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There's also the goal of slowing down and stalling in hopes of getting a vaccine, better treatments, production to catch up with supply shortages for healthcare

There's also the goal of slowing down and stalling in hopes of getting a vaccine, better treatments, production to catch up with supply shortages for healthcare facilities, and allowing healthcare facilities to increase capacity, etc.

elliekelly 7y ago
Has there been any research on survival rates over time? If given the choice of getting COVID-19 today or two months from now I would much prefer the later infection because that’s two more months of doctors learning how best to treat the disease. Even delaying infection by a week seems like it would offer a better fighting chance. The medical community is learning as much as they can as quickly as they can and that benefits everyone who will eventually get sick.
- rtkwe 7y ago
  It’s complicated a bit because of limited hospital capacity and related treatment supplies. If where ever you are is still below saturation later is better than now probably but once your local system is in the band where they’re running out of supplies things can get pretty dire.
treis 7y ago
Barring a miracle, mass production of a vaccine is at least 9 months away. Likely more like a year+ There's no better treatments coming. We've been fighting viral pneumonia since the dawn of medicine and the tool kit is pretty sparse. Finding anything nearing a cure or even a 20% improvement is wishful thinking. Our health care capacity is adequate. NYC got to ~30% infected and while I'm sure none of the medical workers want to repeat the experience the level of care remained good. Any capacity increase is going to come with only marginally improved outcomes. There's no purpose in extending the lockdown. Either we can get back to something resembling normal life and control the spread or we can't and everyone gets infected. Extending the lockdown is just delaying that day of reckoning.
- lazyasciiart 7y ago
  We can't control the spread until we can test people for the disease. As multiple leaders have stated, the lockdowns need to continue until we build up testing capabilities. For instance in WA, the governor said they are waiting for "widely-available testing, quick isolation for those who may have the virus, identifying people who came into contact with a positive case and getting them into quarantine."
  - makomk 7y ago
    The only country where this seems to have even vaguely worked is South Korea, and the US is already testing much more people for coronavirus than South Korea even in per-capita terms. Has been for a while. Now, the New York Times editorial board has been pushing the idea that you're behind South Korea because more of your tests are coming back positive - but the way they dropped that number is by using stricter social distancing measures to drop transmission rates, not increasing the number of tests. That doesn't seem to be happening in the US even with a full lockdown, and we don't really know why. Basically, all of the US media reporting around testing has been terrible, misleading, partisan nonsense designed to create an imaginary testing gap that can be blamed on the current president to try and kick him out of office in November. Publications like the Times are quite open about why they're doing it. The UK isn't much better though.
    - lazyasciiart 7y ago
      I don't care what the comparison to South Korea is, and I don't expect other countries to have already achieved this. I care whether testing is widely available enough that a person who finds out that they had dinner with someone last night who has coronavirus can go and get tested immediately, not wait until they are short of breath and feverish. Perhaps you would like to read Dr Fauci talking about why we need more testing capacity before relaxing lockdown rules? https://time.com/5826161/anthony-fauci-covid-19-testing-capabilities/ https://time.com/5826161/anthony-fauci-covid-19-testing-capa... Or Gottlieb, Trump's appointee for the FDA? https://www.vox.com/2020/4/14/21219021/scott-gottlieb-coronavirus-covid-19-social-distancing-economy-recession https://www.vox.com/2020/4/14/21219021/scott-gottlieb-corona... If you are dismissing "all of the US media reporting around testing" as terrible, misleading, partisan nonsense, then you are either looking for a particular opinion to be represented that isn't, or, more likely, you aren't reading all of it.

elliekelly 7y ago

Has there been any research on survival rates over time? If given the choice of getting COVID-19 today or two months from now I would much prefer the later infection because that’s two more months of doctors learning how best to treat the disease. Even delaying infection by a week seems like it would offer a better fighting chance. The medical community is learning as much as they can as quickly as they can and that benefits everyone who will eventually get sick.

rtkwe 7y ago
It’s complicated a bit because of limited hospital capacity and related treatment supplies. If where ever you are is still below saturation later is better than now probably but once your local system is in the band where they’re running out of supplies things can get pretty dire.

treis 7y ago

Barring a miracle, mass production of a vaccine is at least 9 months away. Likely more like a year+ There's no better treatments coming. We've been fighting viral pneumonia since the dawn of medicine and the tool kit is pretty sparse. Finding anything nearing a cure or even a 20% improvement is wishful thinking. Our health care capacity is adequate. NYC got to ~30% infected and while I'm sure none of the medical workers want to repeat the experience the level of care remained good. Any capacity increase is going to come with only marginally improved outcomes. There's no purpose in extending the lockdown. Either we can get back to something resembling normal life and control the spread or we can't and everyone gets infected. Extending the lockdown is just delaying that day of reckoning.

lazyasciiart 7y ago
We can't control the spread until we can test people for the disease. As multiple leaders have stated, the lockdowns need to continue until we build up testing capabilities. For instance in WA, the governor said they are waiting for "widely-available testing, quick isolation for those who may have the virus, identifying people who came into contact with a positive case and getting them into quarantine."
- makomk 7y ago
  The only country where this seems to have even vaguely worked is South Korea, and the US is already testing much more people for coronavirus than South Korea even in per-capita terms. Has been for a while. Now, the New York Times editorial board has been pushing the idea that you're behind South Korea because more of your tests are coming back positive - but the way they dropped that number is by using stricter social distancing measures to drop transmission rates, not increasing the number of tests. That doesn't seem to be happening in the US even with a full lockdown, and we don't really know why. Basically, all of the US media reporting around testing has been terrible, misleading, partisan nonsense designed to create an imaginary testing gap that can be blamed on the current president to try and kick him out of office in November. Publications like the Times are quite open about why they're doing it. The UK isn't much better though.
  - lazyasciiart 7y ago
    I don't care what the comparison to South Korea is, and I don't expect other countries to have already achieved this. I care whether testing is widely available enough that a person who finds out that they had dinner with someone last night who has coronavirus can go and get tested immediately, not wait until they are short of breath and feverish. Perhaps you would like to read Dr Fauci talking about why we need more testing capacity before relaxing lockdown rules? https://time.com/5826161/anthony-fauci-covid-19-testing-capabilities/ https://time.com/5826161/anthony-fauci-covid-19-testing-capa... Or Gottlieb, Trump's appointee for the FDA? https://www.vox.com/2020/4/14/21219021/scott-gottlieb-coronavirus-covid-19-social-distancing-economy-recession https://www.vox.com/2020/4/14/21219021/scott-gottlieb-corona... If you are dismissing "all of the US media reporting around testing" as terrible, misleading, partisan nonsense, then you are either looking for a particular opinion to be represented that isn't, or, more likely, you aren't reading all of it.