4 ms·

Since this isn't our first pandemic, it would be interesting to look back on the 1918 pandemic and the 1950s pandemic and see if anything can be learned from th

by beaner 6y ago

Since this isn't our first pandemic, it would be interesting to look back on the 1918 pandemic and the 1950s pandemic and see if anything can be learned from them. I don't have an opinion either way because I haven't studied them. But due to how drastically this situation continues to affect the entire world, I'm kind of surprised that I haven't really seen any mainstream comparisons. How long did it last? What did they do? Was there a mass economic decline? If so, how could it have been avoided? If not, why not? Etc. I suspect that because these questions are not being asked, it may be the case that there are things to learn which are counter to popular narratives. I could definitely be very wrong about that. But it might be worthwhile to explore.

ianmobbs 6y ago
You don’t have to look at 1918. You can just look at nearly every other country in the world and how it’s been impacted. South Korea, Italy, China, and so on are all reopening or have been reopened despite having been hit just as hard as the US in the beginning - they just acted much more swiftly in the beginning. The less action our government takes, the longer this is going to go on.
- beaner 6y ago
  Sure you don't have to, but then you potentially end up with a bias and you definitely end up with an incomplete perspective, when completeness is defined by considering the complete set of experienced circumstances. It may be the case that a hammer-like lockdown has largely stamped the virus out of many countries and that the US failed at that and is worse-off for it. It may also be the case that the US will build herd immunity faster and it the average infection rate and death rates will eventually converge to the same everywhere. We simply do not know yet, but people are judging as if we do. If we look to the past, we may be able to gain insight into how it played out until completion and how it was or was not affected by regulation, local & international laws, and the layperson perspective. In the current instance, no country has yet played it out to completion so that is something we could not learn from other countries right now.
- CryptoPunk 6y ago
  Just to give one counter-point: Take New Zealand. Its geographical isolation, low population density and strict national lockdown and contact tracing, led to it eliminating the virus. However, now it has a set of policies that increase its isolation, and is stuck with them until an effective vaccine or treatment is found: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/new-zealand-beat-back-the-coronavirus-but-families-were-left-divided-and-migrant-workers-stranded-in-the-process/ https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/new-zealand-beat-back-t... In the absence of a vaccine, herd immunity is the only durable solution to the virus, and New Zealand is foregoing that solution to avoid a spike in deaths in the short term. And indeed, the original plan, of 'flattening the curve' was tolerant of COVID19 deaths, and aiming for herd immunity. But somewhere along the way, death from COVID19 became politically intolerable in the US, and now any rise in deaths leads to a call to re-lockdown, even when COVID19 cases are well below ICU capacity.
controversy 6y ago
One thing we learned from the 1918 pandemic is to not to give 40 mg of aspirin to people. One of the major causes of death during that time was bleeding out internally. We now know that 4mg is the max. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091002132346.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091002132346.h...
- CryptoPunk 6y ago
  What caused the 1918 pandemic to become significantly more deadly in its second wave was the war inadvertedly forcing healthy asymptomatic carriers to stay in place, instead of preferentially spread their strain of the virus, while sending symptomatic carriers of the virus to hospitals which acted as conduits for transmission: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Transmission_and_mutation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Transmission_and_m...
tdfx 6y ago
The one glaring difference from previous pandemics is that we are not quarantining our sick people from other members of their household, instead choosing to enforce "stay at home" orders. I'm not sure how much more evidence we need that this is a bad idea, particularly in multigenerational households.
TeaDrunk 6y ago
In 1918, the death toll spiked once people stopped giving a shit about self isolation, refusing to wear masks, etc. This is the same shit different day.

by beaner 6y ago

ianmobbs 6y ago

You don’t have to look at 1918. You can just look at nearly every other country in the world and how it’s been impacted. South Korea, Italy, China, and so on are all reopening or have been reopened despite having been hit just as hard as the US in the beginning - they just acted much more swiftly in the beginning. The less action our government takes, the longer this is going to go on.

beaner 6y ago
Sure you don't have to, but then you potentially end up with a bias and you definitely end up with an incomplete perspective, when completeness is defined by considering the complete set of experienced circumstances. It may be the case that a hammer-like lockdown has largely stamped the virus out of many countries and that the US failed at that and is worse-off for it. It may also be the case that the US will build herd immunity faster and it the average infection rate and death rates will eventually converge to the same everywhere. We simply do not know yet, but people are judging as if we do. If we look to the past, we may be able to gain insight into how it played out until completion and how it was or was not affected by regulation, local & international laws, and the layperson perspective. In the current instance, no country has yet played it out to completion so that is something we could not learn from other countries right now.
CryptoPunk 6y ago
Just to give one counter-point: Take New Zealand. Its geographical isolation, low population density and strict national lockdown and contact tracing, led to it eliminating the virus. However, now it has a set of policies that increase its isolation, and is stuck with them until an effective vaccine or treatment is found: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/new-zealand-beat-back-the-coronavirus-but-families-were-left-divided-and-migrant-workers-stranded-in-the-process/ https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/new-zealand-beat-back-t... In the absence of a vaccine, herd immunity is the only durable solution to the virus, and New Zealand is foregoing that solution to avoid a spike in deaths in the short term. And indeed, the original plan, of 'flattening the curve' was tolerant of COVID19 deaths, and aiming for herd immunity. But somewhere along the way, death from COVID19 became politically intolerable in the US, and now any rise in deaths leads to a call to re-lockdown, even when COVID19 cases are well below ICU capacity.

controversy 6y ago

One thing we learned from the 1918 pandemic is to not to give 40 mg of aspirin to people. One of the major causes of death during that time was bleeding out internally. We now know that 4mg is the max. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091002132346.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091002132346.h...

CryptoPunk 6y ago
What caused the 1918 pandemic to become significantly more deadly in its second wave was the war inadvertedly forcing healthy asymptomatic carriers to stay in place, instead of preferentially spread their strain of the virus, while sending symptomatic carriers of the virus to hospitals which acted as conduits for transmission: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Transmission_and_mutation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Transmission_and_m...

tdfx 6y ago

The one glaring difference from previous pandemics is that we are not quarantining our sick people from other members of their household, instead choosing to enforce "stay at home" orders. I'm not sure how much more evidence we need that this is a bad idea, particularly in multigenerational households.

TeaDrunk 6y ago

In 1918, the death toll spiked once people stopped giving a shit about self isolation, refusing to wear masks, etc. This is the same shit different day.