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When comparing policies, you have to factor in the costs though. As a more straightforward example, it's simpler to compare countries with closed pandemics - s
by usaar333 6y ago
When comparing policies, you have to factor in the costs though.
As a more straightforward example, it's simpler to compare countries with closed pandemics - say Iceland or New Zealand. Iceland has much higher deaths per capita, but they didn't lock down nearly as hard (groups limited to 10, schools open for kids below age 10, etc.). If you do the math, Iceland lost about 120 extra years of life, or something like ~3 hours per person. Is depriving everyone of additional liberties for a month worth increasing life expectancy by 3 hours?
The case for France vs. Sweden is a bit more complex, since Sweden, even though it isn't locked down, will be "unsafe" for large numbers of people longer. The raw math and projection models suggests Sweden will lose an extra 1-2 days of life per person, but more analysis is needed to really understand benefits and costs.
- mantas 6y ago1 death is a tragedy, thousands of deaths is statistics. That "3 hours" mean that you're likely to loose one of the relatives or friends who are in high risk group. Suddenly a month of lockdown is worth to give your loved ones years or even decades.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago> That "3 hours" mean that you're likely to loose one of the relatives or friends who are in high risk group. Suddenly a month of lockdown is worth to give your loved ones years or even decades. Not even close. For example, no one I know has been directly hurt by the coronavirus. And neither has anyone they know, including my friend from Wuhan. (Why "directly"? I do know someone who had a mental breakdown related to isolation.)
- sukilot 6y agoMost people know more people than the average HN commenter. I suspect you don't know the fate of everyone known by everyone you know.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago> I suspect you don't know the fate of everyone known by everyone you know. Certain information is significantly more likely than average to be broadcast. Do I know what those people are doing? Do I have any idea who they are? No. But I do know they haven't been hurt by the coronavirus.
- mantas 6y agoIf your personal experience doesn't match statistics, are statistics wrong?
- Semaphor 6y ago> That "3 hours" mean that you're likely to loose one of the relatives or friends who are in high risk group Not arguing one way or the other, but I most certainly would not call it likely. Germany had more deaths than Iceland per capita and none of my relatives or friends are or know anyone even infected, let alone dead. In Germany, you’d need to know about 440 people to even know someone who has been confirmed infected, in Iceland still around 200. To know someone who died, you’d need to know 9,661 in Germany and 36,363 in Iceland.
- mantas 6y agoAnecdata vs statistics? Some people did die. Some do know them. If no people you know died, does it makes it a media hoax?
- matz1 6y agoSure its sucks for some people who die or know people who died but for most other people they won't even notice.
- mantas 6y agoWhat's what I said up the thread. It's a tragedy for people directly involved even though averaged-out it becomes a cold statistics. Personally I'd rather not gamble wether I'd end up on tragedy or statistics side.
- matz1 6y agoTechnically, life itself is a series of gamble, every choice has its risk and benefit.
- Semaphor 6y agoYes, I used statistics. You said it’s likely. I gave numbers on how many people you’d need to know to, on average, know someone who died. Which, considering how high that number is, does not make it seem "likely" Edit: > does it makes it a media hoax Honestly, you completely lost me there. Did you read some other comment and attributed it to me? edit2: FWIW, I wear a mask when going to the store despite it being only required inside, one of maybe 5% of people who do that. And that’s in a city of 200k with 0 known active cases.
- rumanator 6y ago> If you do the math, Iceland lost about 120 extra years of life The problem with "extra years of life" metrics is that they artificially play down the death wave on older segments of the population, as if those dying from covid19 who happen to be older than 40yo should not matter to society. The consequences of this nonsensical pick of statistics indicators is that a death wave of thousands of people per day that happens to hit harder on the > 40yo segment is watered down with "all this just to gain 3 hours of life" nonsense, as if all the coffins were only piling up because instead of being delivered on scheduled they needed to be delivered 3 hours earlier.
- mewpmewp2 6y agoSo someone with 1 day left in their life is equal to someone with 70 years? It does seem to me that a more just system would consider "time lost" as a metric since surely it can't be binary.
- rumanator 6y ago> So someone with 1 day left in their life is equal to someone with 70 years? You're the one trying to quantify the value of life. To me, my parents and grandparents are more important than your 1yo son/daughter, so YMMV. Still, you're missing the whole point. The point is that it makes absolutely no sense to downplay an epidemic just because it hits hardest on those suffering from pre-existing medical conditions or being over 40. The coffins piling up on makeshift morgues make it quite obvious that the real effect of the death wave is not anticipating death by a couple of hours, and it matters nothing if those doing the dying are sick, old, or disabled.
- randomsearch 6y agoWow, you’d sacrifice a 1yo to save your grandparents? I find that genuinely shocking.
- colde 6y agoI think the argument is more akin to not sacrificing anybody, and trying to save everyone.
- mewpmewp2 6y agoI never thought of it this way. This is a really good observation in my opinion. There's a lot of math and viewpoints that should be considered here. It does not seem to me that proponents of lockdowns are even doing any maths, it seems like they take it for guaranteed that lockdowns are the only choice.
- rob74 6y agoNo, they just treat human life as valuable and tend to err on the side of caution - reducing people to numbers is a slippery slope, because you can prove almost any point with statistics. Then you end up with [Star Trek-style dystopias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_a_Life_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_a_Life_(Star_Trek:_The_Ne...) like euthanising everyone at the age of 60 - after all, society as a whole is better off if you do that...
- mewpmewp2 6y agoBut when you are calculating active cases and death rates you are also reducing people to a number, it's just binary in this case, 1 = death, 0 = no deaths.
- CathedralBorrow 6y agoAre you open to the possibility that those proponents actually have considered those viewpoints and come to a different conclusion than you for reasons other than being too stupid to understand math?
- rlkf 6y ago> Is depriving everyone of additional liberties for a month worth increasing life expectancy by 3 hours? This analysis is flawed, because it compares the entire cost to only parts of the gain. Economic depression because no-one dares to go outside of fear for their lives, has for instance negative value too.
- natch 6y ago> Iceland has much higher deaths per capita We can’t know this number conclusively until a few years from now. The pandemic is still ongoing and does not have a flat distribution of impact over time. So all this analysis is based on a false premise.