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> The US cannot do testing and tracing because they waited too late. "Cannot"? Why wouldn't it just require a much bigger effort? I've been flabbergasted by t

> The US cannot do testing and tracing because they waited too late. "Cannot"? Why wouldn't it just require a much bigger effort? I've been flabbergasted by the lack of wartime thinking this whole time in the US. We know how to mobilize things and build logistical supply chains, why can't we apply that to a in-country medical battle? Not only did the US governments (at all levels) demonstrate incompetence early, we've now given up on even trying to be competent. That bodes poorly for future events. If you're a person who can work from home and isolate, or just someone who's not scared because you think your personal odds are good, then it burning through the rest of population faster is better than it burning through more slowly, which is the best most of the country had gotten through their restrictions. But wow... what a low standard for our country.

tomrod 6y ago
The folks holding the power in the US don't appear to want there to be a pandemic, therefore it's just a bad flu. Out of sync with reality. This is going to get rougher, I think.
redis_mlc 6y ago
> "Cannot"? Why wouldn't it just require a much bigger effort? Corona is basically endemic in the US. You can test nursing homes and airport arrivals, and do followup testing on a small population. You cannot test 320 million people, and do followup weekly testing on them. Perhaps you're inspired by the success in NZ or Taiwan. The US has a totally different situation. You seem to think that "doing something" is better than nothing. Again, that's false hope in this case. Herd immunity is the only logical result in this case. But hope is not a strategy. I would compare the US response to corona in 2020 to the English and French appeasement of Germany in the 1930's. Denial of reality resulted in the total destruction of Europe in WW2, not much different to the health and financial results of corona.
- majormajor 6y ago
  This isn't "hope" that I'm expressing. This is me saying that *if we never try, we'll never succeed, at ANYTHING, not just at this. You're convinced hard equals impossible. Which is definitely part of why the US is so incompetent when it comes to this (or healthcare in general). People don't care that we suck. I just find that sad and horrifying. Let's say you take NYC, where the cases have been tailing off, and you implement a massive contract tracing effort there. MASSIVE. Maybe it doesn't save the whole country. Maybe it doesn't even prevent inbound infections from spreading very well. But it's also a hell of a lot of practice for the next time we need to accomplish something big.
  - Gibbon1 6y ago
    Walk back. Look at the hapless response to Hurricane Maria. You see any difference between that and the hapless response to Covid19? I don't. Hurricane Katrina? Ditto. Consider the need to replace the year old train tunnels that service New York. Nope can't do it. California needs to build a high speed rail system to deal with increased commuter and air traffic? Watch people get into a rage at the idea. The US healthcare system is completely out of control. Costs twice what other countries systems cost, with worse outcomes and large numbers of unserved people. Lots of countries have systems that work. But reform is impossible. The underlying cause here isn't technical. It's nihilist ideology.
  - mixmastamyk 6y ago
    I and a lot of folks won’t submit to contact tracing. So it is infeasible in more ways than one.
    - Intermernet 6y ago
      Sorry if this seems rude, it's not meant to be, I'm genuinely curious. I understand (and support) opposition to contact tracing by badly designed technological solutions, but what is your argument against manual contact tracing? (actually asking people one-on-one who they've been in contact with if they test positive to Covid-19) I'm just after your reasoning. I promise I won't deride your decision in any way (and I hope others refrain from doing so as well). People react differently in extreme situations, and I try to be aware of as many different reactions as possible, and possibly try to understand the reasons for those reactions.
      - kmonsen 6y ago
        A substantial part of the US population will not cooperate.
        Intermernet 6y ago
        Yes, but why? It may be a valid reason, but I don't know what it is.
- hcknwscommenter 6y ago
  "You cannot test 320 million people, and do followup weekly testing on them." I mean, that is factually wrong. We could actually do that. It wouldn't even be that expensive. Of course, such a thing isn't really necessary. If everyone who wanted a test could get one without delay and get results back in hours, that would be sufficient to implement test and trace effectively.
  - kmonsen 6y ago
    Of course testing scales with the size of the country.
    - pedrocr 6y ago
      So do available resources. This go to argument that things that work in smaller countries don't work in the US is bizarre. It's used in all these discussions of how things that work in the EU couldn't possibly work in the US, even though the EU has a larger population.
      - redis_mlc 6y ago
        Nobody is talking about the EU - we're talking about NZ and Taiwan.
        pedrocr 6y ago
        New Zeland hasn't tested more per population size than the US or the EU. If the argument is scale the EU is a counter-example. If the argument is management there are literally dozens of countries that have managed things better than the US. NZ and Taiwan are just examples of where things were done particularly well, but there are plenty of others.
      - kmonsen 6y ago
        Mostly agree 100% with you, there is one caveat: you can’t restrict travel inside the USA, so it’s harder to keep things local. For scale it clearly should scale, and there should be efficiencies you can find in bigger countries.
- NhanH 6y ago
  Did you just recently believe that herd immunity is the solution in the past month (or 2), or was it your ideal solution since January?
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    1) Since SF hospitalizations flatlined 2 months ago: https://www.sccgov.org/sites/covid19/Pages/dashboard.aspx#hospital https://www.sccgov.org/sites/covid19/Pages/dashboard.aspx#ho... 2) Since it turned out the US can't do testing and tracing
pasquinelli 6y ago
This is, i think, the root of people's anger toward the police right now. The ruling class can't seem to do anything but stomp on the people they hold power over.

tomrod 6y ago

The folks holding the power in the US don't appear to want there to be a pandemic, therefore it's just a bad flu. Out of sync with reality. This is going to get rougher, I think.

redis_mlc 6y ago

> "Cannot"? Why wouldn't it just require a much bigger effort? Corona is basically endemic in the US. You can test nursing homes and airport arrivals, and do followup testing on a small population. You cannot test 320 million people, and do followup weekly testing on them. Perhaps you're inspired by the success in NZ or Taiwan. The US has a totally different situation. You seem to think that "doing something" is better than nothing. Again, that's false hope in this case. Herd immunity is the only logical result in this case. But hope is not a strategy. I would compare the US response to corona in 2020 to the English and French appeasement of Germany in the 1930's. Denial of reality resulted in the total destruction of Europe in WW2, not much different to the health and financial results of corona.

majormajor 6y ago
This isn't "hope" that I'm expressing. This is me saying that *if we never try, we'll never succeed, at ANYTHING, not just at this. You're convinced hard equals impossible. Which is definitely part of why the US is so incompetent when it comes to this (or healthcare in general). People don't care that we suck. I just find that sad and horrifying. Let's say you take NYC, where the cases have been tailing off, and you implement a massive contract tracing effort there. MASSIVE. Maybe it doesn't save the whole country. Maybe it doesn't even prevent inbound infections from spreading very well. But it's also a hell of a lot of practice for the next time we need to accomplish something big.
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  Walk back. Look at the hapless response to Hurricane Maria. You see any difference between that and the hapless response to Covid19? I don't. Hurricane Katrina? Ditto. Consider the need to replace the year old train tunnels that service New York. Nope can't do it. California needs to build a high speed rail system to deal with increased commuter and air traffic? Watch people get into a rage at the idea. The US healthcare system is completely out of control. Costs twice what other countries systems cost, with worse outcomes and large numbers of unserved people. Lots of countries have systems that work. But reform is impossible. The underlying cause here isn't technical. It's nihilist ideology.
- mixmastamyk 6y ago
  I and a lot of folks won’t submit to contact tracing. So it is infeasible in more ways than one.
  - Intermernet 6y ago
    Sorry if this seems rude, it's not meant to be, I'm genuinely curious. I understand (and support) opposition to contact tracing by badly designed technological solutions, but what is your argument against manual contact tracing? (actually asking people one-on-one who they've been in contact with if they test positive to Covid-19) I'm just after your reasoning. I promise I won't deride your decision in any way (and I hope others refrain from doing so as well). People react differently in extreme situations, and I try to be aware of as many different reactions as possible, and possibly try to understand the reasons for those reactions.
    - kmonsen 6y ago
      A substantial part of the US population will not cooperate.
      - Intermernet 6y ago
        Yes, but why? It may be a valid reason, but I don't know what it is.
hcknwscommenter 6y ago
"You cannot test 320 million people, and do followup weekly testing on them." I mean, that is factually wrong. We could actually do that. It wouldn't even be that expensive. Of course, such a thing isn't really necessary. If everyone who wanted a test could get one without delay and get results back in hours, that would be sufficient to implement test and trace effectively.
- kmonsen 6y ago
  Of course testing scales with the size of the country.
  - pedrocr 6y ago
    So do available resources. This go to argument that things that work in smaller countries don't work in the US is bizarre. It's used in all these discussions of how things that work in the EU couldn't possibly work in the US, even though the EU has a larger population.
    - redis_mlc 6y ago
      Nobody is talking about the EU - we're talking about NZ and Taiwan.
      - pedrocr 6y ago
        New Zeland hasn't tested more per population size than the US or the EU. If the argument is scale the EU is a counter-example. If the argument is management there are literally dozens of countries that have managed things better than the US. NZ and Taiwan are just examples of where things were done particularly well, but there are plenty of others.
    - kmonsen 6y ago
      Mostly agree 100% with you, there is one caveat: you can’t restrict travel inside the USA, so it’s harder to keep things local. For scale it clearly should scale, and there should be efficiencies you can find in bigger countries.
NhanH 6y ago
Did you just recently believe that herd immunity is the solution in the past month (or 2), or was it your ideal solution since January?
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  1) Since SF hospitalizations flatlined 2 months ago: https://www.sccgov.org/sites/covid19/Pages/dashboard.aspx#hospital https://www.sccgov.org/sites/covid19/Pages/dashboard.aspx#ho... 2) Since it turned out the US can't do testing and tracing

pasquinelli 6y ago

This is, i think, the root of people's anger toward the police right now. The ruling class can't seem to do anything but stomp on the people they hold power over.