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Vietnam at 0 deaths. Singapore at 24 deaths (despite a relatively high number of cases). There's a thread on the front page right now re Sweden's handling. A
by latch 6y ago
Vietnam at 0 deaths.
Singapore at 24 deaths (despite a relatively high number of cases).
There's a thread on the front page right now re Sweden's handling. A lot of the comments seem to be trying to rate the performance of various European countries against each other. I guess I'm missing something, because I'd just categorize most of it as a disaster.
- wonderlg 6y agoVietnam’s numbers are incredible and I cheer for them, but I wouldn’t trust their exactness, given the country’s placement in the freedom of the press index as the 4th least free.
- hannob 6y agoMistrust about the vietnam numbers comes up every time this is discussed. But I have not yet seen any evidence that they're forged. I admit I find it hard to believe that a country bordering china could handle this so well. But I am more inclined to believe the numbers are real than that the numbers are completely fake and nobody has produced any evidence of this. Vietnam isn't North Korea. It's a country well connected to the world, plenty of people work there that have international connections or come from other countries.
- manojlds 6y agoVietnam also has everything to lose. Lots of companies are moving their factories to Vietnam and China's faltering has been to Vietnam's gains.
- ceilingcorner 6y agoIt seems more likely to me that the COVID reporting is shoddy, rather than the implementation of some genius plan. Hundreds of thousands of people die every year in Vietnam [1] and you're telling me there's a zero percent chance that some of them were miscategorized? Seems unlikely to me. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1101034/vietnam-number-of-deaths/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1101034/vietnam-number-o...
- simion314 6y agoYou can look at extra deaths and miscategorization is not a a giant problem.
- ceilingcorner 6y agoThe extra deaths thing also seems sketchy to me, this early after the outbreak. If someone was within ±12 months of dying and the coronavirus got them, then the death rates of the past month would be higher while the death rates of the next year would still be the same. We are too early to make any statements of fact about it.
- simion314 6y agoYou can wait a bit more and average things, but anyway this last point is not part of miss-categorization point I was replying to.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago> this last point is not part of miss-categorization point I was replying to Yes, you're right, and I realized that just as I made the post. But I still don't think that normal rates of death automatically equal coronavirus didn't kill anyone.
- simion314 6y agoYou will have a margin of error , my main point is that even if some politicians will push too miss=categorize the deaths, if the numbers are sufficiently large things can't be hidden that way. Do you have any statistics that show that if I die of COVID then this imply that my probability to live 1 more year was very slim without COVID? This kind of number as less then 1 year seems very non-scientific and more something you would use to push your opinion, like yes 400K people died but 99% of them would ahve been dead anyway in a few months
- soco 6y ago
- vanderZwan 6y agoThe most infuriating thing about the Sweden situation to me is that Anders Tegnell has claimed that no country has managed to stop or slow down the spread of the virus. Even if you dismiss China's claims due to government meddling (fair enough), Tegnell was being ignorant of a number of other Asian countries at the time he said this. I know that I'm somewhat jumping to conclusions, but this feels so much like typical Eurocentric ignorance of other parts of the world whenever the latter manages to handle something better than them that it makes my blood boil. Just swallow your pride and acknowledge the findings of others, dammit. In general there are multiple Asian countries with recent experiences with these kinds of outbreaks - you know, SARS? Would it be so hard to look at their conclusions of which methods of handling past outbreaks worked and didn't work? To learn from their mistakes so we don't have to repeat them in our arrogance?
- puranjay 6y agoI don't know if Asian countries should be patting themselves on the backs yet. Here in India, it seemed like we had everything under control in the first 6 weeks of the lockdown. But now, our cases and deaths are rising fast, just as we're winding down the lockdowns. Bangalore avoided infections since much of the country was locked down. The real litmus test will be to see how the infection rate holds after the lockdowns end.
- intended 6y agoI think when they say Asia India is not included. I usually find that India/Bangladesh/Sri lanka/Pakistan etc are categorized as "the subcontinent" That said, infection rates in India have been weird.
- vanderZwan 6y agoOh I agree - nobody should pat themselves on the back until this is over, and even then I'm sure all countries involved could have handled the situation better. This is a separate issue from Tegnell ignoring a lot of knowledge that is out there in order to stick to his existing narrative.
- mytailorisrich 6y ago
- mytailorisrich 6y agoVietnam's political system is the same as China's. The starting point ought to be as cautious with Vietnamese numbers as with Chinese numbers. If the massive differences with see among countries turn out to be accurate I suspect that natural causes will be found quite apart from governments' performances in managing the virus. Age, climate, genetic susceptibility, or other natural factors seem to be playing a big role.
- rm445 6y agoAlso Japan at all of 900 deaths despite an early start. Articles have been written about government responses and cultural behaviours, but it feels like there's something with a stronger effect out there waiting to be discovered. A genetic quirk, perhaps? Or maybe a strain of another coronavirus (a kind that gives 'common cold' type symptoms) that has already swept the region and confers some immunity? Presumably people with the right expertise are looking into this sort of question already, but it seems like a lot of media reports are going off half-cocked. I'm not trying to apologise for European or US governments' handling of the crisis, but countries have all reacted differently and it doesn't look like that strong a correlation between their responses and the outcomes.
- tuna-piano 6y agoThe simplest explanation that seems potentially correct is - masks and climate. Japan has basically 100% mask wearing rate. The climate in India is probably helpful. But crazy thought- what if different languages spread this virus at different amounts? some words in English release more droplets than those in other languages? Or because Italians speak more loudly than Japanese? But I’d vote for simpler explanations.
- wil421 6y agoIt’s called sneezing and it sprays droplets everywhere. If you have close to 100% mask use then you can stop the infection rate faster than hand washing alone. Sneeze visualization. https://youtu.be/wnafrAtfMzE https://youtu.be/wnafrAtfMzE
- rm445 6y agoYes, the Italians-speak-loud-and-close theory is both plausible and bleakly funny. It works for New Yorkers as well.