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Germany is still missing out on some very basic things that have been done right in countries like South Korea: Namely: constant cleanup, constant testing, iden

Germany is still missing out on some very basic things that have been done right in countries like South Korea: Namely: constant cleanup, constant testing, identification and information about potential hot spots. The government reacted really slow (we had the first case ~mid of February and nothing happened for another 3 weeks) it now does a lot of actions but mostly destructive ones like shutting down the economy. Yes, social distancing is good, and yes we need to flatten the curve, but there are other possibilities, too? Protecting people above 65 (i.e., retired) and with medical conditions would have been easier. Now there is fear everywhere. Still, I hear from a lot of people that they indeed show (mild) symptoms, but are not tested - even upon request. How can that work? I was riding the subway here in Munich last Friday. Quite empty - still very dirty. No where anyone with sanitizing spray or anything.

alkonaut 7y ago
> Still, I hear from a lot of people that they indeed show (mild) symptoms, but are not tested - even upon request. How can that work? Why would you test everyone with mild symptoms? 90% or more of those people are going to have the flu or a common cold. And they’d use a test that can be used on someone where it makes a difference: someone admitted to hospital, or someone working at a hospital. Everyone else with symptoms can just act as if it is covid and isolate for 14 days. When you have exponential growing, testing capability can never keep up.
- Gene_Parmesan 7y ago
  Given the long incubation period, as well as the fact that many people who are carriers are completely asymptomatic, blanket testing has been tentatively shown to be an effective way to halt the spread of the virus. See: the whole of South Korea's approach, as well as https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-vo-euganeo-blanket-testing-veneto-luca-zaia-a9411201.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-...
  - alkonaut 7y ago
    My point wasn’t that fewer than possible should be tested, my point was that given the constraints (staff, equipment, time) it’s best to test people that it makes a difference for, such as those who must be in contact with people - in healthcare. If you could test everyone with symptoms (or everyone full stop) then go for it. That’s not possible though.
    - MagnumOpus 7y ago
      > That’s not possible though With less foot-dragging it can be. Germany tests 20,000 people a day, Korea tests 15,000 a day, the US (4-6x more populous) only test a few thousand...
  - DanBC 7y ago
    The tests have an approx 20% false negative rate. You test someone who has symptoms. The test returns negative. What do you tell them to do, given that you know the false negative rate? This doctor says it better than me. https://twitter.com/keirshiels/status/1241042696560619523?s=20 https://twitter.com/keirshiels/status/1241042696560619523?s=...
    - colonelcanoe 7y ago
      You tell them the same thing regardless of the outcome of the test. The 80% of the time it returns positive, you tell the epidemiologist, and they prevent a few further infections by investigating close personal contacts.
  - Hamuko 7y ago
    >blanket testing has been tentatively shown to be an effective way to halt the spread of the virus. Testing does not halt the virus. A test is just an indicator to see if you have it or not. Even if you could test for Corona as easily as you can for drunk driving, it'd still do us no good if you don't actually take some concrete steps to halt the virus. If you have mild symptoms, you don't need a test. You need to stay the fuck home. No symptoms? Avoid going out if you don't need to.
  - 7y ago
- oezi 7y ago
  Berlin for instance tested over 20.000 people last week alone. Less than 3% results were positive.
  - seppel 7y ago
    > Berlin for instance tested over 20.000 people last week alone. 20000 per week seems to be an absurdly low number to me. > Less than 3% results were positive. Given high number of VIPs that are already infected (members of the parliament, professional soccer, actors), I suspect that 0.5% to 1% of the population is already infected. Edit to add numbers: The German parliament of size 709 had 4 member already infected last weekend. On March 19 we were at 6.
    - perl4ever 7y ago
      If 3% test positive and 0.5% are infected, then most of the positives are false, right?
      - seppel 7y ago
        But they test only 20000 per week(!).
- helij 7y ago
  We assume you at least have temporary immunity so testing everybody with symptoms will make their anxiety less and a lot of more people could be mobile and working.
- gns24 7y ago
  Because if you're tested and it's positive you can tell everyone you came into contact that they need to isolate themselves too.
DangerousPie 7y ago
Do you have any evidence that cleaning subways is an effective way of preventing infection? From everything I have read the main vector of infection is by direct droplet infection during personal contact with an infected person. Sure, maybe if you disinfect surfaces everywhere you may decrease the spread a tiny little bit, but everyone's resources are probably better spent elsewhere right now. You also can't just protect people above 65 and let the virus spread amongst young people. Have a look at the Imperial College study published a few days ago, where they modeled the effect of different interventions in the UK and US. Even if you could perfectly isolate all old people (and ignoring the mental health cost of that) the young people needing medical attention would still vastly overwhelm the health system. And I agree that widespread testing would be great, but there are simply only so many tests you can do with the resources available. It's easy to say "you should test everyone" but nobody ever has an answer for how.
- chapium 7y ago
  It has been shown that this virus can survive on surfaces for 3 days.
  - oezi 7y ago
    Virus fragments. The ability of the virus to infect decreases quickly.
    - shadowprofile77 7y ago
      Honestly curious, do you by chance have a source for this ability to infect decreasing quickly? I would love to share it becasue many people are getting paranoid about how long a tabletop or doorknob could infect them after being touched.
  - DangerousPie 7y ago
    That doesn't mean much without also accounting for how easily an infected person actually spreads the virus into their environment, as well as how likely copies of the virus left in the environment are to actually infect someone. I would suspect that as long as people don't sneeze/cough without a tissue they are not actually spreading that much copies of the virus on surfaces. And similarly I would also expect that if you wash your hands before eating or touching your face, you are not that likely to get infected even if you had touched a surface with viral particles on it. But of course I have no evidence for any of this since the studies have clearly not been done yet.
oezi 7y ago
Having people wear masks in public so that they don't spread the virus by droplets is the biggest thing missing in all western countries. Lack of masks seems to be the primary reason.
- rjsw 7y ago
  I went out to a supermarket last night, I was the only person there wearing a mask and disposable gloves.
  - NicoJuicy 7y ago
    People only need to wear masks currently when they are infected
    - yodsanklai 7y ago
      Yes, but some people are infected and don't know it yet. And some people have symptoms but don't think it's worth wearing a mask, maybe because of the social stigma of wearing one in western countries. I think if everyone was wearing a mask, that would solve both problems. (of course, we know that many countries don't have enough masks). I was saying the same thing as you two weeks ago (even in HN comments). Now I'm confined and can't leave my home without risking a fine. There may not be sufficient scientific evidence yet, but I'm starting to believe that we wouldn't be in this situation if everybody started to wear a mask in public places at the very start of the epidemics.
      - NicoJuicy 7y ago
        Than you are describing human fallacy. Even when you only think you are infected or there is a good chance => wear a mask
    - robocat 7y ago
      I strongly disagree. 1. Heaps of people have the virus without showing symptoms 2. No-one wants to be treated like a leper, so everyone needs to wear masks. If only the sick wear them, then self-deception and avoiding social opprobrium will cause people to avoid wearing masks, and the selfish will not wear masks 3. If home-made masks help even 20%, that would make a massive difference to infection rates over time due to exponential growth (think compounding interest). 4. Everyone in smart Asian countries wears them for a reason. 5. There is a reasonable chance that the reason Japan has low infection rates is due to masks. Everyone should be jumping on whatever actions that have a percentage chance of working (so long as they don’t carry significant risk).
m4rtink 7y ago
Add to that mandatory (includign self made) mask wearing in public space. This is really not hard to do, cheap & can help a lot to prevent infected people from infecting others in public.
- jansan 7y ago
  The official opinion on mask wearing is absolutely pathetic in Germany. The should declare that there is a shortage, medical staff must have priority, others should use DIY masks.
- FlorianRappl 7y ago
  Exactly this. Looking at South Korea every citizen got 2 facial masks per week. That's how it should be done - they are only effective if everyone wears them.
nocturnial 7y ago
> Still, I hear from a lot of people that they indeed show (mild) symptoms, but are not tested - even upon request. How can that work? The sad truth is that we're low on reagents to test if people are infected. If the general advise is to stay home and self-isolate anyways, then we can stretch the supply for healthcare workers (nurses, doctors,...). I might be wrong but I think this is the reasoning to prioritize and ration testing for certain critical people in the health supply chain of things. edit: "low on reagents" was meant relative. I just wanted to convey we need to be smart how we use this limited supply.

alkonaut 7y ago

> Still, I hear from a lot of people that they indeed show (mild) symptoms, but are not tested - even upon request. How can that work? Why would you test everyone with mild symptoms? 90% or more of those people are going to have the flu or a common cold. And they’d use a test that can be used on someone where it makes a difference: someone admitted to hospital, or someone working at a hospital. Everyone else with symptoms can just act as if it is covid and isolate for 14 days. When you have exponential growing, testing capability can never keep up.

Gene_Parmesan 7y ago
Given the long incubation period, as well as the fact that many people who are carriers are completely asymptomatic, blanket testing has been tentatively shown to be an effective way to halt the spread of the virus. See: the whole of South Korea's approach, as well as https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-vo-euganeo-blanket-testing-veneto-luca-zaia-a9411201.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-...
- alkonaut 7y ago
  My point wasn’t that fewer than possible should be tested, my point was that given the constraints (staff, equipment, time) it’s best to test people that it makes a difference for, such as those who must be in contact with people - in healthcare. If you could test everyone with symptoms (or everyone full stop) then go for it. That’s not possible though.
  - MagnumOpus 7y ago
    > That’s not possible though With less foot-dragging it can be. Germany tests 20,000 people a day, Korea tests 15,000 a day, the US (4-6x more populous) only test a few thousand...
- DanBC 7y ago
  The tests have an approx 20% false negative rate. You test someone who has symptoms. The test returns negative. What do you tell them to do, given that you know the false negative rate? This doctor says it better than me. https://twitter.com/keirshiels/status/1241042696560619523?s=20 https://twitter.com/keirshiels/status/1241042696560619523?s=...
  - colonelcanoe 7y ago
    You tell them the same thing regardless of the outcome of the test. The 80% of the time it returns positive, you tell the epidemiologist, and they prevent a few further infections by investigating close personal contacts.
- Hamuko 7y ago
  >blanket testing has been tentatively shown to be an effective way to halt the spread of the virus. Testing does not halt the virus. A test is just an indicator to see if you have it or not. Even if you could test for Corona as easily as you can for drunk driving, it'd still do us no good if you don't actually take some concrete steps to halt the virus. If you have mild symptoms, you don't need a test. You need to stay the fuck home. No symptoms? Avoid going out if you don't need to.
- 7y ago
oezi 7y ago
Berlin for instance tested over 20.000 people last week alone. Less than 3% results were positive.
- seppel 7y ago
  > Berlin for instance tested over 20.000 people last week alone. 20000 per week seems to be an absurdly low number to me. > Less than 3% results were positive. Given high number of VIPs that are already infected (members of the parliament, professional soccer, actors), I suspect that 0.5% to 1% of the population is already infected. Edit to add numbers: The German parliament of size 709 had 4 member already infected last weekend. On March 19 we were at 6.
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    If 3% test positive and 0.5% are infected, then most of the positives are false, right?
    - seppel 7y ago
      But they test only 20000 per week(!).
helij 7y ago
We assume you at least have temporary immunity so testing everybody with symptoms will make their anxiety less and a lot of more people could be mobile and working.
gns24 7y ago
Because if you're tested and it's positive you can tell everyone you came into contact that they need to isolate themselves too.

DangerousPie 7y ago

Do you have any evidence that cleaning subways is an effective way of preventing infection? From everything I have read the main vector of infection is by direct droplet infection during personal contact with an infected person. Sure, maybe if you disinfect surfaces everywhere you may decrease the spread a tiny little bit, but everyone's resources are probably better spent elsewhere right now. You also can't just protect people above 65 and let the virus spread amongst young people. Have a look at the Imperial College study published a few days ago, where they modeled the effect of different interventions in the UK and US. Even if you could perfectly isolate all old people (and ignoring the mental health cost of that) the young people needing medical attention would still vastly overwhelm the health system. And I agree that widespread testing would be great, but there are simply only so many tests you can do with the resources available. It's easy to say "you should test everyone" but nobody ever has an answer for how.

chapium 7y ago
It has been shown that this virus can survive on surfaces for 3 days.
- oezi 7y ago
  Virus fragments. The ability of the virus to infect decreases quickly.
  - shadowprofile77 7y ago
    Honestly curious, do you by chance have a source for this ability to infect decreasing quickly? I would love to share it becasue many people are getting paranoid about how long a tabletop or doorknob could infect them after being touched.
- DangerousPie 7y ago
  That doesn't mean much without also accounting for how easily an infected person actually spreads the virus into their environment, as well as how likely copies of the virus left in the environment are to actually infect someone. I would suspect that as long as people don't sneeze/cough without a tissue they are not actually spreading that much copies of the virus on surfaces. And similarly I would also expect that if you wash your hands before eating or touching your face, you are not that likely to get infected even if you had touched a surface with viral particles on it. But of course I have no evidence for any of this since the studies have clearly not been done yet.

oezi 7y ago

Having people wear masks in public so that they don't spread the virus by droplets is the biggest thing missing in all western countries. Lack of masks seems to be the primary reason.

rjsw 7y ago
I went out to a supermarket last night, I was the only person there wearing a mask and disposable gloves.
- NicoJuicy 7y ago
  People only need to wear masks currently when they are infected
  - yodsanklai 7y ago
    Yes, but some people are infected and don't know it yet. And some people have symptoms but don't think it's worth wearing a mask, maybe because of the social stigma of wearing one in western countries. I think if everyone was wearing a mask, that would solve both problems. (of course, we know that many countries don't have enough masks). I was saying the same thing as you two weeks ago (even in HN comments). Now I'm confined and can't leave my home without risking a fine. There may not be sufficient scientific evidence yet, but I'm starting to believe that we wouldn't be in this situation if everybody started to wear a mask in public places at the very start of the epidemics.
    - NicoJuicy 7y ago
      Than you are describing human fallacy. Even when you only think you are infected or there is a good chance => wear a mask
  - robocat 7y ago
    I strongly disagree. 1. Heaps of people have the virus without showing symptoms 2. No-one wants to be treated like a leper, so everyone needs to wear masks. If only the sick wear them, then self-deception and avoiding social opprobrium will cause people to avoid wearing masks, and the selfish will not wear masks 3. If home-made masks help even 20%, that would make a massive difference to infection rates over time due to exponential growth (think compounding interest). 4. Everyone in smart Asian countries wears them for a reason. 5. There is a reasonable chance that the reason Japan has low infection rates is due to masks. Everyone should be jumping on whatever actions that have a percentage chance of working (so long as they don’t carry significant risk).

m4rtink 7y ago

Add to that mandatory (includign self made) mask wearing in public space. This is really not hard to do, cheap & can help a lot to prevent infected people from infecting others in public.

jansan 7y ago
The official opinion on mask wearing is absolutely pathetic in Germany. The should declare that there is a shortage, medical staff must have priority, others should use DIY masks.
FlorianRappl 7y ago
Exactly this. Looking at South Korea every citizen got 2 facial masks per week. That's how it should be done - they are only effective if everyone wears them.

nocturnial 7y ago

> Still, I hear from a lot of people that they indeed show (mild) symptoms, but are not tested - even upon request. How can that work? The sad truth is that we're low on reagents to test if people are infected. If the general advise is to stay home and self-isolate anyways, then we can stretch the supply for healthcare workers (nurses, doctors,...). I might be wrong but I think this is the reasoning to prioritize and ration testing for certain critical people in the health supply chain of things. edit: "low on reagents" was meant relative. I just wanted to convey we need to be smart how we use this limited supply.