4 ms·

With so many people ignorant of the science, believing in wild conspiracy theories, being antivaxers and antimakers, of course it's going to become endemic. It

With so many people ignorant of the science, believing in wild conspiracy theories, being antivaxers and antimakers, of course it's going to become endemic. It remains to be seen if most people will even get vaccinated if/when a safe and effective vaccine becomes available. Even if people got vaccinated once, to actually eradicate COVID-19 they might have to get revaccinated multiple times, possibly over a span of years. We can't even get everyone to get flu shots. Getting everyone to get a new vaccine to a disease towards which there's so much disbelief will be even more difficult. We eradicated smallpox, but that was a fluke. Take a look at the eradication efforts towards HIV, measles, and polio. Much more progress could be made on these fronts, but paranoia, ignorance, and long-held beliefs and behavior patterns stand in the way. Even if COVID-19 itself is eradicated, something else to consider, that virologists have been pointing out, is that there are plenty of other coronaviruses in various animal species that could make the jump to infect humans, possibly causing another pandemic which is just as bad or even worse. A major shift in thinking and priorites has to happen globally, on many different fronts to make humans less vulnerable to this kind of disease in the long-run.

mns 6y ago
You can’t just put all the “many” people in the same bucket. I hate this so much now in various circles. I also saw someone else with a similar idea: “why is there a second wave, are so many people anti maskers and non COVID believers?”. No, people had enough of the fumbling and incoherent messages, people are tired and the world is made up not just of developers that can work from home and see this pandemic from their windows while ordering food online, most of the people can’t afford to lose their jobs or stay at home. The whole world adopted this toxic US us vs. they model where everyone who doesn’t agree with you on everything is an ignorant fool and your enemy. Instead of acting with compassion and trying to convince people of the dangers of this disease, but also providing some sort of perspective of where we are going, we’re just calling everyone who has a different opinion an anti-* and be done with it.
- dehrmann 6y ago
  There's also the issue that while it's deadlier than the flu, it's not that much deadlier, so people are genuinely looking at death rates and making different value judgements on if various restrictions are worth it.
  - pmoriarty 6y ago
    "while it's deadlier than the flu, it's not that much deadlier" From just a week ago: "Covid deaths three times higher than flu and pneumonia"[1] And that's taking in to account all the lockdown, mask-wearing, and social distancing measures. Without those it'd be even worse. [1] - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-54463511 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-54463511
    - HarryHirsch 6y ago
      There's also the issue that cases of flu are remarkably low this year because of all the mask wearing, social distancing &c. Comparing apples to apples, coronaplague is about 10 times as deadly as annual flu.
      - pmoriarty 6y ago
        "cases of flu are remarkably low this year because of all the mask wearing, social distancing &c." And yet if COVID-19 was no more dangerous than the flu you'd expect to see equal result form those mask wearing and social distancing measures.. but you don't. COVID-19 is just way more deadly.
        guenthert 6y ago
        COVID-19 is just way more deadly than the typical flu might be true, but it is telling not much more than claiming COVID-19 is way more deadly than the common cold. Less than 217000 people died of COVID-19 during the epidemic in the USA while some 1.5 million people died from other causes in the same time frame. Why the obsession with COVID-19?
      - anoncake 6y ago
- pmoriarty 6y ago
  "Instead of acting with compassion and trying to convince people of the dangers of this disease" Like that hasn't been done non-stop since the world heard the term "coronavirus"? A significant percentage of the population prefer not to listen to the science and instead believe in conspiracy theories. Science literacy in the general population is abysmal. That's just a fact. Many people prefer to listen to what their morning talk show tells them than listen to the CDC. This kind of ignorance could be overcome to some extent through massive information campaigns, but so far the US government at least is incapable or unwilling to do that. If anything, on some of the highest levels it's doing quite the opposite. That kind of obviously harmful attitude is not just ignorant, it's borderline malicious. People certainly have and will probably continue to die because of it.
  - throwmeaway_pls 6y ago
    I think people can tell that bullshit has been spewed in all directions. Nobody is looking good here. Nobody is above reproach.
  - tengbretson 6y ago
    > This kind of ignorance could be overcome to some extent through massive information campaigns, but so far the US government at least is incapable or unwilling to do that. If anything, on some of the highest levels it's doing quite the opposite. I think at this point we have enough data to understand what happens when we try to force people to think or believe things on a massive scale. Its not great.
wtetzner 6y ago
> A major shift in thinking and priorites has to happen globally, on many different fronts to make humans less vulnerable to this kind of disease in the long-run. I don't necessarily disagree with this, but I don't think the current mitigations can reasonably be long-term solutions. Think about how the lockdowns have caused small businesses to close down, people to lose their jobs, etc. We count deaths caused by COVID-19, but do we count the deaths and quantify the damage caused by our mitigation strategies?
- lsllc 6y ago
  Anecdotally: in my years on this planet, I've never known anyone who committed suicide (thankfully). However in the last 3 months, I've had both a friend and a relative kill themselves unexpectedly, both laid off since March, unable to work, financial issues, no hope and one just recently in an area just gone back into lockdown. It is very much easier for those of us who are able to WFH taking Zoom meetings in PJs with Amazon Fresh delivering groceries to the door. But for a big chunk of the populace, these are really hard times. I do not know what the right answer is, but you have a very good point.
  - anoncake 6y ago
    We are killing people to save others. It's the trolley problem, except we don't even know how many we save and how many we kill.
    - mofosyne 6y ago
      Not even the trolly problems. These people do not have to die if we have equitable wellbeing support to pull them along this lockdown.
      - anoncake 6y ago
        But we don't.

mns 6y ago

You can’t just put all the “many” people in the same bucket. I hate this so much now in various circles. I also saw someone else with a similar idea: “why is there a second wave, are so many people anti maskers and non COVID believers?”. No, people had enough of the fumbling and incoherent messages, people are tired and the world is made up not just of developers that can work from home and see this pandemic from their windows while ordering food online, most of the people can’t afford to lose their jobs or stay at home. The whole world adopted this toxic US us vs. they model where everyone who doesn’t agree with you on everything is an ignorant fool and your enemy. Instead of acting with compassion and trying to convince people of the dangers of this disease, but also providing some sort of perspective of where we are going, we’re just calling everyone who has a different opinion an anti-* and be done with it.

dehrmann 6y ago
There's also the issue that while it's deadlier than the flu, it's not that much deadlier, so people are genuinely looking at death rates and making different value judgements on if various restrictions are worth it.
- pmoriarty 6y ago
  "while it's deadlier than the flu, it's not that much deadlier" From just a week ago: "Covid deaths three times higher than flu and pneumonia"[1] And that's taking in to account all the lockdown, mask-wearing, and social distancing measures. Without those it'd be even worse. [1] - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-54463511 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-54463511
  - HarryHirsch 6y ago
    There's also the issue that cases of flu are remarkably low this year because of all the mask wearing, social distancing &c. Comparing apples to apples, coronaplague is about 10 times as deadly as annual flu.
    - pmoriarty 6y ago
      "cases of flu are remarkably low this year because of all the mask wearing, social distancing &c." And yet if COVID-19 was no more dangerous than the flu you'd expect to see equal result form those mask wearing and social distancing measures.. but you don't. COVID-19 is just way more deadly.
      - guenthert 6y ago
        COVID-19 is just way more deadly than the typical flu might be true, but it is telling not much more than claiming COVID-19 is way more deadly than the common cold. Less than 217000 people died of COVID-19 during the epidemic in the USA while some 1.5 million people died from other causes in the same time frame. Why the obsession with COVID-19?
    - anoncake 6y ago
pmoriarty 6y ago
"Instead of acting with compassion and trying to convince people of the dangers of this disease" Like that hasn't been done non-stop since the world heard the term "coronavirus"? A significant percentage of the population prefer not to listen to the science and instead believe in conspiracy theories. Science literacy in the general population is abysmal. That's just a fact. Many people prefer to listen to what their morning talk show tells them than listen to the CDC. This kind of ignorance could be overcome to some extent through massive information campaigns, but so far the US government at least is incapable or unwilling to do that. If anything, on some of the highest levels it's doing quite the opposite. That kind of obviously harmful attitude is not just ignorant, it's borderline malicious. People certainly have and will probably continue to die because of it.
- throwmeaway_pls 6y ago
  I think people can tell that bullshit has been spewed in all directions. Nobody is looking good here. Nobody is above reproach.
- tengbretson 6y ago
  > This kind of ignorance could be overcome to some extent through massive information campaigns, but so far the US government at least is incapable or unwilling to do that. If anything, on some of the highest levels it's doing quite the opposite. I think at this point we have enough data to understand what happens when we try to force people to think or believe things on a massive scale. Its not great.

wtetzner 6y ago

> A major shift in thinking and priorites has to happen globally, on many different fronts to make humans less vulnerable to this kind of disease in the long-run. I don't necessarily disagree with this, but I don't think the current mitigations can reasonably be long-term solutions. Think about how the lockdowns have caused small businesses to close down, people to lose their jobs, etc. We count deaths caused by COVID-19, but do we count the deaths and quantify the damage caused by our mitigation strategies?

lsllc 6y ago
Anecdotally: in my years on this planet, I've never known anyone who committed suicide (thankfully). However in the last 3 months, I've had both a friend and a relative kill themselves unexpectedly, both laid off since March, unable to work, financial issues, no hope and one just recently in an area just gone back into lockdown. It is very much easier for those of us who are able to WFH taking Zoom meetings in PJs with Amazon Fresh delivering groceries to the door. But for a big chunk of the populace, these are really hard times. I do not know what the right answer is, but you have a very good point.
- anoncake 6y ago
  We are killing people to save others. It's the trolley problem, except we don't even know how many we save and how many we kill.
  - mofosyne 6y ago
    Not even the trolly problems. These people do not have to die if we have equitable wellbeing support to pull them along this lockdown.
    - anoncake 6y ago
      But we don't.