4 ms·

> It's like they don't understand that things are in control There are about 70,000 detected cases a day... it’s certainly the case that widespread US tourism

> It's like they don't understand that things are in control There are about 70,000 detected cases a day... it’s certainly the case that widespread US tourism in Canada by people who haven’t been tested or gone through a 14-day quarantine could result in a significant amount of virus being spread. Various US states have these restrictions on travel from other states as well, e.g. Hawaii and Maine. Massachusetts is currently requiring out of state travelers from about 40 states to get tested or quarantine for 14 days after arriving. So this is nothing to do with xenophobia. Simply governments trying to protect their citizens from a virus which kills between 0.25-0.75% of those who are infected.

ddingus 6y ago
When death rates are measured based on outcomes, as in one either recovers, or is dead, the risk is 3 to 7 percent depending on where you are in the world. (Dead people)/(recovered people) = (death rate) Doing the math based on infection ignores the fact that many cases are in progress, outcome unknown. This makes for much smaller numbers, and a less realistic risk perception based on lack of data for the scope of risk being evaluated. Flat out, we do not yet know whether active cases will turn bad. This also means death rates can and will change over time too. By tracking outcomes we can understand the impact of science and policy, as well as mother nature and how the virus itself continues to mutate. Further, there is a secondary risk of ongoing, potentially chronic, complications. People may recover, but are changed significantly. Data on that is harder to boil down. My own outcome is profound fatigue. It is significant and appears very slow to improve. Being sick was no joke. Being more tired for months on end now isn't either. And I am fortunate, due to fatigue being among the more mild of the potential bad outcomes we know about today. Surviving the virus does not always mean returning to normal. Those governments acting to prevent harm are on stronger ground than many may be aware of. The health care system costs will be serious and endure for a long time, even by measures of what governments consider a long time. In the US, that will be acute, due to our current policy. Other nations are well justified in many of their policies for this reason alone. Health care impact translates into increased death rates from other causes. Flatten the curve is about that as much as it is being able to manage the death rate direct from COVID down. Right now, death is understated and poor health outcomes more seriously missing from the policy discussion, as are the timelines and potential costs, efficacy of our potential remedies. This mess is here with us for a long time. A poorly managed, non global discussion only makes it all worse across the board, risks, costs, quality of life, etc. It is time to realize COVID is more likely to transition to endemic than we are to return to life and business as it was last year. That will be true for humans on this planet period.
- irq11 6y ago
  Calculating “death rate” with a denominator of “recovered people” is simply lying with data: of all of the covid metrics, “recovered people” is the least well reported. Of the millions and millions of people who have now had this virus and recovered without incident, only a small fraction have seen the inside of a medical facility. Only a tiny fraction of those have had “recovery” reported, and even when it is reported, it generally lags by months. The only reason you would divide “deaths” by that number is to mislead people and scare them. The overall IFR for this virus is somewhere around 0.1-0.6%. That is the actual chance a person will die if they catch it. For healthy people under the age of ~50, divide that by ten (at least).
  - ddingus 6y ago
    Given the deaths in my peer group of known, tested, infected people, the higher number I cited makes more sense. We shall see as more outcomes continue to be known. We will get better at tracking that because this virus is more likely to be endemic, forced. Having some healthy respect for this mess, rooted in basic fear and concern for the future, is just not a bad thing. As we get better at the data related to chronic complications, that info will also give people a more solid reason to live and work differently. Fact is a whole lot more people than we think will suffer a reduction in overall health too. Also not a bad thing. Frankly, I believe the outcome based death rates will fall over time as we improve our will and ability to record outcomes. I do not believe it will end up being fractions of a percent. I also believe complications, organ damage, etc... will be respectable percentages as we improve on capturing that data. We are finding immunity does not endure. We are also finding repeat cases can vary widely in severity. Add in the growing reality of it being endemic, and there is a solid basis for real concern. Ideally, we all remain able to revisit all this after a full year cycle.
  - iso1210 6y ago
    > The overall IFR for this virus is somewhere around 0.1-0.6% Do you have a good citation for this, because the Biostatics research university at Cambridge have IFR 10 times that. https://www.mrc-bsu.cam.ac.uk/now-casting/ https://www.mrc-bsu.cam.ac.uk/now-casting/

ddingus 6y ago

When death rates are measured based on outcomes, as in one either recovers, or is dead, the risk is 3 to 7 percent depending on where you are in the world. (Dead people)/(recovered people) = (death rate) Doing the math based on infection ignores the fact that many cases are in progress, outcome unknown. This makes for much smaller numbers, and a less realistic risk perception based on lack of data for the scope of risk being evaluated. Flat out, we do not yet know whether active cases will turn bad. This also means death rates can and will change over time too. By tracking outcomes we can understand the impact of science and policy, as well as mother nature and how the virus itself continues to mutate. Further, there is a secondary risk of ongoing, potentially chronic, complications. People may recover, but are changed significantly. Data on that is harder to boil down. My own outcome is profound fatigue. It is significant and appears very slow to improve. Being sick was no joke. Being more tired for months on end now isn't either. And I am fortunate, due to fatigue being among the more mild of the potential bad outcomes we know about today. Surviving the virus does not always mean returning to normal. Those governments acting to prevent harm are on stronger ground than many may be aware of. The health care system costs will be serious and endure for a long time, even by measures of what governments consider a long time. In the US, that will be acute, due to our current policy. Other nations are well justified in many of their policies for this reason alone. Health care impact translates into increased death rates from other causes. Flatten the curve is about that as much as it is being able to manage the death rate direct from COVID down. Right now, death is understated and poor health outcomes more seriously missing from the policy discussion, as are the timelines and potential costs, efficacy of our potential remedies. This mess is here with us for a long time. A poorly managed, non global discussion only makes it all worse across the board, risks, costs, quality of life, etc. It is time to realize COVID is more likely to transition to endemic than we are to return to life and business as it was last year. That will be true for humans on this planet period.

irq11 6y ago
Calculating “death rate” with a denominator of “recovered people” is simply lying with data: of all of the covid metrics, “recovered people” is the least well reported. Of the millions and millions of people who have now had this virus and recovered without incident, only a small fraction have seen the inside of a medical facility. Only a tiny fraction of those have had “recovery” reported, and even when it is reported, it generally lags by months. The only reason you would divide “deaths” by that number is to mislead people and scare them. The overall IFR for this virus is somewhere around 0.1-0.6%. That is the actual chance a person will die if they catch it. For healthy people under the age of ~50, divide that by ten (at least).
- ddingus 6y ago
  Given the deaths in my peer group of known, tested, infected people, the higher number I cited makes more sense. We shall see as more outcomes continue to be known. We will get better at tracking that because this virus is more likely to be endemic, forced. Having some healthy respect for this mess, rooted in basic fear and concern for the future, is just not a bad thing. As we get better at the data related to chronic complications, that info will also give people a more solid reason to live and work differently. Fact is a whole lot more people than we think will suffer a reduction in overall health too. Also not a bad thing. Frankly, I believe the outcome based death rates will fall over time as we improve our will and ability to record outcomes. I do not believe it will end up being fractions of a percent. I also believe complications, organ damage, etc... will be respectable percentages as we improve on capturing that data. We are finding immunity does not endure. We are also finding repeat cases can vary widely in severity. Add in the growing reality of it being endemic, and there is a solid basis for real concern. Ideally, we all remain able to revisit all this after a full year cycle.
- iso1210 6y ago
  > The overall IFR for this virus is somewhere around 0.1-0.6% Do you have a good citation for this, because the Biostatics research university at Cambridge have IFR 10 times that. https://www.mrc-bsu.cam.ac.uk/now-casting/ https://www.mrc-bsu.cam.ac.uk/now-casting/