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This bull shit of social distancing... what are people thinking that they won’t get the virus by staying away for a while? There are close to 20m newly unemploy

This bull shit of social distancing... what are people thinking that they won’t get the virus by staying away for a while? There are close to 20m newly unemployed people that could give a shit about it. There will be risks of riots soon if this goes on. And in the end we’ll get worst of both ends.

Gollapalli 7y ago
I'm not sure it's fair to say that it's just social distancing, but you're absolutely right that economic effects have a potential to destroy this country. (writing from the US) 52% of people under the age of 45 have been laid off, put on leave, or had hours reduced. Putting the people with young families, or who would have been looking to start families in dire straits is a great recipe for high crime and social unrest.
- peterlk 7y ago
  > 52% of people under the age of 45 have been laid off, put on leave, or had hours reduced Do you have a source for this? I'm not finding it with a quick google search
  - Gollapalli 7y ago
    > In a new report, Data for Progress found that a staggering 52 percent of people under the age of 45 have lost a job, been put on leave, or had their hours reduced due to the pandemic, compared with 26 percent of people over the age of 45. Nearly half said that the cash payments the federal government is sending to lower- and middle-income individuals would cover just a week or two of expenses, compared with a third of older adults. This means skipped meals, scuppered start-ups, and lost homes. From: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/millennials-are-new-lost-generation/609832/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/millennial... Report cited in quote: http://filesforprogress.org/memos/the-staggering-economic-impact-coronavirus.pdf http://filesforprogress.org/memos/the-staggering-economic-im... (I haven't read this.)
- djsumdog 7y ago
  There was already a protest in Columbus, Ohio in the US over the shutdown. You can say it was irresponsible of them to gather and protest, but the fact remains that their concerns are legitimate to them. People do not know what is going to happen, our leaders are not doing anywhere nearly enough to address potential famine and no world leader I have heard to far is even beginning to talk about reconstruction. It's just more endless lockdown without clear metrics for what would even end it. Democratic leaders must use ideas are currency, and right now, they're not offering people any hope at all.
- danaris 7y ago
  Something like this can only "destroy the country" if the government lets it. We have the ability to keep essential workers safe with proper protective gear and guarantee both food and shelter to all for the duration—we just have to decide that we value human life and dignity more than money.
  - sethammons 7y ago
    I don’t think we have demonstrated the ability to provide protective gear nor can we guarantee food and shelter. We couldn’t keep toilet paper on shelves and nobody could get proper masks.
    - danaris 7y ago
      Well, toilet paper is not "essential protective gear." That said, my point is mainly that if the government were responding effectively, we could have had production shifting to ensure proper supplies in January. That could have included toilet paper, too, though I suppose it's possible that even an effective government wouldn't have foreseen that particular oddity of the crisis. As it stands, our government is hamstrung by the fact that its chief executive cares exactly zero for the wellbeing of the country except inasmuch as it makes him feel like he'll have better chances of winning re-election.
      - sethammons 7y ago
        > if the government were responsible effectively I’m not sure I’ve ever seen any part of the government respond effectively to anything, to the point of it being an oxymoron. I also fail to believe that the president has much power over anything related. In a state of emergency, the president can get more powers. I am unaware of any that would help. He can imprison, disable services, turn off the Internet, sanction, all sticks and no carrots. I think our president is an ass, but I think it is silly to think “if but for him, our government wouldn’t be hamstrung.” Edit: clarification on my first post: I was not claiming toilet paper as protective or emergency supplies, but as an example that even trifling things can’t be secured. Let alone things that are actually important such as masks or food.
wcoenen 7y ago
On the other hand, if the virus spreads so fast that we can't keep up with burying the dead, then that might also cause social unrest, to put it mildly. In Ecuador, families have had to keep their dead for over a week while waiting for burial. Some have resorted to dumping them on the street. https://youtu.be/XHsfjnRB-uA https://youtu.be/XHsfjnRB-uA
- sethammons 7y ago
  Monty Python style “bring out your dead” wagons would be easier than restarting the economy.
barkingcat 7y ago
You misunderstand the goal of social distancing. The goal is to have fewer people get sick at a time so the medical system can care for the sick without collapsing. You will get sick. Ultimately, unless there is a vaccine (or herd immunity), you will get sick no matter what. The difference is whether you get sick now, and become a number in the statistics of people who die alone in their house because there was no room in the hospital, or you get sick a few months from now once all the equipment and tools are in place, and there is a good triage system in the medical centers. I think if there's a riot, then the medical system will need to take care of the rioters who end up getting sick all at once (and yes, some of the rioters will die because of lack of care). So go riot, and take the chance that you will die.
- djsumdog 7y ago
  Except what we're learning now, hospitals can be a death sentence. If you've under 40 and need a non invasive ventilator, it's nearly a 50/50 chance you'll survive. If you need intubation, that chance drops rapidly.
  - barkingcat 7y ago
    Yup ! I suggest waiting until there are better treatment options before getting sick!! That's exactly why we're all staying home. Stay home. keep healthy until there is a vaccine or a better standard of care. If you want to riot, wait until there's a better thing than just going on the ventilator at the hospital and dying. Unless you want to martyr in protest which is also a valid way to go.
  - mrunkel 7y ago
    So, if I understand you properly, being sick enough that you need to be in a hospital is bad for your health? And the sicker you are the more likely it is that you won't recover? Are you positing that the same people would have better survival rates at home?
    - barkingcat 7y ago
      There is no cure or treatment for covid-19. The standard of care for home patients are: stay home, self isolate from other members of the household, drink lots of fluids, do-or-don't-take-these-several-kinds-of-otc-meds (conflicting findings about anti-inflammatory drugs), etc. and let your body heal itself, or die. At the hospital, they have additional equipment: the ability to isolate you so you don't infect anyone else, provide oxygen at a higher purity and rate, various drugs and techniques to facilitate your body to heal itself (for ex. medically induced coma), and the ventilator and ecmo's which take over certain body functions so your damaged organs don't have to (ie mechanical lung, mechanical kidney (dialysis), mechanical heart, etc). None of those items are cures. Novel coronavirus means New to human biology - no body, including evolution, has seen this before and no, we don't have a cure. Going to the hospital means there are no other options other than to put you on extraordinary measures - of course it means that you might not recover. Again, there is no cure at the moment, no pill you can take to get better. [edit: the exception is if you get into one of those drug trials at a hospital that is offering experimental treatments - it could be worth it - since you'd be offering your body to science to fight this virus. Pasteur had to infect himself in order to test his vaccines, many of those on experimental trials are just like him - bravely trying things out to see if they work.] Stay at home everyone, so we can properly investigate. In IT outage terms, this is the time when all systems are down, and the incident commander is going "I know that all the database servers are down," "no I don't know why," and "could you please stop issuing extraneous replication requests to the master server?? issuing replication right now is no use because the master server is just not there."

Gollapalli 7y ago

I'm not sure it's fair to say that it's just social distancing, but you're absolutely right that economic effects have a potential to destroy this country. (writing from the US) 52% of people under the age of 45 have been laid off, put on leave, or had hours reduced. Putting the people with young families, or who would have been looking to start families in dire straits is a great recipe for high crime and social unrest.

peterlk 7y ago
> 52% of people under the age of 45 have been laid off, put on leave, or had hours reduced Do you have a source for this? I'm not finding it with a quick google search
- Gollapalli 7y ago
  > In a new report, Data for Progress found that a staggering 52 percent of people under the age of 45 have lost a job, been put on leave, or had their hours reduced due to the pandemic, compared with 26 percent of people over the age of 45. Nearly half said that the cash payments the federal government is sending to lower- and middle-income individuals would cover just a week or two of expenses, compared with a third of older adults. This means skipped meals, scuppered start-ups, and lost homes. From: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/millennials-are-new-lost-generation/609832/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/millennial... Report cited in quote: http://filesforprogress.org/memos/the-staggering-economic-impact-coronavirus.pdf http://filesforprogress.org/memos/the-staggering-economic-im... (I haven't read this.)
djsumdog 7y ago
There was already a protest in Columbus, Ohio in the US over the shutdown. You can say it was irresponsible of them to gather and protest, but the fact remains that their concerns are legitimate to them. People do not know what is going to happen, our leaders are not doing anywhere nearly enough to address potential famine and no world leader I have heard to far is even beginning to talk about reconstruction. It's just more endless lockdown without clear metrics for what would even end it. Democratic leaders must use ideas are currency, and right now, they're not offering people any hope at all.
danaris 7y ago
Something like this can only "destroy the country" if the government lets it. We have the ability to keep essential workers safe with proper protective gear and guarantee both food and shelter to all for the duration—we just have to decide that we value human life and dignity more than money.
- sethammons 7y ago
  I don’t think we have demonstrated the ability to provide protective gear nor can we guarantee food and shelter. We couldn’t keep toilet paper on shelves and nobody could get proper masks.
  - danaris 7y ago
    Well, toilet paper is not "essential protective gear." That said, my point is mainly that if the government were responding effectively, we could have had production shifting to ensure proper supplies in January. That could have included toilet paper, too, though I suppose it's possible that even an effective government wouldn't have foreseen that particular oddity of the crisis. As it stands, our government is hamstrung by the fact that its chief executive cares exactly zero for the wellbeing of the country except inasmuch as it makes him feel like he'll have better chances of winning re-election.
    - sethammons 7y ago
      > if the government were responsible effectively I’m not sure I’ve ever seen any part of the government respond effectively to anything, to the point of it being an oxymoron. I also fail to believe that the president has much power over anything related. In a state of emergency, the president can get more powers. I am unaware of any that would help. He can imprison, disable services, turn off the Internet, sanction, all sticks and no carrots. I think our president is an ass, but I think it is silly to think “if but for him, our government wouldn’t be hamstrung.” Edit: clarification on my first post: I was not claiming toilet paper as protective or emergency supplies, but as an example that even trifling things can’t be secured. Let alone things that are actually important such as masks or food.

wcoenen 7y ago

On the other hand, if the virus spreads so fast that we can't keep up with burying the dead, then that might also cause social unrest, to put it mildly. In Ecuador, families have had to keep their dead for over a week while waiting for burial. Some have resorted to dumping them on the street. https://youtu.be/XHsfjnRB-uA https://youtu.be/XHsfjnRB-uA

sethammons 7y ago
Monty Python style “bring out your dead” wagons would be easier than restarting the economy.

barkingcat 7y ago

You misunderstand the goal of social distancing. The goal is to have fewer people get sick at a time so the medical system can care for the sick without collapsing. You will get sick. Ultimately, unless there is a vaccine (or herd immunity), you will get sick no matter what. The difference is whether you get sick now, and become a number in the statistics of people who die alone in their house because there was no room in the hospital, or you get sick a few months from now once all the equipment and tools are in place, and there is a good triage system in the medical centers. I think if there's a riot, then the medical system will need to take care of the rioters who end up getting sick all at once (and yes, some of the rioters will die because of lack of care). So go riot, and take the chance that you will die.

djsumdog 7y ago
Except what we're learning now, hospitals can be a death sentence. If you've under 40 and need a non invasive ventilator, it's nearly a 50/50 chance you'll survive. If you need intubation, that chance drops rapidly.
- barkingcat 7y ago
  Yup ! I suggest waiting until there are better treatment options before getting sick!! That's exactly why we're all staying home. Stay home. keep healthy until there is a vaccine or a better standard of care. If you want to riot, wait until there's a better thing than just going on the ventilator at the hospital and dying. Unless you want to martyr in protest which is also a valid way to go.
- mrunkel 7y ago
  So, if I understand you properly, being sick enough that you need to be in a hospital is bad for your health? And the sicker you are the more likely it is that you won't recover? Are you positing that the same people would have better survival rates at home?
  - barkingcat 7y ago
    There is no cure or treatment for covid-19. The standard of care for home patients are: stay home, self isolate from other members of the household, drink lots of fluids, do-or-don't-take-these-several-kinds-of-otc-meds (conflicting findings about anti-inflammatory drugs), etc. and let your body heal itself, or die. At the hospital, they have additional equipment: the ability to isolate you so you don't infect anyone else, provide oxygen at a higher purity and rate, various drugs and techniques to facilitate your body to heal itself (for ex. medically induced coma), and the ventilator and ecmo's which take over certain body functions so your damaged organs don't have to (ie mechanical lung, mechanical kidney (dialysis), mechanical heart, etc). None of those items are cures. Novel coronavirus means New to human biology - no body, including evolution, has seen this before and no, we don't have a cure. Going to the hospital means there are no other options other than to put you on extraordinary measures - of course it means that you might not recover. Again, there is no cure at the moment, no pill you can take to get better. [edit: the exception is if you get into one of those drug trials at a hospital that is offering experimental treatments - it could be worth it - since you'd be offering your body to science to fight this virus. Pasteur had to infect himself in order to test his vaccines, many of those on experimental trials are just like him - bravely trying things out to see if they work.] Stay at home everyone, so we can properly investigate. In IT outage terms, this is the time when all systems are down, and the incident commander is going "I know that all the database servers are down," "no I don't know why," and "could you please stop issuing extraneous replication requests to the master server?? issuing replication right now is no use because the master server is just not there."