate.

basscomm 7y ago
>I’ve talked to a lot of folks in the past few weeks who aren’t laughing at all over what might be an overreaction. It's a no-win situation for a lot of people with a certain mindset. If we take extreme measures and the infection is worse than predicted, then they'll say that everyone should have done more. If we take extreme measures and 'flatten the curve' enough so that the hospitals aren't overwhelmed and the number of deaths is lower than expected, then they'll say that all those measures were an overreaction to something that turned out to not be that bad. Even though that was the desired outcome of taking those extreme measures in the first place. There is also a worryingly-large number of people that will insist that everything is overblown, everything is fine, et cetera, until they (or someone they know personally) is impacted. Until then all these things are happening to 'someone else' and can be ignored.
- guscost 7y ago
  You’re not even acknowledging the third possibility: if it doesn’t turn out “that bad” and the extreme measures don’t make much of a difference. This is the possibility I would be super pissed about, not the other two. Unfortunately, in either “not that bad” outcome it’s going to be very hard to prove which one it is, which of course won’t stop a bunch of folks from parading around and bragging about how they saved the world. I’ve seen this pattern more than once in my short time alive. But assuming what we all hope, that one of the “not that bad” scenarios plays out, the difference this time will be that many millions of lives will have been directly ruined because of those extreme measures.

dnautics 7y ago

There's an overreaction budget that when you exhaust goes into 'boy who cried wolf' territory.

guscost 7y ago
Yep, this is another huge potential problem. If we just wasted everyone’s tolerance for collective action on a nasty cold, that’s pretty fucking stupid.
- dnautics 7y ago
  don't forget that we are also using tolerance on other, non-pandemic things, like school shooting drills, wars on terrorism, etc.

dmix 7y ago

When people are losing jobs at a higher rate than the worst recession in the modern era, while kids miss out on critical education time, and everyone is basically self-imprisoned in homes I think it’s fine to constantly question if we are overreacting. Even if that answer is mostly no, we’re not. Emergency funding will only go so far and once we get past a month of extraordinary measures the serious pain hitting millions of people will be a guarantee. Even in countries with far wider safety nets than the US, none of them are designed to handle this sort of unprecedented event. Then we see Hong Kong announcing 50 new cases in a single day [1] after getting down to zero for an extended period. The only certainty is that there will be no easy answers. Which I think the OP posts downplays in their ‘data driven’ recommendations. [1] https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3076113/coronavirus-highest-risk-yet-new-covid-19 https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/artic...

Mikeb85 7y ago
In Canada right now jobs are being lost at a higher rate than the worst recession of all-time...
hackeraccount 7y ago
This exactly. Medicine is all about the dosage. If we are overreacting than we're not helping people extra - we're actively hurting people.