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Strange, I first read this as "Governments that try to trade the economy for safety will end up with neither" and wholeheartedly agreed. I think both versions a

by daenz 6y ago

Strange, I first read this as "Governments that try to trade the economy for safety will end up with neither" and wholeheartedly agreed. I think both versions are right, unfortunately.

tialaramex 6y ago
The larger economy is unavoidably global and local policy can't do anything about that being destroyed, it's a consequence of pandemic disease. But, locally of course elimination means you can open safely. We know that's not just theory because New Zealand did it in June. They have stadium-filling events, because they can now, and so why wouldn't they? Yes, their border has to be essentially closed to non-citizens and there's much more surveillance testing (ie people who have no symptoms getting tested "just in case") than you'd have without a pandemic, but locally it's normal. And so I think this actually puts a lie to the idea that you can't trade economy for safety. New Zealand shut down, tested and traced, eliminated the disease, opened back up in about three months. Will they see economic damage? Yes. Largely because everywhere in the whole world gets damaged. Wishful thinking by Trump aside, this won't be put right by November. But are they safe? Zero cases in over two months for a population of around five million sounds pretty safe to me.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  The question is whether you actually can eliminate locally. Australia was trying to, but they failed, and now they're starting to send cities back into lockdown. All the Asian and European countries I know of have made it clear that social distancing is here to stay and they don't expect to reach "safe" until a vaccine has been deployed.
  - tialaramex 6y ago
    I presented an existence proof. New Zealand did this. So there is no residual doubt that it can be done. Generally people determined not to learn anything will look for excuses. New Zealand has relatively low population density (outside the cities where it had community transmission...). Or it's further away from other countries. Maybe the virus hates the cold (remember how we pretended maybe it hates the heat? Yeah, good luck with that). Such excuses don't matter. They might help some politician keep their job, but they won't stop you dying from a disease that those politicians decided they weren't really bothered about eliminating. I follow infectious disease eradication programmes. Elimination works. Other approaches can reduce the impact of a disease, maybe temporarily suppress it in the First World, but only elimination actually makes it go away and stay gone. The US ought to know this. It has endemic disease of a wide variety of types otherwise not seen in the First World, because it decided not to give its citizens healthcare. So if you're poor in America and you've got some awful parasitic disease that any other developed country in the world would fix as a priority public health measure, America says "Too bad, get a job" and the disease spreads. A vaccine is about luck. We do not understand virology well enough to firmly guarantee we can build a vaccine for all the money in the world. So maybe you get lucky in the next few months and an effective vaccine is available in 2021. But maybe you don't ever get lucky, and then what? "Social distancing" forever?
    - jkinudsjknds 6y ago
      I lifted a rock, therefore there is no residual doubt that any rock can be lifted. Anyone claiming that some rocks are much larger is just making excuses. The reason NZ is successful is because it's an easily isolated island.
  - lancewiggs 6y ago
    Australia failed to lock their border down, and we have all learned from that, hopefully in time. They also never got to elimination. Here in New Zealand we are aware we are always one selfish idiot or one mistake away from a breakout. We quarantine people but can’t and won’t put them in jails. That’s not kind. But we have slowed border arrivals. We are collectively reliant on the entire community, including newly returned folks, on behaving like adults. And that’s what is happening so far.

by daenz 6y ago

Strange, I first read this as "Governments that try to trade the economy for safety will end up with neither" and wholeheartedly agreed. I think both versions are right, unfortunately.

tialaramex 6y ago

The larger economy is unavoidably global and local policy can't do anything about that being destroyed, it's a consequence of pandemic disease. But, locally of course elimination means you can open safely. We know that's not just theory because New Zealand did it in June. They have stadium-filling events, because they can now, and so why wouldn't they? Yes, their border has to be essentially closed to non-citizens and there's much more surveillance testing (ie people who have no symptoms getting tested "just in case") than you'd have without a pandemic, but locally it's normal. And so I think this actually puts a lie to the idea that you can't trade economy for safety. New Zealand shut down, tested and traced, eliminated the disease, opened back up in about three months. Will they see economic damage? Yes. Largely because everywhere in the whole world gets damaged. Wishful thinking by Trump aside, this won't be put right by November. But are they safe? Zero cases in over two months for a population of around five million sounds pretty safe to me.

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
The question is whether you actually can eliminate locally. Australia was trying to, but they failed, and now they're starting to send cities back into lockdown. All the Asian and European countries I know of have made it clear that social distancing is here to stay and they don't expect to reach "safe" until a vaccine has been deployed.
- tialaramex 6y ago
  I presented an existence proof. New Zealand did this. So there is no residual doubt that it can be done. Generally people determined not to learn anything will look for excuses. New Zealand has relatively low population density (outside the cities where it had community transmission...). Or it's further away from other countries. Maybe the virus hates the cold (remember how we pretended maybe it hates the heat? Yeah, good luck with that). Such excuses don't matter. They might help some politician keep their job, but they won't stop you dying from a disease that those politicians decided they weren't really bothered about eliminating. I follow infectious disease eradication programmes. Elimination works. Other approaches can reduce the impact of a disease, maybe temporarily suppress it in the First World, but only elimination actually makes it go away and stay gone. The US ought to know this. It has endemic disease of a wide variety of types otherwise not seen in the First World, because it decided not to give its citizens healthcare. So if you're poor in America and you've got some awful parasitic disease that any other developed country in the world would fix as a priority public health measure, America says "Too bad, get a job" and the disease spreads. A vaccine is about luck. We do not understand virology well enough to firmly guarantee we can build a vaccine for all the money in the world. So maybe you get lucky in the next few months and an effective vaccine is available in 2021. But maybe you don't ever get lucky, and then what? "Social distancing" forever?
  - jkinudsjknds 6y ago
    I lifted a rock, therefore there is no residual doubt that any rock can be lifted. Anyone claiming that some rocks are much larger is just making excuses. The reason NZ is successful is because it's an easily isolated island.
- lancewiggs 6y ago
  Australia failed to lock their border down, and we have all learned from that, hopefully in time. They also never got to elimination. Here in New Zealand we are aware we are always one selfish idiot or one mistake away from a breakout. We quarantine people but can’t and won’t put them in jails. That’s not kind. But we have slowed border arrivals. We are collectively reliant on the entire community, including newly returned folks, on behaving like adults. And that’s what is happening so far.