13 ms·

The next outbreak? We're not ready. Ted talk by Bill Gates (2015)

166 points by axelfontaine 7y ago

merpnderp 7y ago
No one paid attention. After the H1N1 crisis, the US burned through its reserves of N95 masks and other pandemic supplies, and never refilled them. We aren't even learning now, even after it was obvious Italy needed to lock down more, the US still wasn't taking it seriously. I listened last night to my city council argue that it was still no big deal. Two members, a doctor and scientist said we needed to shut down the city, and everyone else arguing it would destroy small businesses and it wasn't that big a deal to anyone but the elderly. We just don't learn.
- chrisco255 7y ago
  20-50 year olds with no pre-existing conditions are at low risk. The policy of shutting down the economy indefinitely is frightening on its own and we'll be dealing with the steep repercussions of that for many years. This is not sustainable.
  - wastedhours 7y ago
    Well, you can kick things off by sacrificing any member of your family over the age of 50 then. It's almost as if people don't realise economies are reliant on people to contribute to them. You infect half the population you're going to have the same effect regardless. Only this way, we might not end up killing millions unnecessarily.
  - m_mueller 7y ago
    Japan shows that wide use of masks, good hygiene and a decent HC system should actually allow to keep the country running. After what's happened so far, I wonder whether Western countries will be able to learn from this - it's going to need lots of politicians to walk back on previous statements.
    - johnchristopher 7y ago
      Some European countries weren't as deep into bad HC as the US so there are going to be a wide range of reactions and adaptation. Weird thing: in my country, the political entities responsible for budget cuts in HC are applauded at the moment for their handling of the situation they made worse because of those previous cuts.
      - chrisco255 7y ago
        We have an expensive healthcare system in the U.S. but it's not a bad healthcare system.
        bigmanwalter 7y ago
        Depends on whether or not you have a job.
        johnchristopher 7y ago
        Sorry, I abused the language. I'd say you have good healthcare but a bad healthcare system.
    - claudeganon 7y ago
      Japan shows nothing besides doing a better job of the appearance games that US tried and failed to play. Everyone I know in Japan is saying the response is a disaster and bracing for the worst. There was a huge uptick in cases just reported and the media is starting to break their government-imposed silence and warn people.
      - baq 7y ago
        Now that Olympic Games are cancelled they don’t have much reason to cook numbers anymore. I expect a gradual change in tune of official communication starting immediately.
      - bigmanwalter 7y ago
        Those aren't mutually exclusive. Japanese people can accuse their government of not responding effectively even though the Japanese government is doing a better job than the US.
  - CerealFounder 7y ago
    Its pretty simple. We didn't scale testing at all which turns a national isolation into just isolating people that are potentially infected. Then you keep isolating those people until it dies on the vine. This current solutions SUCKS, but it silver medal sucks to just letting the disease roam free and infect everyone. Also, the whole "young people and what not are at low risk" is anecdotal. We have no clue what the longterm, and passive ramifications of this virus are.
  - gregcrv 7y ago
    "nearly 40 percent of patients sick enough to be hospitalized were age 20 to 54" So yes, they are low risk because they get priority in the hospitals. But when the hospital is full, what will happen to them? https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/health/coronavirus-young-people.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/health/coronavirus-young-...
    - misun78 7y ago
      Hospitalization does not imply high risk. That article also has an unnecessarily wide range to make the data meaningless. Why are 20 year olds and 54 year olds bucketed in the same category? For more accurate data, 0 deaths have occurred in Italy for those under 30. Under 40, the few (9) are due to severe pre-existing conditions. Median age for fatality is 80 years old. The exponential curve not only applies for rate of infection but seems to be holding true for age as well. Edit: Source for Italy data here - https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Infografica_19marzo%20ENG.pdf https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Infograf...
      - dajohnson89 7y ago
        could you please share a source? I dont think your comment deserves to be downvoted like it is, but a source on the data you mention would be very helpful.
        _delirium 7y ago
        This article from yesterday has a decent summary of case fatality rates by age in various countries: https://www.vox.com/2020/3/23/21190033/coronavirus-covid-19-deaths-by-age https://www.vox.com/2020/3/23/21190033/coronavirus-covid-19-...
        wolco 7y ago
        He is right on 0 deaths in Italy, Spain has one but 15% hospitalized rate. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2020/3/23/21190033/coronavirus-covid-19-deaths-by-age https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2020/3...
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - amluto 7y ago
    They may be at low risk of death, but not of transmitting the disease. When the economy reopens, we need real measures to reduce transmission. For example, all businesses with more than one person or with customer contact (including not-quite-employment situations like UPS or ride sharing) should take everyone’s temperature every day. Feverish or otherwise sick employees should be sent some, with pay, and there should be very strong disincentives for managers to encourage their employees to pretend to be healthy. For another example, everyone on public transit or otherwise in a crowded place should wear a mask. If a real surgical mask is not available, a couple of layers of fabric should still help.
    - misun78 7y ago
      This comment applies to any viral disease that spreads amongst humans. What warrants a complete shutdown this time around when we didn't do the same for H1N1, SARS etc?
      - amluto 7y ago
        I’m not personally convinced that a complete shutdown is the right choice. But SARS wasn’t very contagious and only had a few total cases in the US. Arguably H1N1 should have had a somewhat stronger response. Also, people are used to the flu and it’s not as scary. (Also, there wasn’t really any research needed to vaccinate against H1N1. It was just a matter of production. On the flip side, the flu mutates very quickly to evade immunity, whereas coronaviruses seem to mutate very very slowly. A COVID-19 vaccine that works* seems likely to provide protection essentially forever.) * Early indications were that the obvious vaccine design for SARS made the disease worse, not better. That’s why we haven’t seen much excitement about inactivated COVID-19 vaccines.
      - rovolo 7y ago
        SARS was much more contained, and only infected ~8K people. It infected ~3K people outside of China, most whom were in east Asia. The case counts outside east Asia were in descending order: - Canada: 250 - US: 27 - Germany: 9 Areas affected by SARS instituted targeted quarantines after detection and were able to contain the virus. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002%E2%80%932004_SARS_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002%E2%80%932004_SARS_outbrea... H1N1 was much less deadly than Covid-19 and spread less quickly. There were only ~18K confirmed deaths worldwide. (The estimated number of deaths was much higher at 150-600K. Basically, we confirmed it was less deadly than the seasonal flu so we didn't test everyone for it.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic People are freaking out about Covid-19 because it spreads faster and is already stressing hospitals. Deaths and cases double every 2-3 days absent control measures. It can take 2 weeks to cause symptoms, so even if everything gets shut down now, we could have 25x as many hospitalizations/deaths than today. If smaller control measures aren't as effective, it'd take time to confirm and the peak would be multiples higher. H1N1 spread much slower so we could have responded much more leisurely if things started to go out of control. https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest
  - enumjorge 7y ago
    So do we treat anyone outside the group of 20-50 year old with no preexisting conditions as acceptable collateral damage to keeping the economy afloat?
    - Klinky 7y ago
      It's almost as if some people think human's purpose is to sustain an economy, rather than the other way around. Economies and markets are a tool used by human's to achieve goals(ideally better quality of life), they are not the goal itself.
      - jjeaff 7y ago
        It seems like you are making their point for them. If an economy's purpose is to sustain humans, then letting it crash and burn puts those humans at risk. It's a balancing act. We just can't forget that too much economic destruction will cost lives as well.
        Klinky 7y ago
        It is a balancing act, but we need to watch out that we're not letting the economy run the show based on things like overinflated valuations and speculation, which at the first sign of trouble, implode on themselves at almost a 50% loss. How much actual value(quality of life) is really being generated here? How much of it is hype, bandwagons, and charades? How sustainable is it and what safety nets are available when the bottom falls out? During this time you also think about how many people are telecommuting effectively right now, and how much downtown economies and real estate relies on everyone getting in their car, or on a bus/train going downtown each morning, and then the knock on effects this has on the environment. A lot of people don't want to hear pessimism or realism, they want to see growth, growth and growth. Growth at all other costs can still result in the side effect of quality of life improvements, but unlimited economic growth has not been sustainable, and we've had quite a few boom and bust cycles the last 2 decades now. If you're designing the economy to continually boom & bust, it's hard not to expect eventual economic destruction. It's not a matter of "not letting it happen", it's a matter of that's how it's been designed. It's what it does.
  - wbronitsky 7y ago
    The alternative is a wildly increased death rate, which you cannot reverse. There are so many ways to fix economies, only a few ways to address a pandemic. If you do not have another solution that keeps people alive, kindly be quiet; you have nothing important to say.
    - chrisco255 7y ago
      There's only so many trillions of dollars the Fed can print before the whole structure of the economy buckles. And when economies buckle, death and despair ensue. The economy is about more than just making money. The Great Depression caused a lot of secondary effects including World War II. We definitely want to avoid situations like that. EDIT: All complex decisions involve trade-offs. Right now, there's at least a few dozen more likely ways that people will die other than COVID-19. Heart disease, cancer, car accidents, even seasonal flu currently has a higher death count. You cannot lock down the economy for months on end, ratchet up unemployment to 30%+, and continue to feed people and keep their housing and shelter paid for. People's lives and livelihoods depend on the economy staying functional and healthy. It's not trivial. You have to find some way of moving forward without locking down all 320 million people. Maybe you look at areas of outbreak and you quarantine those areas on a piecewise basis. You ramp up testing, you use masks in public, you do something pro-active to keep the economy going. You provide assistance to those that are at high risk, but you let low risk individuals get back to work and keep the economy moving. The food you eat. The healthcare services you depend on. The military. The semi-truck drivers delivering products and services. The aircraft to transport products and people. All of that depends on the economy working. Kindly keep the nasty comments about trying to dissuade me from discussing these important topics to yourself.
      - wbronitsky 7y ago
        This argument is not worth responding to. You are arguing that our economy should be protected before people are protected. It is disgusting, and I'm tired of rehashing the same disgusting crap over and over. If you really think that the economic effects outweigh the loss of life this virus can and will cause, all I can do is be glad that all you have is your ability to express your opinion, not the ability to do anything about it. Thank god for that. Finally, and yes I'm quoting myself here "If you do not have another solution that keeps people alive, kindly be quiet; you have nothing important to say." > Kindly keep the nasty comments about trying to dissuade me from discussing these important topics to yourself. This is absurd; you're responding to me. And this isn't a discussion, these are opinions, with no facts to back them up. I simply find these opinions disgusting, as they do not prioritize keeping people healthy and alive.
  - hbharadwaj 7y ago
    Forgetting the overload of medical infrastructure for a bit, here are some of the myriad of issues that this leads to: 1. There are 20-50 year olds with pre-existing conditions such as asthma who are at higher risk. For example, a colleague on my team has asthma. Another colleague on my team has a husband who has asthma. As a Manager, I can't ask either of them to come into work. 2. What about 20-50 year olds who come in contact with 50+ year old or live together with them? They may be at low risk, but they will definitely spread the virus around more It becomes quite complicated dealing with these things on a case by case basis.
  - oarabbus_ 7y ago
    At low risk of dying. Not low risk of getting hospitalized and having permanent or long-lasting lung damaged. Do you want compromised breathing for the next 5 years?
  - misun78 7y ago
    No idea why you're getting downvoted, this comment is spot on.
- slg 7y ago
  > we needed to shut down the city, and everyone else arguing it would destroy small businesses The problem is that they are right with this. Shutting down the city will probably destroy small businesses. Those same people also can't do much to help small businesses. It is understandable that they don't want to sentence these businesses to death when they are powerless to save them. This is why the relative inaction by the federal government is such a problem here. They are the only entity that has the power to stop the wide spread of the virus and absorb the economic repercussions of the shutdown.
  - davidw 7y ago
    What happened in Italy is that they delayed... and then ended up shutting down everything anyway - just with a lot more infected people and deaths, and the exact same economic hardships.
    - birdyrooster 7y ago
      Probably worse economic hardship with the added strain on the labor force.
  - yiyus 7y ago
    Staying open is not a panacea for small businesses. Nobody is travelling, nobody is spending. My parents have a small shop (in Spain) and they had to close before the lockdown started because they were not selling anything. And, by that time, things were much better that they are now around here.
    - slg 7y ago
      You are certainly right, but it is a question of blame. If the government shuts down your business and it never recovers you will likely blame the government. If the government lets you stay open and your business still fails you will likely blame the virus. EDIT: This is being downvoted, so let me make a clarification that I am explaining the government's potential reasoning but I am not excusing or agreeing with it.
- eternalban 7y ago
  You are making assumptions here. I'm working on a joke and only have the punchline: "Western Democracy with Chinese Communist Party Characteristics".
- xwdv 7y ago
  What if what we learned is simply that there’s nothing we can do? You can lock down, you can isolate... destiny still arrives.
  - spuz 7y ago
    Then fine, we just keep moving on and accept deaths from the virus in the same way as we do for deaths from the flu or road traffic accidents. However that is absolutely NOT the situation we are in. If we do nothing, significant numbers of people will die from the virus. If we completely shutdown the economy, significant numbers of people will die from lack of access to essential services. What we decide to do matters a great deal. There is no reason to be fatalistic.
  - fatjokes 7y ago
    Avoiding infection was never the goal. "Flattening the curve" so as to not overwhelm the fragile health infra is, and it's already been shown to be working.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
glofish 7y ago
yeah, he was not ready even after telling us about how we are not ready
- melling 7y ago
  The warning was for us...5 years ago.
  - 3fe9a03ccd14ca5 7y ago
    Warnings are cheap and easy. Lots of people warning about all kinds of things all of the time. Where is the technology? Where is the solution? Where is the execution on the warning?
- dangus 7y ago
  We should be expecting our governments to be ready, not a billionaire with a charitable foundation. I wish my government was as effective and functional as Taiwan or South Korea.
  - tathougies 7y ago
    We should follow Taiwan's lead and withdraw from WHO, who lied to the entire world while Taiwan was preparing.
- merpnderp 7y ago
  The warning was for governments. If the US had spare ICU capacity, and a national reserve of PPE and critical care supplies like we had before 2009, we'd be miles better off. Experts knew it was "all but airborne if not airborne" and that masks were the best way to stop it from day one, but discouraged Americans from buying them as the hospitals would desperately need them far more. So many more people will be infected and die because they didn't have a $.50 mask. And this is all because we didn't spend a tiny pittance getting ready.
tbergeron 7y ago
Seems he was ready after all. Look up Event201 and ID2020.
- melling 7y ago
  I found this: http://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/ http://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/
  - cbhl 7y ago
    It appears they updated that page to explicitly state that the tabletop exercise was not meant to be a prediction, but simply to highlight challenges in responding in a pandemic.
    - jjoonathan 7y ago
      Well, yes, but the general prediction is trivial. There's going to be another bad virus after this one, too!
    - melling 7y ago
      Here’s an exercise: There’s an epidemic in the China with a population of 1.3 billion, the second largest economy. They lock down Wuhan on Jan 23rd to try and contain it from spreading to the rest of China. On Jan 30th with 7818 infected, the WHO declares Global Health Emergency. It’s a now threat beyond China. What do you do? Things to consider: - There are 100,000 global flights a day. - China is rushing to build 2 hospitals in 10 days - It appears to be highly contagious
      - user_50123890 7y ago
        USA banned flights from/to China. Italy banned flights from/to China. (both decisions caused an outcry about "racism" at the time, btw) Other countries kept the flights going. USA and Italy are now the countries hit hardest despite these restrictions, because the economy is global. Either all countries must react properly, or a single country's actions won't do anything. Good luck with that.
DanSmooth 7y ago
Perhaps also of interest, his recent AMA on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fksnbf/im_bill_gates_cochair_of_the_bill_melinda_gates/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fksnbf/im_bill...
jimbob45 7y ago
Would things have been different if it had started in a country other than China? Politics aside, starting in the most populous and most trafficked country on Earth seems like the worst-case scenario.
- beager 7y ago
  Population density is a factor to be sure, but the government response was a bigger factor in failing to contain it in my opinion. The CCP’s culture of fear and retribution pushed municipal officials to suppress reports of a novel outbreak, and pushed authorities to retaliate against medical professionals sounding the alarm. A culture of transparency and non-retribution may have enabled China to contain this, and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened.
  - KaoruAoiShiho 7y ago
    I guess some people actually believe this. The new orientalism?
    - 49531 7y ago
      Yea, unfortunately that seems to be the case. While local level officials in Wuhan punished some early whistleblowers for posting publicly about the virus the Chinese Supreme Peoples Court said they should not have been punished. I think China has shown a lot of transparency and has put a ton of resources towards containment.
  - iforgotpassword 7y ago
    I agree with your initial reasoning, although given the long incubation period that was initially unknown I still see a high chance this would have spread either way. But > and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened. Not in a thousand years. The west was sitting on their hands for almost two months, busy armchair-commenting on the CCP's failings, preparing half-heartedly at best, taking no proactive measures whatsoever. I'm utterly disappointed with my government and don't see how this would have turned out any different for us had we had twice as much time to prepare, or had this originated in a western country.
DarkCoder 7y ago
i highly doubt that. its all about microchip implemenation
0xff00ffee 7y ago
This feels like a giant game of "I can't wait to say 'I told you so!'" by many different factions. The HeadInTheSand GOP, the Apocalyptic Left, the panicked middle (/r/coronavirus). Everyone except health professionals. Competitive Schadenfreude.
- skrebbel 7y ago
  Loving the term "the Apocalyptic Left"
- starik36 7y ago
  > the panicked middle (/r/coronavirus) The Panicked Middle leans heavily towards the Apocalyptic Left.
  - TLightful 7y ago
    That's why there are right wing governments in the US, the UK and many other countries. Stay off the political drugs. They're not good for you.
- emilsedgh 7y ago
  While we are in the middle of an apocalypse, you're name calling the people who predicted it. I sincerely hope that one of the side effects of this crisis would be more acceptance towards science.
  - 0xff00ffee 7y ago
    I name-called the "health professionals"? Help me out: what do they like to be called?
- SuperFerret 7y ago
  Enlightened centrist
- SuperFerret 7y ago
  Health professionals are generally lefties. Same with scientists.
dustingetz 7y ago
"Sufficiently Powerful Optimization Of Any Known Target Destroys All Value" From the Moral Mazes blog series featured on HN a couple months ago https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/31/does-big-business-hate-your-family/ https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/31/does-big-business-ha... ; the first segment is https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/28/moloch-hasnt-won/ https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/28/moloch-hasnt-won/
zaptheimpaler 7y ago
The asian countries by and large did better because they don't view every decision through a narrow economic lens. They simply understand that the health of their population is the ground upon which everything else is built. US/West has been taken over by paperclip maximizers, thats all. The landlords want to maximize paperclips, so no rent relief for small businesses. The politicians see this and decide shutting down would be catastrophic, instead of questioning the premise. Like it is literally inconceivable to me how retarded modern capitalism is. You need a 5-6 week shutdown on businesses, so force rent to be waived for that period. Thats most of the fixed cost, and the employees being on leavetakes care of the variable cost. The businesses don't go bankrupt, everyone just takes a 6 week vacation and comes back like nothing happened. You need ICUs/equipment - take over hotels and make it happen. Instead, they are worried about getting congress approval to pass a bill to pay the hotel owners leasing costs during a global emergency. In the face of a million deaths, the paperclip maximizers can only see all the lost paperclips.
ryndbfsrw 7y ago
I try to imagine the counter-scenario where leaders had done the correct thing but because they did the right thing and a spread never occurred we collectively boot them out of office because nothing bad happened and criticize them for 'overreacting' when that is exactly what is needed for a pandemic. I am sympathetic to why nothing changed and no one listened. good risk management shows up as nothing bad happening. Heroes who avert disaster don’t get statues.
- nocorpwelfare 7y ago
  Look, the US and everywhere is more interested in financializing everything, leveraging and doing all kinds of other stupid shit in order to make money without actually producing anything. So this is what you get. Want strong civil defense? Look at Switzerland.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- mistermann 7y ago
  Very good point. Most people do not include counter-factuals in their thought process. I would go further and propose that not only do most people not even know what counter-factuals are, but many of them would be extremely psychologically resistant to the very idea. A similar example of this is: go into a forum, find someone who is predicting the future, point out to them that they are predicting the future, and observe the result. Now do this 100 or 1000 times and keep track of your results. "But this is just people being stupid!" I disagree. Yes, it is indeed people being stupid....but is it "just" that?
- tome 7y ago
  That scenario would only come true if every leader did the correct thing. In the more likely scenario where some did and some didn't, the ones who did would say "It might seem at first sight that we overreacted, but look at country X. They didn't act and all their citizens are dying and the economy crumbling."
- siwatanejo 7y ago
  This is why good security professionals are never promoted: if they do their job well, nobody notices.
jliptzin 7y ago
It’s because we have really been in the midst of a stupidity epidemic for at least the last 5 years and our debt has finally come due.
- Enginerrrd 7y ago
  For only the last 5 years?! We started approaching our current level of polarization and infighting over wedge issues during the 90's, and have steadily gotten worse. Both sides are hopelessly deadlocked and so convinced they're right as to completely disparage and dehumanize half of the population. They're more interested in fighting the other side than they are moving forward in any way if it involves giving the other side a victory, no matter how small. If that's not the stupidity that got us into this mess, I don't know what is.
  - throwaway894345 7y ago
    By my estimation, most elite media, academia, and other epistemological institutions retained a strong sense of professional integrity prior to ~2012. They certainly had their biases, but they took some care to veil them. This change felt pretty distinct and abrupt to me; before the sort of overt partisanship was widespread among the general population, but these elite institutions were generally seen as above the fray. Afterward, we saw a steep trend toward tabloidism that climaxed early last year with the Covington Catholic affair (for the unfamiliar, the media doctored a video of some students to make them appear to be frothing racists to the effect that they were mobbed online and received threats of death and violence even from celebrities) but which has remained in a lesser but still heightened state ever since.
- chapium 7y ago
  Much longer than that.
- mcrad 7y ago
  This is exactly right. The evidence is not an any academic journal but in the way power and money led to the demise of major political parties and other institutions. The trend led to a shoddy papering over of the last financial crisis, which led to even more "creative" ways to blow bubbles, and further deteriorating checks and balances in both public and private sectors. Does the scientific community know about this? More importantly do they care? Granted, the virus is a serious matter. However the response is basically a different problem. Those in power know the financial system is strained beyond repair, and have a very strong incentive to use HC Healthcare Crisis to avert the blame and prepare new world order. Something like that.
tehjoker 7y ago
Bill Gates, the giving pledge guy, is somehow richer than before he took the pledge. His organization is also mysteriously involved in encouraging the women of developing nations to get IUDs under a Malthusian theory that mysteriously benefits the people of rich nations over poor nations. This guy may be talking to health experts, but he's not someone we should be taking advice from. He represents the right wing of international development aid. https://www.dailywire.com/news/whos-racists-bill-gates-spending-18-million-paul-bois https://www.dailywire.com/news/whos-racists-bill-gates-spend...
- pinkfoot 7y ago
  > get IUDs under a Malthusian theory 3 new people per second. Out of curiosity, which developing nation problems get easier with more people? Mankind's time of easy answers is behind us.
RyanShook 7y ago
Really thankful that Bill Gates is focusing his attention on coronavirus at this time. I think he will likely be called one of the many heroes in this epidemic.
throwaway894345 7y ago
I really hope we (the US) conducts a thorough and credible investigation as to who is responsible for this failure to prepare for this crisis. I have minimal faith in government or regulatory agencies, but I thought the CDC was one of the few government agencies that had its shit together. Apparently they couldn't even be bothered to keep a reasonably stocked reserve of masks and ventilators--things that we knew we would need in the event of a respiratory disease outbreak which we were looking pretty probable following SARS and MURS. Never mind planning to secure and ramp up critical supply chains. I'm sure there's lots of blame to be laid at the feet of congress and various administrations, but these things seem to be squarely in the purview of the CDC and certainly aren't line items on the congressional appropriations bill. I want criminal charges pressed against bureaucrats and politicians tarred and feathered not so much because I'm pissed that their negligence has killed / will kill thousands but so that future politicians and agency heads will take this shit seriously in the future. If there aren't sufficient legal avenues for holding politicians and bureaucrats accountable, then we need to create some.
- dfxm12 7y ago
  There's plenty of blame to go around, not the least of which falls on the president [0]. His party mates in congress have shown to be unwilling to hold him accountable. You have some power to hold them accountable come November. 0 - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/24/trump-cuts-undermine-coronavirus-containment-cdc-watchdog-report https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/24/trump-cuts-u...
- chapium 7y ago
  Trump is already blaming china for not containing this, even though the us has equal responsibility to contain the virus within our own borders. Not to mention the measures taken by china to flatten the curve were extraordinary.
- kiba 7y ago
  I really hope we (the US) conducts a thorough and credible investigation as to who is responsible for this failure to prepare for this crisis. I don't see how blaming x and y will fix anything but boot out the current bureaucrats. The next time a pandemic happens, the guys who remembered anything in living memory are already dead or retired. Worse, punishing people when they don't understand or making honest mistakes are going to lead to hiding of their mistakes or incentive not to understand anything. but I thought the CDC was one of the few government agencies that had its shit together. Apparently they couldn't even be bothered to keep a reasonably stocked reserve of masks and ventilators It's hard to keep a reserve of masks and ventilators when the higher ups don't think your mission is particularly important and you don't have a budget. Ventilators and masks costs money to store, maintain, and test. The better solution is to prioritize pandemic preparation and war game pandemic scenario, and conduct an honest investigation to prepare for the future, rather than punish people.
dang 7y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22575745 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22575745
- melling 7y ago
  It’s 10 days old and has far fewer comments By marking it as a duplicate, you just killed this new thread.
  - dang 7y ago
    The criterion we use is: did the previous post get significant attention? 87 points and 36 comments is way over that threshold. When a discussion is particularly good, we sometimes override that. This one seems pretty generic to me, though, especially in light of how many coronavirus threads HN has been seeing. I'm not sure there's even a single comment below that is reacting to more than what's in the title: "outbreak", "not ready", and "Bill Gates".
    - nouveaux 7y ago
      I'd argue that this post is more relevant than 10 days ago and should receive an exemption. 10 days ago, the number of cases were small and there was no lock down. Many people did not consider Corvid-19's real impact. Now that most of the country is taking it seriously, it is more top of mind. 10 days ago, Corvid-19 posts were barely considered here on HN. Now many are generating serious discussions. Please reconsider marking this as a dupe.
      - dang 7y ago
        We've also had 10 days worth of massive coronavirus discussion. The issue is the quality (and specificity) of this thread relative to the others.

166 points by axelfontaine 7y ago

No one paid attention. After the H1N1 crisis, the US burned through its reserves of N95 masks and other pandemic supplies, and never refilled them. We aren't even learning now, even after it was obvious Italy needed to lock down more, the US still wasn't taking it seriously. I listened last night to my city council argue that it was still no big deal. Two members, a doctor and scientist said we needed to shut down the city, and everyone else arguing it would destroy small businesses and it wasn't that big a deal to anyone but the elderly. We just don't learn.

chrisco255 7y ago
20-50 year olds with no pre-existing conditions are at low risk. The policy of shutting down the economy indefinitely is frightening on its own and we'll be dealing with the steep repercussions of that for many years. This is not sustainable.
- wastedhours 7y ago
  Well, you can kick things off by sacrificing any member of your family over the age of 50 then. It's almost as if people don't realise economies are reliant on people to contribute to them. You infect half the population you're going to have the same effect regardless. Only this way, we might not end up killing millions unnecessarily.
- m_mueller 7y ago
  Japan shows that wide use of masks, good hygiene and a decent HC system should actually allow to keep the country running. After what's happened so far, I wonder whether Western countries will be able to learn from this - it's going to need lots of politicians to walk back on previous statements.
  - johnchristopher 7y ago
    Some European countries weren't as deep into bad HC as the US so there are going to be a wide range of reactions and adaptation. Weird thing: in my country, the political entities responsible for budget cuts in HC are applauded at the moment for their handling of the situation they made worse because of those previous cuts.
    - chrisco255 7y ago
      We have an expensive healthcare system in the U.S. but it's not a bad healthcare system.
      - bigmanwalter 7y ago
        Depends on whether or not you have a job.
      - johnchristopher 7y ago
        Sorry, I abused the language. I'd say you have good healthcare but a bad healthcare system.
  - claudeganon 7y ago
    Japan shows nothing besides doing a better job of the appearance games that US tried and failed to play. Everyone I know in Japan is saying the response is a disaster and bracing for the worst. There was a huge uptick in cases just reported and the media is starting to break their government-imposed silence and warn people.
    - baq 7y ago
      Now that Olympic Games are cancelled they don’t have much reason to cook numbers anymore. I expect a gradual change in tune of official communication starting immediately.
    - bigmanwalter 7y ago
      Those aren't mutually exclusive. Japanese people can accuse their government of not responding effectively even though the Japanese government is doing a better job than the US.
- CerealFounder 7y ago
  Its pretty simple. We didn't scale testing at all which turns a national isolation into just isolating people that are potentially infected. Then you keep isolating those people until it dies on the vine. This current solutions SUCKS, but it silver medal sucks to just letting the disease roam free and infect everyone. Also, the whole "young people and what not are at low risk" is anecdotal. We have no clue what the longterm, and passive ramifications of this virus are.
- gregcrv 7y ago
  "nearly 40 percent of patients sick enough to be hospitalized were age 20 to 54" So yes, they are low risk because they get priority in the hospitals. But when the hospital is full, what will happen to them? https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/health/coronavirus-young-people.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/health/coronavirus-young-...
  - misun78 7y ago
    Hospitalization does not imply high risk. That article also has an unnecessarily wide range to make the data meaningless. Why are 20 year olds and 54 year olds bucketed in the same category? For more accurate data, 0 deaths have occurred in Italy for those under 30. Under 40, the few (9) are due to severe pre-existing conditions. Median age for fatality is 80 years old. The exponential curve not only applies for rate of infection but seems to be holding true for age as well. Edit: Source for Italy data here - https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Infografica_19marzo%20ENG.pdf https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Infograf...
    - dajohnson89 7y ago
      could you please share a source? I dont think your comment deserves to be downvoted like it is, but a source on the data you mention would be very helpful.
      - _delirium 7y ago
        This article from yesterday has a decent summary of case fatality rates by age in various countries: https://www.vox.com/2020/3/23/21190033/coronavirus-covid-19-deaths-by-age https://www.vox.com/2020/3/23/21190033/coronavirus-covid-19-...
      - wolco 7y ago
        He is right on 0 deaths in Italy, Spain has one but 15% hospitalized rate. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2020/3/23/21190033/coronavirus-covid-19-deaths-by-age https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2020/3...
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- amluto 7y ago
  They may be at low risk of death, but not of transmitting the disease. When the economy reopens, we need real measures to reduce transmission. For example, all businesses with more than one person or with customer contact (including not-quite-employment situations like UPS or ride sharing) should take everyone’s temperature every day. Feverish or otherwise sick employees should be sent some, with pay, and there should be very strong disincentives for managers to encourage their employees to pretend to be healthy. For another example, everyone on public transit or otherwise in a crowded place should wear a mask. If a real surgical mask is not available, a couple of layers of fabric should still help.
  - misun78 7y ago
    This comment applies to any viral disease that spreads amongst humans. What warrants a complete shutdown this time around when we didn't do the same for H1N1, SARS etc?
    - amluto 7y ago
      I’m not personally convinced that a complete shutdown is the right choice. But SARS wasn’t very contagious and only had a few total cases in the US. Arguably H1N1 should have had a somewhat stronger response. Also, people are used to the flu and it’s not as scary. (Also, there wasn’t really any research needed to vaccinate against H1N1. It was just a matter of production. On the flip side, the flu mutates very quickly to evade immunity, whereas coronaviruses seem to mutate very very slowly. A COVID-19 vaccine that works* seems likely to provide protection essentially forever.) * Early indications were that the obvious vaccine design for SARS made the disease worse, not better. That’s why we haven’t seen much excitement about inactivated COVID-19 vaccines.
    - rovolo 7y ago
      SARS was much more contained, and only infected ~8K people. It infected ~3K people outside of China, most whom were in east Asia. The case counts outside east Asia were in descending order: - Canada: 250 - US: 27 - Germany: 9 Areas affected by SARS instituted targeted quarantines after detection and were able to contain the virus. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002%E2%80%932004_SARS_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002%E2%80%932004_SARS_outbrea... H1N1 was much less deadly than Covid-19 and spread less quickly. There were only ~18K confirmed deaths worldwide. (The estimated number of deaths was much higher at 150-600K. Basically, we confirmed it was less deadly than the seasonal flu so we didn't test everyone for it.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic People are freaking out about Covid-19 because it spreads faster and is already stressing hospitals. Deaths and cases double every 2-3 days absent control measures. It can take 2 weeks to cause symptoms, so even if everything gets shut down now, we could have 25x as many hospitalizations/deaths than today. If smaller control measures aren't as effective, it'd take time to confirm and the peak would be multiples higher. H1N1 spread much slower so we could have responded much more leisurely if things started to go out of control. https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest
- enumjorge 7y ago
  So do we treat anyone outside the group of 20-50 year old with no preexisting conditions as acceptable collateral damage to keeping the economy afloat?
  - Klinky 7y ago
    It's almost as if some people think human's purpose is to sustain an economy, rather than the other way around. Economies and markets are a tool used by human's to achieve goals(ideally better quality of life), they are not the goal itself.
    - jjeaff 7y ago
      It seems like you are making their point for them. If an economy's purpose is to sustain humans, then letting it crash and burn puts those humans at risk. It's a balancing act. We just can't forget that too much economic destruction will cost lives as well.
      - Klinky 7y ago
        It is a balancing act, but we need to watch out that we're not letting the economy run the show based on things like overinflated valuations and speculation, which at the first sign of trouble, implode on themselves at almost a 50% loss. How much actual value(quality of life) is really being generated here? How much of it is hype, bandwagons, and charades? How sustainable is it and what safety nets are available when the bottom falls out? During this time you also think about how many people are telecommuting effectively right now, and how much downtown economies and real estate relies on everyone getting in their car, or on a bus/train going downtown each morning, and then the knock on effects this has on the environment. A lot of people don't want to hear pessimism or realism, they want to see growth, growth and growth. Growth at all other costs can still result in the side effect of quality of life improvements, but unlimited economic growth has not been sustainable, and we've had quite a few boom and bust cycles the last 2 decades now. If you're designing the economy to continually boom & bust, it's hard not to expect eventual economic destruction. It's not a matter of "not letting it happen", it's a matter of that's how it's been designed. It's what it does.
- wbronitsky 7y ago
  The alternative is a wildly increased death rate, which you cannot reverse. There are so many ways to fix economies, only a few ways to address a pandemic. If you do not have another solution that keeps people alive, kindly be quiet; you have nothing important to say.
  - chrisco255 7y ago
    There's only so many trillions of dollars the Fed can print before the whole structure of the economy buckles. And when economies buckle, death and despair ensue. The economy is about more than just making money. The Great Depression caused a lot of secondary effects including World War II. We definitely want to avoid situations like that. EDIT: All complex decisions involve trade-offs. Right now, there's at least a few dozen more likely ways that people will die other than COVID-19. Heart disease, cancer, car accidents, even seasonal flu currently has a higher death count. You cannot lock down the economy for months on end, ratchet up unemployment to 30%+, and continue to feed people and keep their housing and shelter paid for. People's lives and livelihoods depend on the economy staying functional and healthy. It's not trivial. You have to find some way of moving forward without locking down all 320 million people. Maybe you look at areas of outbreak and you quarantine those areas on a piecewise basis. You ramp up testing, you use masks in public, you do something pro-active to keep the economy going. You provide assistance to those that are at high risk, but you let low risk individuals get back to work and keep the economy moving. The food you eat. The healthcare services you depend on. The military. The semi-truck drivers delivering products and services. The aircraft to transport products and people. All of that depends on the economy working. Kindly keep the nasty comments about trying to dissuade me from discussing these important topics to yourself.
    - wbronitsky 7y ago
      This argument is not worth responding to. You are arguing that our economy should be protected before people are protected. It is disgusting, and I'm tired of rehashing the same disgusting crap over and over. If you really think that the economic effects outweigh the loss of life this virus can and will cause, all I can do is be glad that all you have is your ability to express your opinion, not the ability to do anything about it. Thank god for that. Finally, and yes I'm quoting myself here "If you do not have another solution that keeps people alive, kindly be quiet; you have nothing important to say." > Kindly keep the nasty comments about trying to dissuade me from discussing these important topics to yourself. This is absurd; you're responding to me. And this isn't a discussion, these are opinions, with no facts to back them up. I simply find these opinions disgusting, as they do not prioritize keeping people healthy and alive.
- hbharadwaj 7y ago
  Forgetting the overload of medical infrastructure for a bit, here are some of the myriad of issues that this leads to: 1. There are 20-50 year olds with pre-existing conditions such as asthma who are at higher risk. For example, a colleague on my team has asthma. Another colleague on my team has a husband who has asthma. As a Manager, I can't ask either of them to come into work. 2. What about 20-50 year olds who come in contact with 50+ year old or live together with them? They may be at low risk, but they will definitely spread the virus around more It becomes quite complicated dealing with these things on a case by case basis.
- oarabbus_ 7y ago
  At low risk of dying. Not low risk of getting hospitalized and having permanent or long-lasting lung damaged. Do you want compromised breathing for the next 5 years?
- misun78 7y ago
  No idea why you're getting downvoted, this comment is spot on.
slg 7y ago
> we needed to shut down the city, and everyone else arguing it would destroy small businesses The problem is that they are right with this. Shutting down the city will probably destroy small businesses. Those same people also can't do much to help small businesses. It is understandable that they don't want to sentence these businesses to death when they are powerless to save them. This is why the relative inaction by the federal government is such a problem here. They are the only entity that has the power to stop the wide spread of the virus and absorb the economic repercussions of the shutdown.
- davidw 7y ago
  What happened in Italy is that they delayed... and then ended up shutting down everything anyway - just with a lot more infected people and deaths, and the exact same economic hardships.
  - birdyrooster 7y ago
    Probably worse economic hardship with the added strain on the labor force.
- yiyus 7y ago
  Staying open is not a panacea for small businesses. Nobody is travelling, nobody is spending. My parents have a small shop (in Spain) and they had to close before the lockdown started because they were not selling anything. And, by that time, things were much better that they are now around here.
  - slg 7y ago
    You are certainly right, but it is a question of blame. If the government shuts down your business and it never recovers you will likely blame the government. If the government lets you stay open and your business still fails you will likely blame the virus. EDIT: This is being downvoted, so let me make a clarification that I am explaining the government's potential reasoning but I am not excusing or agreeing with it.
eternalban 7y ago
You are making assumptions here. I'm working on a joke and only have the punchline: "Western Democracy with Chinese Communist Party Characteristics".
xwdv 7y ago
What if what we learned is simply that there’s nothing we can do? You can lock down, you can isolate... destiny still arrives.
- spuz 7y ago
  Then fine, we just keep moving on and accept deaths from the virus in the same way as we do for deaths from the flu or road traffic accidents. However that is absolutely NOT the situation we are in. If we do nothing, significant numbers of people will die from the virus. If we completely shutdown the economy, significant numbers of people will die from lack of access to essential services. What we decide to do matters a great deal. There is no reason to be fatalistic.
- fatjokes 7y ago
  Avoiding infection was never the goal. "Flattening the curve" so as to not overwhelm the fragile health infra is, and it's already been shown to be working.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

glofish 7y ago

yeah, he was not ready even after telling us about how we are not ready

melling 7y ago
The warning was for us...5 years ago.
- 3fe9a03ccd14ca5 7y ago
  Warnings are cheap and easy. Lots of people warning about all kinds of things all of the time. Where is the technology? Where is the solution? Where is the execution on the warning?
dangus 7y ago
We should be expecting our governments to be ready, not a billionaire with a charitable foundation. I wish my government was as effective and functional as Taiwan or South Korea.
- tathougies 7y ago
  We should follow Taiwan's lead and withdraw from WHO, who lied to the entire world while Taiwan was preparing.
merpnderp 7y ago
The warning was for governments. If the US had spare ICU capacity, and a national reserve of PPE and critical care supplies like we had before 2009, we'd be miles better off. Experts knew it was "all but airborne if not airborne" and that masks were the best way to stop it from day one, but discouraged Americans from buying them as the hospitals would desperately need them far more. So many more people will be infected and die because they didn't have a $.50 mask. And this is all because we didn't spend a tiny pittance getting ready.

tbergeron 7y ago

Seems he was ready after all. Look up Event201 and ID2020.

melling 7y ago
I found this: http://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/ http://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/
- cbhl 7y ago
  It appears they updated that page to explicitly state that the tabletop exercise was not meant to be a prediction, but simply to highlight challenges in responding in a pandemic.
  - jjoonathan 7y ago
    Well, yes, but the general prediction is trivial. There's going to be another bad virus after this one, too!
  - melling 7y ago
    Here’s an exercise: There’s an epidemic in the China with a population of 1.3 billion, the second largest economy. They lock down Wuhan on Jan 23rd to try and contain it from spreading to the rest of China. On Jan 30th with 7818 infected, the WHO declares Global Health Emergency. It’s a now threat beyond China. What do you do? Things to consider: - There are 100,000 global flights a day. - China is rushing to build 2 hospitals in 10 days - It appears to be highly contagious
    - user_50123890 7y ago
      USA banned flights from/to China. Italy banned flights from/to China. (both decisions caused an outcry about "racism" at the time, btw) Other countries kept the flights going. USA and Italy are now the countries hit hardest despite these restrictions, because the economy is global. Either all countries must react properly, or a single country's actions won't do anything. Good luck with that.

DanSmooth 7y ago

Perhaps also of interest, his recent AMA on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fksnbf/im_bill_gates_cochair_of_the_bill_melinda_gates/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fksnbf/im_bill...

jimbob45 7y ago

Would things have been different if it had started in a country other than China? Politics aside, starting in the most populous and most trafficked country on Earth seems like the worst-case scenario.

beager 7y ago
Population density is a factor to be sure, but the government response was a bigger factor in failing to contain it in my opinion. The CCP’s culture of fear and retribution pushed municipal officials to suppress reports of a novel outbreak, and pushed authorities to retaliate against medical professionals sounding the alarm. A culture of transparency and non-retribution may have enabled China to contain this, and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened.
- KaoruAoiShiho 7y ago
  I guess some people actually believe this. The new orientalism?
  - 49531 7y ago
    Yea, unfortunately that seems to be the case. While local level officials in Wuhan punished some early whistleblowers for posting publicly about the virus the Chinese Supreme Peoples Court said they should not have been punished. I think China has shown a lot of transparency and has put a ton of resources towards containment.
- iforgotpassword 7y ago
  I agree with your initial reasoning, although given the long incubation period that was initially unknown I still see a high chance this would have spread either way. But > and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened. Not in a thousand years. The west was sitting on their hands for almost two months, busy armchair-commenting on the CCP's failings, preparing half-heartedly at best, taking no proactive measures whatsoever. I'm utterly disappointed with my government and don't see how this would have turned out any different for us had we had twice as much time to prepare, or had this originated in a western country.

DarkCoder 7y ago

i highly doubt that. its all about microchip implemenation

0xff00ffee 7y ago

This feels like a giant game of "I can't wait to say 'I told you so!'" by many different factions. The HeadInTheSand GOP, the Apocalyptic Left, the panicked middle (/r/coronavirus). Everyone except health professionals. Competitive Schadenfreude.

skrebbel 7y ago
Loving the term "the Apocalyptic Left"
starik36 7y ago
> the panicked middle (/r/coronavirus) The Panicked Middle leans heavily towards the Apocalyptic Left.
- TLightful 7y ago
  That's why there are right wing governments in the US, the UK and many other countries. Stay off the political drugs. They're not good for you.
emilsedgh 7y ago
While we are in the middle of an apocalypse, you're name calling the people who predicted it. I sincerely hope that one of the side effects of this crisis would be more acceptance towards science.
- 0xff00ffee 7y ago
  I name-called the "health professionals"? Help me out: what do they like to be called?
SuperFerret 7y ago
Enlightened centrist
SuperFerret 7y ago
Health professionals are generally lefties. Same with scientists.

dustingetz 7y ago

"Sufficiently Powerful Optimization Of Any Known Target Destroys All Value" From the Moral Mazes blog series featured on HN a couple months ago https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/31/does-big-business-hate-your-family/ https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/31/does-big-business-ha... ; the first segment is https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/28/moloch-hasnt-won/ https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2019/12/28/moloch-hasnt-won/

zaptheimpaler 7y ago

The asian countries by and large did better because they don't view every decision through a narrow economic lens. They simply understand that the health of their population is the ground upon which everything else is built. US/West has been taken over by paperclip maximizers, thats all. The landlords want to maximize paperclips, so no rent relief for small businesses. The politicians see this and decide shutting down would be catastrophic, instead of questioning the premise. Like it is literally inconceivable to me how retarded modern capitalism is. You need a 5-6 week shutdown on businesses, so force rent to be waived for that period. Thats most of the fixed cost, and the employees being on leavetakes care of the variable cost. The businesses don't go bankrupt, everyone just takes a 6 week vacation and comes back like nothing happened. You need ICUs/equipment - take over hotels and make it happen. Instead, they are worried about getting congress approval to pass a bill to pay the hotel owners leasing costs during a global emergency. In the face of a million deaths, the paperclip maximizers can only see all the lost paperclips.

ryndbfsrw 7y ago

I try to imagine the counter-scenario where leaders had done the correct thing but because they did the right thing and a spread never occurred we collectively boot them out of office because nothing bad happened and criticize them for 'overreacting' when that is exactly what is needed for a pandemic. I am sympathetic to why nothing changed and no one listened. good risk management shows up as nothing bad happening. Heroes who avert disaster don’t get statues.

nocorpwelfare 7y ago
Look, the US and everywhere is more interested in financializing everything, leveraging and doing all kinds of other stupid shit in order to make money without actually producing anything. So this is what you get. Want strong civil defense? Look at Switzerland.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
mistermann 7y ago
Very good point. Most people do not include counter-factuals in their thought process. I would go further and propose that not only do most people not even know what counter-factuals are, but many of them would be extremely psychologically resistant to the very idea. A similar example of this is: go into a forum, find someone who is predicting the future, point out to them that they are predicting the future, and observe the result. Now do this 100 or 1000 times and keep track of your results. "But this is just people being stupid!" I disagree. Yes, it is indeed people being stupid....but is it "just" that?
tome 7y ago
That scenario would only come true if every leader did the correct thing. In the more likely scenario where some did and some didn't, the ones who did would say "It might seem at first sight that we overreacted, but look at country X. They didn't act and all their citizens are dying and the economy crumbling."
siwatanejo 7y ago
This is why good security professionals are never promoted: if they do their job well, nobody notices.

jliptzin 7y ago

It’s because we have really been in the midst of a stupidity epidemic for at least the last 5 years and our debt has finally come due.

Enginerrrd 7y ago
For only the last 5 years?! We started approaching our current level of polarization and infighting over wedge issues during the 90's, and have steadily gotten worse. Both sides are hopelessly deadlocked and so convinced they're right as to completely disparage and dehumanize half of the population. They're more interested in fighting the other side than they are moving forward in any way if it involves giving the other side a victory, no matter how small. If that's not the stupidity that got us into this mess, I don't know what is.
- throwaway894345 7y ago
  By my estimation, most elite media, academia, and other epistemological institutions retained a strong sense of professional integrity prior to ~2012. They certainly had their biases, but they took some care to veil them. This change felt pretty distinct and abrupt to me; before the sort of overt partisanship was widespread among the general population, but these elite institutions were generally seen as above the fray. Afterward, we saw a steep trend toward tabloidism that climaxed early last year with the Covington Catholic affair (for the unfamiliar, the media doctored a video of some students to make them appear to be frothing racists to the effect that they were mobbed online and received threats of death and violence even from celebrities) but which has remained in a lesser but still heightened state ever since.
chapium 7y ago
Much longer than that.
mcrad 7y ago
This is exactly right. The evidence is not an any academic journal but in the way power and money led to the demise of major political parties and other institutions. The trend led to a shoddy papering over of the last financial crisis, which led to even more "creative" ways to blow bubbles, and further deteriorating checks and balances in both public and private sectors. Does the scientific community know about this? More importantly do they care? Granted, the virus is a serious matter. However the response is basically a different problem. Those in power know the financial system is strained beyond repair, and have a very strong incentive to use HC Healthcare Crisis to avert the blame and prepare new world order. Something like that.

tehjoker 7y ago

Bill Gates, the giving pledge guy, is somehow richer than before he took the pledge. His organization is also mysteriously involved in encouraging the women of developing nations to get IUDs under a Malthusian theory that mysteriously benefits the people of rich nations over poor nations. This guy may be talking to health experts, but he's not someone we should be taking advice from. He represents the right wing of international development aid. https://www.dailywire.com/news/whos-racists-bill-gates-spending-18-million-paul-bois https://www.dailywire.com/news/whos-racists-bill-gates-spend...

pinkfoot 7y ago
> get IUDs under a Malthusian theory 3 new people per second. Out of curiosity, which developing nation problems get easier with more people? Mankind's time of easy answers is behind us.

RyanShook 7y ago

Really thankful that Bill Gates is focusing his attention on coronavirus at this time. I think he will likely be called one of the many heroes in this epidemic.

throwaway894345 7y ago

I really hope we (the US) conducts a thorough and credible investigation as to who is responsible for this failure to prepare for this crisis. I have minimal faith in government or regulatory agencies, but I thought the CDC was one of the few government agencies that had its shit together. Apparently they couldn't even be bothered to keep a reasonably stocked reserve of masks and ventilators--things that we knew we would need in the event of a respiratory disease outbreak which we were looking pretty probable following SARS and MURS. Never mind planning to secure and ramp up critical supply chains. I'm sure there's lots of blame to be laid at the feet of congress and various administrations, but these things seem to be squarely in the purview of the CDC and certainly aren't line items on the congressional appropriations bill. I want criminal charges pressed against bureaucrats and politicians tarred and feathered not so much because I'm pissed that their negligence has killed / will kill thousands but so that future politicians and agency heads will take this shit seriously in the future. If there aren't sufficient legal avenues for holding politicians and bureaucrats accountable, then we need to create some.

dfxm12 7y ago
There's plenty of blame to go around, not the least of which falls on the president [0]. His party mates in congress have shown to be unwilling to hold him accountable. You have some power to hold them accountable come November. 0 - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/24/trump-cuts-undermine-coronavirus-containment-cdc-watchdog-report https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/24/trump-cuts-u...
chapium 7y ago
Trump is already blaming china for not containing this, even though the us has equal responsibility to contain the virus within our own borders. Not to mention the measures taken by china to flatten the curve were extraordinary.
kiba 7y ago
I really hope we (the US) conducts a thorough and credible investigation as to who is responsible for this failure to prepare for this crisis. I don't see how blaming x and y will fix anything but boot out the current bureaucrats. The next time a pandemic happens, the guys who remembered anything in living memory are already dead or retired. Worse, punishing people when they don't understand or making honest mistakes are going to lead to hiding of their mistakes or incentive not to understand anything. but I thought the CDC was one of the few government agencies that had its shit together. Apparently they couldn't even be bothered to keep a reasonably stocked reserve of masks and ventilators It's hard to keep a reserve of masks and ventilators when the higher ups don't think your mission is particularly important and you don't have a budget. Ventilators and masks costs money to store, maintain, and test. The better solution is to prioritize pandemic preparation and war game pandemic scenario, and conduct an honest investigation to prepare for the future, rather than punish people.

dang 7y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22575745 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22575745

melling 7y ago
It’s 10 days old and has far fewer comments By marking it as a duplicate, you just killed this new thread.
- dang 7y ago
  The criterion we use is: did the previous post get significant attention? 87 points and 36 comments is way over that threshold. When a discussion is particularly good, we sometimes override that. This one seems pretty generic to me, though, especially in light of how many coronavirus threads HN has been seeing. I'm not sure there's even a single comment below that is reacting to more than what's in the title: "outbreak", "not ready", and "Bill Gates".
  - nouveaux 7y ago
    I'd argue that this post is more relevant than 10 days ago and should receive an exemption. 10 days ago, the number of cases were small and there was no lock down. Many people did not consider Corvid-19's real impact. Now that most of the country is taking it seriously, it is more top of mind. 10 days ago, Corvid-19 posts were barely considered here on HN. Now many are generating serious discussions. Please reconsider marking this as a dupe.
    - dang 7y ago
      We've also had 10 days worth of massive coronavirus discussion. The issue is the quality (and specificity) of this thread relative to the others.