4 ms·

> If there had been any sort of long term planning or disaster preparedness. Any politician that would have said "hey, we need to prepare for a global pandemic

> If there had been any sort of long term planning or disaster preparedness. Any politician that would have said "hey, we need to prepare for a global pandemic" would have been a laughing stock. Bill Gates knew (see ted talk), the rest of us didn't. I think the only teacher we accept is a pandemic itself. Therefore I'm very happy it's Covid19 and not something worse. Let's hope we learned our lesson and are prepared next time.

chroem- 7y ago
It's not just the politicians though: the private sector deserves just as much of the blame. Watching this unfold from inside BigCorp has been truly eye opening. In a company of 100k people, nobody thought about preparedness or risk management. Instead, BigCorp bought its own stock on margin, and now it has to throw thousands of human beings at a worsening viral pandemic in order to generate cashflow. People are going to die so that the company can stay in business.
- fit2rule 7y ago
  I have to say, my opinion of Elon Musk has lowered as a result of how he's handling this situation. If he can't get things sorted here on Earth with regards to a pandemic response, how is it going to work out in 10 years when he has a Mars colony to govern? Is there even any plan for how a Mars society is going to proceed in these conditions? I guess its time to dust off the ol' Zubrin material and catch up with where things are these days, vis a vis the human factors of a Mars colony, but the seriously feudal rants of Musk lately are disheartening to say the least ..
- koonsolo 7y ago
  I don't know if you are running your own business, but it's just so hard to take into account all kinds of possible risks. It's just impossible to work like that. Most of the time you gamble which resources to put where. Else you end up in analysis paralysis.
  - pbhjpbhj 7y ago
    We're talking about very large businesses. Risk analysts should have been anticipating a pandemic given the several near-misses (Ebola, SARS, MERS, H1N1, ...) that we've had recently. If you're a large business that risk is going to be significant enough to consider. When I took family holiday insurance in early January, I had to check that pandemics were covered, and they were specifically mentioned. So I'd expect them to be a general part of risk analysis. A pandemic that's covered by insurance is a massive risk for an insurance company, so it's always going to be a paragraph in business insurance, I'd expect. Which should raise the question, "as this can't be insured against, for us, what's our contingency".
arel 7y ago
> Bill Gates knew (see ted talk), the rest of us didn't. This assertion is false. Generally speaking competent governments routinely do threat level risk assessments. For example previous UK governments produced comprehensive pandemic response plans: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/344695/PI_Response_Plan_13_Aug.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Cygnus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Cygnus In the US the Obama administration produced a pandemic playbook. Obama gave speeches highlighting the threat of pandemics and left a fully staffed pandemic response team: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-pandemic-preparedness-2014/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-pandemic-preparednes... However: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/25/trump-coronavirus-national-security-council-149285 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/25/trump-coronavirus-n... I hope this is not seen as a political attack but presentation of facts. Some governments are simply more competent than others.
- koonsolo 7y ago
  Sure, but let's be honest here: nobody cared. I know I didn't care, and my neighbors and friends didn't care. And we are the ones voting for people to govern our country. Nobody cares until shit hits the fan. And the above theory complies with practice. If you look at the countries that were able to properly handle Covid19, they had similar cases before. The people over there were already wearing masks. Not because they are smarter, but they were just always closes to the action. I know myself (=male ;)): I don't learn from somebody telling me something. I learn by hitting my head against the wall, and then say "hey this person was right, let's avoid doing that". The rest of the world seems to have the same strategy. Just my observation. But you are right that other people looked into it, but I just have the impression that most of us really didn't care (including myself)
  - vharuck 7y ago
    >But you are right that other people looked into it, but I just have the impression that most of us really didn't care (including myself) I'm with you about not caring enough about pandemics before. But this is where bureaucracy can shine: hire somebody whose entire job is to care about a niche thing. They usually don't need a huge budget to get a good foundational plan set up: one person, a computer, a phone, and proper security clearance. One of the problems with the current administration isn't that they value some things less, but they have a drive to undo their predecessors' work.
mirimir 7y ago
> I think the only teacher we accept is a pandemic itself. It does seem that way. > Therefore I'm very happy it's Covid19 and not something worse. That's a truism, I suppose. But it's perhaps too early to conclude that it won't become much worse. > Let's hope we learned our lesson and are prepared next time. Sure. But the requisite changes might be more than people will accept. Such as traveler quarantines, and other restrictions on international air travel.
nradov 7y ago
In 2005 President George W. Bush clearly stated that we needed to prepare for a global pandemic. No one laughed at him for that. There are some strains of avian flu that cause a ~50% fatality rate in humans. Those aren't very transmissible between humans, but a mutation could change that.
Ididntdothis 7y ago
“Bill Gates knew (see ted talk), the rest of us didn't.“ Let’s not make Gates into a superhero here. A lot of people knew what would be coming but got ignored.

chroem- 7y ago

It's not just the politicians though: the private sector deserves just as much of the blame. Watching this unfold from inside BigCorp has been truly eye opening. In a company of 100k people, nobody thought about preparedness or risk management. Instead, BigCorp bought its own stock on margin, and now it has to throw thousands of human beings at a worsening viral pandemic in order to generate cashflow. People are going to die so that the company can stay in business.

fit2rule 7y ago
I have to say, my opinion of Elon Musk has lowered as a result of how he's handling this situation. If he can't get things sorted here on Earth with regards to a pandemic response, how is it going to work out in 10 years when he has a Mars colony to govern? Is there even any plan for how a Mars society is going to proceed in these conditions? I guess its time to dust off the ol' Zubrin material and catch up with where things are these days, vis a vis the human factors of a Mars colony, but the seriously feudal rants of Musk lately are disheartening to say the least ..
koonsolo 7y ago
I don't know if you are running your own business, but it's just so hard to take into account all kinds of possible risks. It's just impossible to work like that. Most of the time you gamble which resources to put where. Else you end up in analysis paralysis.
- pbhjpbhj 7y ago
  We're talking about very large businesses. Risk analysts should have been anticipating a pandemic given the several near-misses (Ebola, SARS, MERS, H1N1, ...) that we've had recently. If you're a large business that risk is going to be significant enough to consider. When I took family holiday insurance in early January, I had to check that pandemics were covered, and they were specifically mentioned. So I'd expect them to be a general part of risk analysis. A pandemic that's covered by insurance is a massive risk for an insurance company, so it's always going to be a paragraph in business insurance, I'd expect. Which should raise the question, "as this can't be insured against, for us, what's our contingency".

arel 7y ago

> Bill Gates knew (see ted talk), the rest of us didn't. This assertion is false. Generally speaking competent governments routinely do threat level risk assessments. For example previous UK governments produced comprehensive pandemic response plans: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/344695/PI_Response_Plan_13_Aug.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Cygnus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Cygnus In the US the Obama administration produced a pandemic playbook. Obama gave speeches highlighting the threat of pandemics and left a fully staffed pandemic response team: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-pandemic-preparedness-2014/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-pandemic-preparednes... However: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/25/trump-coronavirus-national-security-council-149285 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/25/trump-coronavirus-n... I hope this is not seen as a political attack but presentation of facts. Some governments are simply more competent than others.

koonsolo 7y ago
Sure, but let's be honest here: nobody cared. I know I didn't care, and my neighbors and friends didn't care. And we are the ones voting for people to govern our country. Nobody cares until shit hits the fan. And the above theory complies with practice. If you look at the countries that were able to properly handle Covid19, they had similar cases before. The people over there were already wearing masks. Not because they are smarter, but they were just always closes to the action. I know myself (=male ;)): I don't learn from somebody telling me something. I learn by hitting my head against the wall, and then say "hey this person was right, let's avoid doing that". The rest of the world seems to have the same strategy. Just my observation. But you are right that other people looked into it, but I just have the impression that most of us really didn't care (including myself)
- vharuck 7y ago
  >But you are right that other people looked into it, but I just have the impression that most of us really didn't care (including myself) I'm with you about not caring enough about pandemics before. But this is where bureaucracy can shine: hire somebody whose entire job is to care about a niche thing. They usually don't need a huge budget to get a good foundational plan set up: one person, a computer, a phone, and proper security clearance. One of the problems with the current administration isn't that they value some things less, but they have a drive to undo their predecessors' work.

mirimir 7y ago

> I think the only teacher we accept is a pandemic itself. It does seem that way. > Therefore I'm very happy it's Covid19 and not something worse. That's a truism, I suppose. But it's perhaps too early to conclude that it won't become much worse. > Let's hope we learned our lesson and are prepared next time. Sure. But the requisite changes might be more than people will accept. Such as traveler quarantines, and other restrictions on international air travel.

nradov 7y ago

In 2005 President George W. Bush clearly stated that we needed to prepare for a global pandemic. No one laughed at him for that. There are some strains of avian flu that cause a ~50% fatality rate in humans. Those aren't very transmissible between humans, but a mutation could change that.

Ididntdothis 7y ago

“Bill Gates knew (see ted talk), the rest of us didn't.“ Let’s not make Gates into a superhero here. A lot of people knew what would be coming but got ignored.