5 ms·

> the transmission rate dropped again, to the point where any single case led to less than one more. Once that happens, an epidemic dies. Note that this can ta

by tsbinz 6y ago

> the transmission rate dropped again, to the point where any single case led to less than one more. Once that happens, an epidemic dies. Note that this can take a while. What the article suggests - getting back to the containment phase - is the stated goal of some countries. However, to get there quick you need very drastic measures. With the measures we adopted, it will take a bit of time - I read one estimate that the reproduction number in Switzerland has been around 0.59 since the lockdown was enacted, so you'd expect cases to drop by a factor of this per generation - it still takes weeks/months to go from 1000+ cases to below 100 (where they estimate they have enough resources for contact tracing).

igorkraw 6y ago
Living in Switzerland and having friends in the surrounding countries, it has been kind of amazing to see how well the comparatively soft touch of the Swiss government has worked. We can still go out, hang out in groups <5 etc., but people are simply being reasonable. I keep waiting for the uptick in cases since they announced their plan for reopening though. I'm unconvinced we'll be through it so smoothly.
- jariel 6y ago
  "but people are simply being reasonable." The Swedes have taken this line as well, saying they 'trust' their citizens. I think it's not very rational, and also borderline chauvinist for people to say this. First - what evidence does anyone have that Swiss/Swedes or anyone for that matter are consistently behaving in one way or another that is more 'responsible' or 'sensible' than others? I don't see any evidence. A nationalist self-image of responsibility doesn't count as Science, and neither does a few images of fools on a Florida beach as it's all rather anecdotal. The other issue is that policy is material, not just 'responsibility' - for example - we know from Wuhan that restaurants and other places are a vector for transmission. So it doesn't matter if certain groups are 'behaving responsibly' so much - if they are going to restaurants, hotels, tanning salons etc. - even that otherwise 'responsible behaviour' inside the scope of 'following the rules' that is actually causing transmission. Given all of the variables we have to look at, the last place I think we can infer variation is with regards to who is 'being reasonable' by some arbitrary definition. That said - it would be really good to look at different nations varying policies and see how it works. It could be that <5 people is 'enough' to keep the R1 below 1, though there are obviously other factors. Maybe the Swiss have found the 'sweet spot'? In Canada, the problem was stopped, but there's already a continued second wave in long-term care homes, it's possible those are structured differently in Canada than other countries.
  - tsbinz 6y ago
    Putting Switzerland and Sweden in the same bucket here isn't fair, IMO. In Switzerland, most things were closed down like in our neighbor countries (some things are reopening now, but still very limited). A difference was that while other countries said no groups of >2 people, in Switzerland the rule was no groups of >5 people, so in that sense it was more lax, but it's far more strict than Sweden's policy.
  - VBprogrammer 6y ago
    I'm not sure what people are reacting negatively to in your post but I thought this was a really well stated point: "A nationalist self-image of responsibility doesn't count as Science"
    - arcticbull 6y ago
      What counts as science is results, and Sweden is flattening the curve just as well as the UK and Canada, so the system is working, whatever it is. I mean, take a look: https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Canada&location=Denmark&location=Finland&location=Sweden&location=US&location=United+Kingdom https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Canada&location=De... I'm not sure why people are having such a hard time accepting that what Sweden is doing is in fact working, in the face of a pretty clear graph. Just because it appears counter-intuitive or possibly not in line with their preexisting ideas of what should be done? There's still 5 US states without any form of lockdown (the Dakotas, Nebraska, Iowa and Arkansas), too, so you could say they're "following the Swedish model." Wyoming, Utah and Oklahoma are only under regional partial lockdowns, too. Of course they only account for about 5% of the population but it remains notable.
      - tsbinz 6y ago
        Ok, I took a look and it doesn't look good ... Compare Sweden to the list of its Nordic neighbors: https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Denmark&location=Finland&location=Sweden&location=Norway https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Denmark&location=F... Or, for a more direct comparison: https://i.insider.com/5e9d6a5015ea4b315c0b4d0a?width=1100&format=jpeg&auto=webp https://i.insider.com/5e9d6a5015ea4b315c0b4d0a?width=1100&fo... (from https://www.businessinsider.com/how-sweden-and-norway-handled-coronavirus-differently-2020-4?r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/how-sweden-and-norway-handle...) - Sweden's population is 2x that of Norway so keep that in mind when comparing, but the difference is really apparent.
dwd 6y ago
The Australian approach has been fairly good but this virus is persistent. Once the lockdowns kicked in the doubling rate dropped dramatically and new case numbers went from a peak of around 500 a day to 10-20 day for a population 1/10 the US. From /r/coronavirusdownunder linking the stats with the lock-down measures gives a good idea of the timeframe involved. date cases growth doubling 2020-03-21 1071 1.22 3.1 2020-03-22 1352 1.26 3.3 <== 10 days ago, Tom Hanks 2020-03-23 1716 1.27 3.5 2020-03-24 2146 1.25 3.8 2020-03-25 2431 1.13 4.0 <== 10 days ago, overseas self-isolate 14 days 2020-03-26 2805 1.15 4.5 <== 10 days ago, Vic declare State of Emergency 2020-03-27 3179 1.13 5.3 2020-03-28 3639 1.14 6.4 2020-03-29 3985 1.1 7.0 <== 10 days ago, TAS self-isolation 14 days 2020-03-30 4250 1.07 8.0 <== 10 days ago, closing borders to all 2020-03-31 4560 1.07 9.3 <== 10 days ago, rule of 4 square metres 2020-04-01 4864 1.07 11.5 2020-04-02 5136 1.06 13.6 <== 10 days ago, no social gathering 2020-04-03 5358 1.04 15.6 <== 10 days ago, WA,SA closing border 2020-04-04 5552 1.04 18.7 2020-04-05 5687 1.02 22.9 2020-04-06 5795 1.02 28.1 2020-04-07 5908 1.02 33.1 2020-04-08 6013 1.02 38.8 <== 10 days ago, mandatory hotel quarantine 2020-04-09 6103 1.01 46.5 2020-04-10 6203 1.02 52.2 2020-04-11 6292 1.01 60.7 2020-04-12 6313 1.003 69.6 2020-04-13 6359 1.007 83.5 <== 10 days ago, QLD closing border 2020-04-14 6400 1.006 96.5 2020-04-15 6447 1.007 114.2 2020-04-16 6468 1.003 106.9 2020-04-17 6523 1.009 121.1 2020-04-18 6565 1.006 129.2 2020-04-19 6606 1.006 157.3 2020-04-20 6619 1.002 165.0 <== 10 days ago, Good Friday 2020-04-21 6645 1.004 210.6 2020-04-22 6649 1.001 247.4 2020-04-23 6661 1.002 307.7 2020-04-24 6675 1.002 301.3 2020-04-25 6695 1.003 350.7 2020-04-26 6711 1.002 298.7
- donavanm 6y ago
  You should look at the breakdown of cases. I was very worried for Sydney in early to mid march. What I didnt see until later was the infection acquisition data. The majority of those march cases appeared to be infected citizens returning from overseas. Locally acquired infections were only 25% of cases at the peak. The local infection rate never really hit the scary 3 day numbers.
  - gonzo41 6y ago
    Most of the issues in north west Tassie are related to the Ruby Princess, which is just a massive scandal that hopefully we'll learn from in the future.

by tsbinz 6y ago

igorkraw 6y ago

Living in Switzerland and having friends in the surrounding countries, it has been kind of amazing to see how well the comparatively soft touch of the Swiss government has worked. We can still go out, hang out in groups <5 etc., but people are simply being reasonable. I keep waiting for the uptick in cases since they announced their plan for reopening though. I'm unconvinced we'll be through it so smoothly.

jariel 6y ago
"but people are simply being reasonable." The Swedes have taken this line as well, saying they 'trust' their citizens. I think it's not very rational, and also borderline chauvinist for people to say this. First - what evidence does anyone have that Swiss/Swedes or anyone for that matter are consistently behaving in one way or another that is more 'responsible' or 'sensible' than others? I don't see any evidence. A nationalist self-image of responsibility doesn't count as Science, and neither does a few images of fools on a Florida beach as it's all rather anecdotal. The other issue is that policy is material, not just 'responsibility' - for example - we know from Wuhan that restaurants and other places are a vector for transmission. So it doesn't matter if certain groups are 'behaving responsibly' so much - if they are going to restaurants, hotels, tanning salons etc. - even that otherwise 'responsible behaviour' inside the scope of 'following the rules' that is actually causing transmission. Given all of the variables we have to look at, the last place I think we can infer variation is with regards to who is 'being reasonable' by some arbitrary definition. That said - it would be really good to look at different nations varying policies and see how it works. It could be that <5 people is 'enough' to keep the R1 below 1, though there are obviously other factors. Maybe the Swiss have found the 'sweet spot'? In Canada, the problem was stopped, but there's already a continued second wave in long-term care homes, it's possible those are structured differently in Canada than other countries.
- tsbinz 6y ago
  Putting Switzerland and Sweden in the same bucket here isn't fair, IMO. In Switzerland, most things were closed down like in our neighbor countries (some things are reopening now, but still very limited). A difference was that while other countries said no groups of >2 people, in Switzerland the rule was no groups of >5 people, so in that sense it was more lax, but it's far more strict than Sweden's policy.
- VBprogrammer 6y ago
  I'm not sure what people are reacting negatively to in your post but I thought this was a really well stated point: "A nationalist self-image of responsibility doesn't count as Science"
  - arcticbull 6y ago
    What counts as science is results, and Sweden is flattening the curve just as well as the UK and Canada, so the system is working, whatever it is. I mean, take a look: https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Canada&location=Denmark&location=Finland&location=Sweden&location=US&location=United+Kingdom https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Canada&location=De... I'm not sure why people are having such a hard time accepting that what Sweden is doing is in fact working, in the face of a pretty clear graph. Just because it appears counter-intuitive or possibly not in line with their preexisting ideas of what should be done? There's still 5 US states without any form of lockdown (the Dakotas, Nebraska, Iowa and Arkansas), too, so you could say they're "following the Swedish model." Wyoming, Utah and Oklahoma are only under regional partial lockdowns, too. Of course they only account for about 5% of the population but it remains notable.
    - tsbinz 6y ago
      Ok, I took a look and it doesn't look good ... Compare Sweden to the list of its Nordic neighbors: https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Denmark&location=Finland&location=Sweden&location=Norway https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=Denmark&location=F... Or, for a more direct comparison: https://i.insider.com/5e9d6a5015ea4b315c0b4d0a?width=1100&format=jpeg&auto=webp https://i.insider.com/5e9d6a5015ea4b315c0b4d0a?width=1100&fo... (from https://www.businessinsider.com/how-sweden-and-norway-handled-coronavirus-differently-2020-4?r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/how-sweden-and-norway-handle...) - Sweden's population is 2x that of Norway so keep that in mind when comparing, but the difference is really apparent.

dwd 6y ago

The Australian approach has been fairly good but this virus is persistent. Once the lockdowns kicked in the doubling rate dropped dramatically and new case numbers went from a peak of around 500 a day to 10-20 day for a population 1/10 the US. From /r/coronavirusdownunder linking the stats with the lock-down measures gives a good idea of the timeframe involved. date cases growth doubling 2020-03-21 1071 1.22 3.1 2020-03-22 1352 1.26 3.3 <== 10 days ago, Tom Hanks 2020-03-23 1716 1.27 3.5 2020-03-24 2146 1.25 3.8 2020-03-25 2431 1.13 4.0 <== 10 days ago, overseas self-isolate 14 days 2020-03-26 2805 1.15 4.5 <== 10 days ago, Vic declare State of Emergency 2020-03-27 3179 1.13 5.3 2020-03-28 3639 1.14 6.4 2020-03-29 3985 1.1 7.0 <== 10 days ago, TAS self-isolation 14 days 2020-03-30 4250 1.07 8.0 <== 10 days ago, closing borders to all 2020-03-31 4560 1.07 9.3 <== 10 days ago, rule of 4 square metres 2020-04-01 4864 1.07 11.5 2020-04-02 5136 1.06 13.6 <== 10 days ago, no social gathering 2020-04-03 5358 1.04 15.6 <== 10 days ago, WA,SA closing border 2020-04-04 5552 1.04 18.7 2020-04-05 5687 1.02 22.9 2020-04-06 5795 1.02 28.1 2020-04-07 5908 1.02 33.1 2020-04-08 6013 1.02 38.8 <== 10 days ago, mandatory hotel quarantine 2020-04-09 6103 1.01 46.5 2020-04-10 6203 1.02 52.2 2020-04-11 6292 1.01 60.7 2020-04-12 6313 1.003 69.6 2020-04-13 6359 1.007 83.5 <== 10 days ago, QLD closing border 2020-04-14 6400 1.006 96.5 2020-04-15 6447 1.007 114.2 2020-04-16 6468 1.003 106.9 2020-04-17 6523 1.009 121.1 2020-04-18 6565 1.006 129.2 2020-04-19 6606 1.006 157.3 2020-04-20 6619 1.002 165.0 <== 10 days ago, Good Friday 2020-04-21 6645 1.004 210.6 2020-04-22 6649 1.001 247.4 2020-04-23 6661 1.002 307.7 2020-04-24 6675 1.002 301.3 2020-04-25 6695 1.003 350.7 2020-04-26 6711 1.002 298.7

donavanm 6y ago
You should look at the breakdown of cases. I was very worried for Sydney in early to mid march. What I didnt see until later was the infection acquisition data. The majority of those march cases appeared to be infected citizens returning from overseas. Locally acquired infections were only 25% of cases at the peak. The local infection rate never really hit the scary 3 day numbers.
- gonzo41 6y ago
  Most of the issues in north west Tassie are related to the Ruby Princess, which is just a massive scandal that hopefully we'll learn from in the future.