4 ms·

As a Canadian I think there's a pretty strong possibility that we get the virus under control while it still rages in the US for quite some time. I'm not really

by drpgq 7y ago

As a Canadian I think there's a pretty strong possibility that we get the virus under control while it still rages in the US for quite some time. I'm not really sure what that will mean.

tenpies 7y ago
I have seen this mentioned, but I'm honestly now sure why Canadians think this. What special measures did Canada take early on? What makes Canada exceptional compared to the US who at least banned some flights? The only difference is that the media doesn't absolutely despise Trudeau, but we're effectively the same. The US is actually surpassing us in testing at this point and some of our most populous provinces have multiple day backlogs in their testing. Our population isn't quite all Florida, but Vancouver very much acted like the Florida of Canada up until just recently. Sure, we can smugly point to our healthcare system, but our healthcare system hasn't scaled to anywhere the capacity the US has in regards to testing. Don't get me wrong, I hope you're right, but I am not sure where the Canadian smug exceptionalism comes from in this case. From a policy perspective we're basically the same as the US. I'm actually kind of worried we'll get it worst here because in January we were in active denial: "the real pandemic is racism" mode. In February we were shipping PPE from our own reserves to China to help them out. In March, we took the "enhanced" screening measure of giving travellers a pamphlet in the airport. We are so comically behind the curve that our only consolation price is to look at the worst of the US media for consolation that maybe we won't have it so bad. It wasn't until the global markets took a nose dive that Canada really realized this might actually affect them.
- ModernMech 7y ago
  > The US is actually surpassing us in testing at this point and some of our most populous provinces have multiple day backlogs in their testing. The US testing numbers are largely due to NY and WA. Per capita the US is still behind most countries. States like MI that are turning into a hot spot are way behind on testing. Florida, our 3rd most populous state with 21 million residents, has tested only 40k people. https://twitter.com/COVID19Tracking/status/1244016316127662080 https://twitter.com/COVID19Tracking/status/12440163161276620...
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- drstewart 7y ago
  I don't really understand this either. As someone who's in Seattle, it seemed like BC lagged 2-3 days behind every action taken in Washington (e.g. closing schools). I keep seeing Canadians say their response was magnitudes better but I don't see why.
  - drpgq 7y ago
    I don't really see Washington being a problem, it's other US states. Plus I see the provinces as being way easier to isolate than US states.
  - hkmurakami 7y ago
    Even if BC lagged Washington by 2-3 days in Earth Time (so to speak), this likely translates into faster-than-Washington response with respect to where they were at on the virus incident growth curve.
  - 93po 7y ago
    Because orange man bad
- drpgq 7y ago
  I would say Canada has seemed to avoid so far what is a really large outbreak like in NYC, which is starting to look pretty grim. With more outbreaks starting in other areas like say Detroit (and compare that to south Detroit) I think the US could be battling this for some time.
refurb 7y ago
Canada has a massive backlog of testing, similar to the US. The current number of cases doesn't reflect reality.[1] [1]https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/03/27/ontario-has-missed-a-third-or-more-covid-19-cases-as-testing-backlog-has-grown-star-analysis-finds.html https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/03/27/ontario-has-m...

by drpgq 7y ago

As a Canadian I think there's a pretty strong possibility that we get the virus under control while it still rages in the US for quite some time. I'm not really sure what that will mean.

tenpies 7y ago

I have seen this mentioned, but I'm honestly now sure why Canadians think this. What special measures did Canada take early on? What makes Canada exceptional compared to the US who at least banned some flights? The only difference is that the media doesn't absolutely despise Trudeau, but we're effectively the same. The US is actually surpassing us in testing at this point and some of our most populous provinces have multiple day backlogs in their testing. Our population isn't quite all Florida, but Vancouver very much acted like the Florida of Canada up until just recently. Sure, we can smugly point to our healthcare system, but our healthcare system hasn't scaled to anywhere the capacity the US has in regards to testing. Don't get me wrong, I hope you're right, but I am not sure where the Canadian smug exceptionalism comes from in this case. From a policy perspective we're basically the same as the US. I'm actually kind of worried we'll get it worst here because in January we were in active denial: "the real pandemic is racism" mode. In February we were shipping PPE from our own reserves to China to help them out. In March, we took the "enhanced" screening measure of giving travellers a pamphlet in the airport. We are so comically behind the curve that our only consolation price is to look at the worst of the US media for consolation that maybe we won't have it so bad. It wasn't until the global markets took a nose dive that Canada really realized this might actually affect them.

ModernMech 7y ago
> The US is actually surpassing us in testing at this point and some of our most populous provinces have multiple day backlogs in their testing. The US testing numbers are largely due to NY and WA. Per capita the US is still behind most countries. States like MI that are turning into a hot spot are way behind on testing. Florida, our 3rd most populous state with 21 million residents, has tested only 40k people. https://twitter.com/COVID19Tracking/status/1244016316127662080 https://twitter.com/COVID19Tracking/status/12440163161276620...
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
drstewart 7y ago
I don't really understand this either. As someone who's in Seattle, it seemed like BC lagged 2-3 days behind every action taken in Washington (e.g. closing schools). I keep seeing Canadians say their response was magnitudes better but I don't see why.
- drpgq 7y ago
  I don't really see Washington being a problem, it's other US states. Plus I see the provinces as being way easier to isolate than US states.
- hkmurakami 7y ago
  Even if BC lagged Washington by 2-3 days in Earth Time (so to speak), this likely translates into faster-than-Washington response with respect to where they were at on the virus incident growth curve.
- 93po 7y ago
  Because orange man bad
drpgq 7y ago
I would say Canada has seemed to avoid so far what is a really large outbreak like in NYC, which is starting to look pretty grim. With more outbreaks starting in other areas like say Detroit (and compare that to south Detroit) I think the US could be battling this for some time.

refurb 7y ago

Canada has a massive backlog of testing, similar to the US. The current number of cases doesn't reflect reality.[1] [1]https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/03/27/ontario-has-missed-a-third-or-more-covid-19-cases-as-testing-backlog-has-grown-star-analysis-finds.html https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/03/27/ontario-has-m...