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conceptually, flattening the curve is meant to turn an exponential infection curve into something more manageable. We are flattening the curve, yes, initially

conceptually, flattening the curve is meant to turn an exponential infection curve into something more manageable. We are flattening the curve, yes, initially because hospitals don't have capacity, but the root of this issue is the exponential nature of infection transmission. If we have the ability to build hospitals at a rate to match O(2^n) time then we can let everyone out and declare quarantine over! But as you know, an O(2^n) algorithm is extraordinarily hard to keep up with once n approaches any large number. That's the curve we're trying to flatten - by changing the approach, changing the "algorithm" so to speak, by not allowing people to interact so they have less chance of infection. If you are able to build a new hospital in a week, and then continue building a new hospital every day after that and then one every hour after that, and then a new hospital every few seconds after that, then you have a chance to keep up with an exponential curve (well, until the virus runs out of people to infect, so until it reaches 100% of the global population).

misja111 7y ago
I was writing that we should both create hospital capacity and have some moderate flattening of the curve. Of course we shouldn't let the virus run free. But unless you are hoping for a vaccine to be invented soon, which would of course be wonderful, you have to face the other scenario and that is that we have to slowly build up herd immunity. Herd immunity means that people have to get infected and a percentage of that will have to go to the hospital. No matter how you manage it, bigger hospital capacity simply means that you are able to reach herd immunity more quickly.
- DanBC 7y ago
  > Herd immunity What does her immunity actually mean though? What other diseases do we try to tackle using herd immunity? How many deaths would make herd immunity acceptable or not acceptable? There are 350m people in the US. We need to get about 60% of them to have had covid-19. That's 210m people. We don't know how fatal covid-19 is yet, so here are some lower numbers: 0.1% = 210,000 deaths 0.2% = 420,000 deaths 0.5% = 1,050,000 deaths And once we've killed off all these people what have we achieved? Covid-19 would be in the population and will come back every year as a seasonal respiratory illness, killing off more people every year until we get a vaccine.
  - misja111 7y ago
    There are ways to limit the number of deaths and still reach herd immunity. For instance by keeping elderly and sick people isolated but the healthier part not, until herd immunity is reached. This disease has to be handled with intelligence and common sense, not with rethorics and dogma's.
  - lftl 7y ago
    > Covid-19 would be in the population and will come back every year as a seasonal respiratory illness, killing off more people every year until we get a vaccine. Do you have any evidence to support that it would keep coming back? As far as I know there's only very small anecdotal evidence of people getting reinfected and we simply have no way of knowing yet whether the average person's immunity will last weeks, months or years.
  - losvedir 7y ago
    For context, about 3 million people die each year in the US. IF (and that's a big if), the infection fatality rate really were just 0.1% (i.e., regular flu), then yeah I think letting this thing run its course is the reasonable thing to do. In my mind, the reason for the lockdowns is because we don't know the morality rate yet, and so we should be cautious in case it's 1-3% how it was looking at first. I could turn the question around on you, and ask what fatality rate makes the "run its course" strategy reasonable to you? No deaths?

misja111 7y ago

I was writing that we should both create hospital capacity and have some moderate flattening of the curve. Of course we shouldn't let the virus run free. But unless you are hoping for a vaccine to be invented soon, which would of course be wonderful, you have to face the other scenario and that is that we have to slowly build up herd immunity. Herd immunity means that people have to get infected and a percentage of that will have to go to the hospital. No matter how you manage it, bigger hospital capacity simply means that you are able to reach herd immunity more quickly.

DanBC 7y ago
> Herd immunity What does her immunity actually mean though? What other diseases do we try to tackle using herd immunity? How many deaths would make herd immunity acceptable or not acceptable? There are 350m people in the US. We need to get about 60% of them to have had covid-19. That's 210m people. We don't know how fatal covid-19 is yet, so here are some lower numbers: 0.1% = 210,000 deaths 0.2% = 420,000 deaths 0.5% = 1,050,000 deaths And once we've killed off all these people what have we achieved? Covid-19 would be in the population and will come back every year as a seasonal respiratory illness, killing off more people every year until we get a vaccine.
- misja111 7y ago
  There are ways to limit the number of deaths and still reach herd immunity. For instance by keeping elderly and sick people isolated but the healthier part not, until herd immunity is reached. This disease has to be handled with intelligence and common sense, not with rethorics and dogma's.
- lftl 7y ago
  > Covid-19 would be in the population and will come back every year as a seasonal respiratory illness, killing off more people every year until we get a vaccine. Do you have any evidence to support that it would keep coming back? As far as I know there's only very small anecdotal evidence of people getting reinfected and we simply have no way of knowing yet whether the average person's immunity will last weeks, months or years.
- losvedir 7y ago
  For context, about 3 million people die each year in the US. IF (and that's a big if), the infection fatality rate really were just 0.1% (i.e., regular flu), then yeah I think letting this thing run its course is the reasonable thing to do. In my mind, the reason for the lockdowns is because we don't know the morality rate yet, and so we should be cautious in case it's 1-3% how it was looking at first. I could turn the question around on you, and ask what fatality rate makes the "run its course" strategy reasonable to you? No deaths?