5 ms·

Its not about me. The benefit comes when the community as a whole does it, there is literally no point to anyone doing it alone, unless they are vulnerable. "

Its not about me. The benefit comes when the community as a whole does it, there is literally no point to anyone doing it alone, unless they are vulnerable. "What do we do next?" Figure out the best way to treat covid, and talk about the best time to end the lockdown. Im in NZ btw, NZ locked down hard and early. Its been six weeks and so far we have 20 deaths from covid. "What next?" is exactly the question, and I dont think anyone knows the best answer yet. We are likely to be mostly ending our lockdown on this wednesday. We are entering "level 2" which I believe is all businesses open and running, just some rules around congregation. I simply do not understand the chorus of calls to end lockdown (or simply never start it) in countries where absolutely nothing is under control. It will cause incredibly loss of life, and people are doing in a rush. Im really struggling, on a personal level, to understand the rush in some countries to sacrifice people and not economies. Surely the economy is there to serve us?

mikem170 6y ago
NZ did a great job of jumping on this early. Last week when I looked they something like 1000-2000 confirmed cases? NZ has been able to effectively eradicate the disease there with their early lockdown. It will be interesting to see how things go there over time (second wave? etc) That is quite a different scenario than in the U.S., where there were hundreds of thousands of infections (millions?), not enough tests to go after eradication at this point, etc. Were you thinking that the U.S. would be able to maintain a lockdown until eradication, perhaps with contact tracing? Is there evidence that such a plan could work? I understand your struggle to see my point of view. Ditto! I read a book that posited that people are born with personality differences, and value some things more than others. For example, I feel very strongly about individualism and anti-authority, while others may be more communitarian and authoritarian. The world ultimately benefits from both. Having said that, I wonder what practical benefits a person who chooses to self-isolate in any of a number of countries where this is endemic gains by forcing other to lockdown against their will when the hospitals are not overflowing. Why should the many young and healthy who face a negligible risk to continue in what is sometimes very difficult circumstances? What is really gained at this point? Anyways, that was all meant to be a peek into my thinking.
- bandushrew 6y ago
  yeah, we got lucky with our leadership and with our island status. ", where there were hundreds of thousands of infections" well, EVENTUALLY, there were hundreds of thousands of infections. at one point there were, famously, 15... "Were you thinking that the U.S. would be able to maintain a lockdown until eradication, perhaps with contact tracing? Is there evidence that such a plan could work?" No, I dont think that would be a long term solution for the US, I dont have any source for my beliefs, but I suspect with the size of the US, the nature of its people and the incredibly porous border it has that a lockdown until eradication would be doomed to failure. " I feel very strongly about individualism and anti-authority, while others may be more communitarian and authoritarian" yess....the world does need both. Im not sure where that comes into the decision to lockdown or not, and for how long. I feel like there needs to be a more sciency approach taken there rather than some vague handwavy stuff about personalities. "Why should the many young and healthy who face a negligible risk to continue in what is sometimes very difficult circumstances?" I dont know. I dont have much use for the word 'should'. I think that two things are true, first the young and healthy are at risk from this disease themselves - the stats prove that, and second its almost certainly true that the young and healthy have loved ones who are young and unhealthy, or old and healthy, or old and unhealthy, and....maybe....the young and healthy dont want to catch covid and then infect the people they love. All I was saying with my comment above, is I dont understand the rush to sacrifice those people who are vulnerable to this disease. Even here in NZ where we have been very lucky so far it is obvious that eventually we will have to reopen the borders and let the rest of the world in, and at that point infections will start again, but by then we have the best possible chance of understanding how to treat the disease most effectively. I dont believe "lockdown for eradication" in the US is a viable choice, but I do think "lockdown to slowdown" is a sensible option for a while yet, to give every one of your citizens the best possible chance of survival. The economy will recover, it always does. It reflects the nature of people, and for that reason is endlessly resilient.
  - mikem170 6y ago
    >well, EVENTUALLY, there were hundreds of thousands of infections. at one point there were, famously, 15... Maybe there were 15 case last October! :-) I'm thinking we could have had thousands of cases in the U.S. before we started testing. But that's water under the bridge at this point. I wasn't arguing that lockdowns were useless, or that they weren't justified a month ago. But given the additional data I wonder about them now. >I think that two things are true, first the young and healthy are at risk from this disease themselves - the stats prove that I end up looking at NYC stats a lot... Last week they were seeing 20-25% of sample population with antibodies. I found found April 14 NYC numbers showing 4.5% of covid deaths there were people under 45, and a bit over 14k deaths in NYC as of yesterday. Extrapolating from these numbers I calculate 2500 people under 45 will die before reaching 80% herd immunity. That's 2500 in a city of 8 million. 2016 numbers showed 4.9 million people under age 45. Which works out to just under 1 in 2000 young people dying. It's interesting for me to think about that number. Is it significant? I looked at some actuarial tables and see that a 45 year old has a 1 in 300 chance of dying in any given year. 1 in 1000 for 20 year old. I'm betting a lot of unemployed young people want to get on with their lives and wouldn't be worries about taking their chance with a 1 in 2000 risk. >and second its almost certainly true that the young and healthy have loved ones who are young and unhealthy, or old and healthy, or old and unhealthy, and....maybe....the young and healthy dont want to catch covid and then infect the people they love. I'm not saying that everyone has to go out and mingle. Everyone is free to self-isolate. I grant that some people could be put in a difficult position, feeling like they have to go to work when they don't want to, living with someone who won't self-isolate, etc. Maybe there's away to ease the lockdown and provide assistance to those left in a bind. These would be good problems to talk about, and will probably come up no matter when we ease the lockdown.

mikem170 6y ago

NZ did a great job of jumping on this early. Last week when I looked they something like 1000-2000 confirmed cases? NZ has been able to effectively eradicate the disease there with their early lockdown. It will be interesting to see how things go there over time (second wave? etc) That is quite a different scenario than in the U.S., where there were hundreds of thousands of infections (millions?), not enough tests to go after eradication at this point, etc. Were you thinking that the U.S. would be able to maintain a lockdown until eradication, perhaps with contact tracing? Is there evidence that such a plan could work? I understand your struggle to see my point of view. Ditto! I read a book that posited that people are born with personality differences, and value some things more than others. For example, I feel very strongly about individualism and anti-authority, while others may be more communitarian and authoritarian. The world ultimately benefits from both. Having said that, I wonder what practical benefits a person who chooses to self-isolate in any of a number of countries where this is endemic gains by forcing other to lockdown against their will when the hospitals are not overflowing. Why should the many young and healthy who face a negligible risk to continue in what is sometimes very difficult circumstances? What is really gained at this point? Anyways, that was all meant to be a peek into my thinking.

bandushrew 6y ago
yeah, we got lucky with our leadership and with our island status. ", where there were hundreds of thousands of infections" well, EVENTUALLY, there were hundreds of thousands of infections. at one point there were, famously, 15... "Were you thinking that the U.S. would be able to maintain a lockdown until eradication, perhaps with contact tracing? Is there evidence that such a plan could work?" No, I dont think that would be a long term solution for the US, I dont have any source for my beliefs, but I suspect with the size of the US, the nature of its people and the incredibly porous border it has that a lockdown until eradication would be doomed to failure. " I feel very strongly about individualism and anti-authority, while others may be more communitarian and authoritarian" yess....the world does need both. Im not sure where that comes into the decision to lockdown or not, and for how long. I feel like there needs to be a more sciency approach taken there rather than some vague handwavy stuff about personalities. "Why should the many young and healthy who face a negligible risk to continue in what is sometimes very difficult circumstances?" I dont know. I dont have much use for the word 'should'. I think that two things are true, first the young and healthy are at risk from this disease themselves - the stats prove that, and second its almost certainly true that the young and healthy have loved ones who are young and unhealthy, or old and healthy, or old and unhealthy, and....maybe....the young and healthy dont want to catch covid and then infect the people they love. All I was saying with my comment above, is I dont understand the rush to sacrifice those people who are vulnerable to this disease. Even here in NZ where we have been very lucky so far it is obvious that eventually we will have to reopen the borders and let the rest of the world in, and at that point infections will start again, but by then we have the best possible chance of understanding how to treat the disease most effectively. I dont believe "lockdown for eradication" in the US is a viable choice, but I do think "lockdown to slowdown" is a sensible option for a while yet, to give every one of your citizens the best possible chance of survival. The economy will recover, it always does. It reflects the nature of people, and for that reason is endlessly resilient.
- mikem170 6y ago
  >well, EVENTUALLY, there were hundreds of thousands of infections. at one point there were, famously, 15... Maybe there were 15 case last October! :-) I'm thinking we could have had thousands of cases in the U.S. before we started testing. But that's water under the bridge at this point. I wasn't arguing that lockdowns were useless, or that they weren't justified a month ago. But given the additional data I wonder about them now. >I think that two things are true, first the young and healthy are at risk from this disease themselves - the stats prove that I end up looking at NYC stats a lot... Last week they were seeing 20-25% of sample population with antibodies. I found found April 14 NYC numbers showing 4.5% of covid deaths there were people under 45, and a bit over 14k deaths in NYC as of yesterday. Extrapolating from these numbers I calculate 2500 people under 45 will die before reaching 80% herd immunity. That's 2500 in a city of 8 million. 2016 numbers showed 4.9 million people under age 45. Which works out to just under 1 in 2000 young people dying. It's interesting for me to think about that number. Is it significant? I looked at some actuarial tables and see that a 45 year old has a 1 in 300 chance of dying in any given year. 1 in 1000 for 20 year old. I'm betting a lot of unemployed young people want to get on with their lives and wouldn't be worries about taking their chance with a 1 in 2000 risk. >and second its almost certainly true that the young and healthy have loved ones who are young and unhealthy, or old and healthy, or old and unhealthy, and....maybe....the young and healthy dont want to catch covid and then infect the people they love. I'm not saying that everyone has to go out and mingle. Everyone is free to self-isolate. I grant that some people could be put in a difficult position, feeling like they have to go to work when they don't want to, living with someone who won't self-isolate, etc. Maybe there's away to ease the lockdown and provide assistance to those left in a bind. These would be good problems to talk about, and will probably come up no matter when we ease the lockdown.