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See, you haven't actually understood what I'm talking about, so no wonder you think my position/view is contradictory. I'm not saying that as an insult BTW, ju

See, you haven't actually understood what I'm talking about, so no wonder you think my position/view is contradictory. I'm not saying that as an insult BTW, just a statement of fact. Countries stop getting new cases without lockdown measures when they approach the herd immunity threshold. So, if we look at New York, which got absolutely ravaged (relatively speaking), they don't have significant new cases anymore. Not because Cuomo is a genius - he's the opposite - but because there's almost nobody left to get infected. So, no, while I have been citing American examples because I am quite clearly an American, what I'm saying is relevant to every country in the world. Following a course of lockdown, social distancing and universal masking is simply an exercise in lunacy. At best it has no effect, and at worse it massively increases mortality. In short, I really don't understand the point you're making. My goal is the maximum aggregate well-being of society, thus I oppose lockdown. If my goal were a more myopic measure like "maximum lives saved" (ignoring that a life is not a life is not a life), lockdown would still be the wrong call. Now if my goal were "minimize COVID-19 mortality regardless of the cost to all-cause mortality", then lockdown may or may not be effective, I personally think that it almost certainly makes COVID-19 mortality worse in the long run full stop, but that point is more debatable. I think the first two are inarguable, though.

hcknwscommenter 6y ago
That is complete nonsense. Germany is nowhere near herd immunity threshold. Taiwan and S. Korea and Japan are no where near herd immunity threshold.
- __blockcipher__ 6y ago
  Please elaborate more. First you need to tell me what you think the threshold is; the findings in this paper suggest it could easily be like 15-25% as opposed to the previous figures of 70-90%.
  - arrrg 6y ago
    Germany has below 2 percent seroprevalence.
  - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
    keyword suggest keyword could be keyword like Yes, if you take the most wildly optimistic assumption for every single variable, when literally millions of lives are on the line, it might be 15 to 25%. Still Germany, S. Korea, Taiwan, and Japan are no where near that number.
  - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
    I don't have any idea what the threshold is. No one does. Based on what it tends to be with coronaviruses in general, 65% to 80% is expected. Could be way more or way less. That is why it simply isn't worth the risk of finding out. If it is 65%, then the costs of you being wrong about all this are astronomically bad. If you were 99% likely to be correct, this would be a different conversation. But you are not 99% likely to be correct.
    - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
      Okay, so on mobile and I’ve already talked too much in this thread so I won’t go in-depth, but you need to read the paper that this thread is about. Your estimates of the HIT are way too high because you are not accounting for the proportion of the population that is immune to COVID-19 infection despite never having come into contact with a SARS-type virus. Also instead of saying “based on coronaviruses in general” you should just say “based on the basic reproduction number”. Anyway even if HIT were 65-90% my argument is the same. But the fact that you gave that 65-80% estimate means you don’t understand the math. Factor in the preexisting t cell cross reactivity. Factor in heterogenous susceptibility (risk of infection even controlling for # of exposure events/social interactions varies heavily in the population, for example old people are much more likely to get infected) TL;DR: you need to do more background reading and update your priors. you’re operating in very stale info. I also think you’ve failed to understand my general argument outlined across this thread but I’m too tired to repeat it so I’d urge you to re-read the comments where I outline my case
      - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
        TL;DR: you are wrong. There is some tantalizing evidence that maybe just maybe there might possibly be some degree of latent t cell cross reactivity. This is not actionable information, because it very well could be false. "based on the basic reproduction number" is total nonsense. I am not basing anything on the basic reproduction number. I don't even know what you are even referring to here. I understand the math just fine. It is you who keep doing the math wrong. You are "factoring in" 3 different variables, each of which are controversial and may not even exist at all. Then you are taking the most optimistic scenario for each one of these variables, compounding your bad math three times over. Your argument is even more murderous if HIT is 65%. 65% of 7.5 billion people is 5 billion. IFR of 0.3% (which you admittedly completely made up) is 14 million dead? I'm on mobile but I think that's right. You want to kill 14 million people. Even though Japan, S. Korea, Singapore, Canada, Taiwan, Germany, Italy, Spain, heck arguably even NYC right now have proven that this can be controlled.

hcknwscommenter 6y ago

That is complete nonsense. Germany is nowhere near herd immunity threshold. Taiwan and S. Korea and Japan are no where near herd immunity threshold.

__blockcipher__ 6y ago
Please elaborate more. First you need to tell me what you think the threshold is; the findings in this paper suggest it could easily be like 15-25% as opposed to the previous figures of 70-90%.
- arrrg 6y ago
  Germany has below 2 percent seroprevalence.
- hcknwscommenter 6y ago
  keyword suggest keyword could be keyword like Yes, if you take the most wildly optimistic assumption for every single variable, when literally millions of lives are on the line, it might be 15 to 25%. Still Germany, S. Korea, Taiwan, and Japan are no where near that number.
- hcknwscommenter 6y ago
  I don't have any idea what the threshold is. No one does. Based on what it tends to be with coronaviruses in general, 65% to 80% is expected. Could be way more or way less. That is why it simply isn't worth the risk of finding out. If it is 65%, then the costs of you being wrong about all this are astronomically bad. If you were 99% likely to be correct, this would be a different conversation. But you are not 99% likely to be correct.
  - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
    Okay, so on mobile and I’ve already talked too much in this thread so I won’t go in-depth, but you need to read the paper that this thread is about. Your estimates of the HIT are way too high because you are not accounting for the proportion of the population that is immune to COVID-19 infection despite never having come into contact with a SARS-type virus. Also instead of saying “based on coronaviruses in general” you should just say “based on the basic reproduction number”. Anyway even if HIT were 65-90% my argument is the same. But the fact that you gave that 65-80% estimate means you don’t understand the math. Factor in the preexisting t cell cross reactivity. Factor in heterogenous susceptibility (risk of infection even controlling for # of exposure events/social interactions varies heavily in the population, for example old people are much more likely to get infected) TL;DR: you need to do more background reading and update your priors. you’re operating in very stale info. I also think you’ve failed to understand my general argument outlined across this thread but I’m too tired to repeat it so I’d urge you to re-read the comments where I outline my case
    - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
      TL;DR: you are wrong. There is some tantalizing evidence that maybe just maybe there might possibly be some degree of latent t cell cross reactivity. This is not actionable information, because it very well could be false. "based on the basic reproduction number" is total nonsense. I am not basing anything on the basic reproduction number. I don't even know what you are even referring to here. I understand the math just fine. It is you who keep doing the math wrong. You are "factoring in" 3 different variables, each of which are controversial and may not even exist at all. Then you are taking the most optimistic scenario for each one of these variables, compounding your bad math three times over. Your argument is even more murderous if HIT is 65%. 65% of 7.5 billion people is 5 billion. IFR of 0.3% (which you admittedly completely made up) is 14 million dead? I'm on mobile but I think that's right. You want to kill 14 million people. Even though Japan, S. Korea, Singapore, Canada, Taiwan, Germany, Italy, Spain, heck arguably even NYC right now have proven that this can be controlled.