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> Rational, educated populace doesnt explain away the difference between Italy vs Austria, Belgium & Netherlands vs Germany, the US vs Canada In the case of US

> Rational, educated populace doesnt explain away the difference between Italy vs Austria, Belgium & Netherlands vs Germany, the US vs Canada In the case of US vs Canada, perhaps it does. Canadians have a high level of trust in expert civil servants, including public health officials. There is also a general Canadian pragmatism that kicks in: politicians from across the country and across the political spectrum have handled the pandemic fairly consistently. The public remains mostly supportive of the federal, provincial and local initiatives. It has not been perfect, but we have not seen local officials warring with the Premier or the Premier warring with the PM on the issue of pandemic response. In terms of education, Canada leads the world in working-age adults with post-secondary education[0]. Though primary and secondary education is a provincial and local matter, it tends to be consistently good in most of the country. [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/business-40708421 https://www.bbc.com/news/business-40708421

refurb 6y ago
Isn’t Ontario and Quebec going through a massive 2nd wave right now? And there have been protests against the restrictions including one on Parliament Hill. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/covid-19-rally-ottawa-1.5705216 https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/covid-19-rally-ottawa-1.570...
- jskdvsksnb 6y ago
  The protests have been very small, despite the media doing their best to promote them. If you look at someone like Doug Ford, the extremely conservative, pro-business premier of Ontario, he has consistently advocated for masking and lockdowns as needed. He was tight-fisted with funds for testing, and overly eager to reopen businesses before fall/winter when outdoor dining would be untenable. That set the stage for our current outbreak, but he hasn't done anything on the level of Trump or Rick Scott.
  - treeman79 6y ago
    Had several boat parades involving many thousands of boats, crowds of tens of thousands. Media had a brief report that a boat flipped over. No other mention of the rally. Seeing daily rallies and parades Driving around now. Zero mention on local news channels. Drove threw 3 states. We saw one Biden bumper sticker. No signs. Thousands of Trump signs. Media is extremely biased in its reporting.
    - colejohnson66 6y ago
      > Drove threw 3 states. We saw one Biden bumper sticker. No signs. Thousands of Trump signs. Is it at all possible that those three states were “red” states?
      - treeman79 6y ago
        2 out of 3
- perardi 6y ago
  Canada has been going through a second wave. (Well, Ontario and Quebec are, with Winnipeg as a bubbling hot spot. But given most of the country lives in Ontario and Quebec…) https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/canada?country=~CAN https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/canada?countr... The protests have been very, very small. The population, based on polls, supports masks. https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/civic-duty-or-infringing-freedom-surveying-canadians-attitudes-about-masks-1.5114694 https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/civic-duty-or-infr... What’s going on in Canada is, I think, what’s going on in Europe: pandemic fatigue. It sucks to be socially distanced for this long, and people’s guards go down. I don’t think we are seeing the almost nihilistic denial that you see in parts of the States here; we’re just tired.
kryogen1c 6y ago
> In the case of US vs Canada remember that in the US, we're still barely in the beginning of this thing. trying to claim correctness of action is largely meaningless as we neither have herd immunity nor have felt the economic impacts of our policies. 9/10 NYC business can't pay full rent https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24574314 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24574314 personally, it seems the economic dangers are far larger than the health effects at this point. with that lens, id prefer a republican next term, even if its trump. well, id prefer a libertarian (and the first female president at that!) but thats a nonstarter for some reason.
- j2bax 6y ago
  You’d prefer someone who lies to the population and downplays science and experts in the field of epidemiology? Do you really think this is going to lead to economic recovery?
- cptroot 6y ago
  > but that's a nonstarter for some reason Yes, welcome to the nash equilibrium of polarized first past the post politics.
nemo44x 6y ago
Canada has little population density outside it’s local hubs. The virus isn’t going to spread so easily there outside of localities. The USA has more metro areas that are drivable to each other. It’s easier to spread in the USA. Look at the massive EU numbers and consider their density.
- qwerty1234599 6y ago
  Diseases mostly don't spread between strangers. They spread between family members, close relatives and friends. Everybody has those, even in rural areas. Look at past pandemics for reference, everybody was hit. The Spanish Flu spread in isolated arctic populations just as well as NYC.
- maxerickson 6y ago
  Rural places in the US are doing a dandy job of spreading it right now. In this rural county, daily new infections are at something like 400/million. That rate is arrived at with a big enough multiplier, but it is a reasonable basis for comparison. Our cumulative case / million is ~23000.
- throw0101a 6y ago
  At a country-level, I'm not sure any conclusion can be drawn for density versus (per capita) infection rates: * https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-19-death-rate-vs-population-density https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-19-death-rate-vs-po... See also: > We also find that after controlling for metropolitan population, county density is not significantly related to the infection rate, possibly due to more adherence to social distancing guidelines. However, counties with higher densities have significantly lower virus-related mortality rates than do counties with lower densities, possibly due to superior health care systems. * https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01944363.2020.1777891 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01944363.2020.1... * https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1777891 https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1777891
  - chongli 6y ago
    I think that’s because population density is notoriously hard to measure. The problem is that most countries have a mixture of big cities, rural areas, and uninhabited wilderness. Taking the total population and dividing by the total land area does not tell you anything useful about the actual proximity in which most people live in a country. On that scatterplot you linked, Canada is way down there in terms of population density. Yet the vast majority of Canada’s land area is uninhabited wilderness to the north. Most Canadians live within a narrow band of cities running parallel to the U.S. border. In addition, a significant minority live in many scattered rural areas outside of that band. So the question is: how do you measure Canada’s true population density? Do you only look at the high density band? Or do you include the rural areas? Where do you draw the line between rural and wilderness? There’s no easy answer.

refurb 6y ago

Isn’t Ontario and Quebec going through a massive 2nd wave right now? And there have been protests against the restrictions including one on Parliament Hill. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/covid-19-rally-ottawa-1.5705216 https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/covid-19-rally-ottawa-1.570...

jskdvsksnb 6y ago
The protests have been very small, despite the media doing their best to promote them. If you look at someone like Doug Ford, the extremely conservative, pro-business premier of Ontario, he has consistently advocated for masking and lockdowns as needed. He was tight-fisted with funds for testing, and overly eager to reopen businesses before fall/winter when outdoor dining would be untenable. That set the stage for our current outbreak, but he hasn't done anything on the level of Trump or Rick Scott.
- treeman79 6y ago
  Had several boat parades involving many thousands of boats, crowds of tens of thousands. Media had a brief report that a boat flipped over. No other mention of the rally. Seeing daily rallies and parades Driving around now. Zero mention on local news channels. Drove threw 3 states. We saw one Biden bumper sticker. No signs. Thousands of Trump signs. Media is extremely biased in its reporting.
  - colejohnson66 6y ago
    > Drove threw 3 states. We saw one Biden bumper sticker. No signs. Thousands of Trump signs. Is it at all possible that those three states were “red” states?
    - treeman79 6y ago
      2 out of 3
perardi 6y ago
Canada has been going through a second wave. (Well, Ontario and Quebec are, with Winnipeg as a bubbling hot spot. But given most of the country lives in Ontario and Quebec…) https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/canada?country=~CAN https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/canada?countr... The protests have been very, very small. The population, based on polls, supports masks. https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/civic-duty-or-infringing-freedom-surveying-canadians-attitudes-about-masks-1.5114694 https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/civic-duty-or-infr... What’s going on in Canada is, I think, what’s going on in Europe: pandemic fatigue. It sucks to be socially distanced for this long, and people’s guards go down. I don’t think we are seeing the almost nihilistic denial that you see in parts of the States here; we’re just tired.

kryogen1c 6y ago

> In the case of US vs Canada remember that in the US, we're still barely in the beginning of this thing. trying to claim correctness of action is largely meaningless as we neither have herd immunity nor have felt the economic impacts of our policies. 9/10 NYC business can't pay full rent https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24574314 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24574314 personally, it seems the economic dangers are far larger than the health effects at this point. with that lens, id prefer a republican next term, even if its trump. well, id prefer a libertarian (and the first female president at that!) but thats a nonstarter for some reason.

j2bax 6y ago
You’d prefer someone who lies to the population and downplays science and experts in the field of epidemiology? Do you really think this is going to lead to economic recovery?
cptroot 6y ago
> but that's a nonstarter for some reason Yes, welcome to the nash equilibrium of polarized first past the post politics.

nemo44x 6y ago

Canada has little population density outside it’s local hubs. The virus isn’t going to spread so easily there outside of localities. The USA has more metro areas that are drivable to each other. It’s easier to spread in the USA. Look at the massive EU numbers and consider their density.

qwerty1234599 6y ago
Diseases mostly don't spread between strangers. They spread between family members, close relatives and friends. Everybody has those, even in rural areas. Look at past pandemics for reference, everybody was hit. The Spanish Flu spread in isolated arctic populations just as well as NYC.
maxerickson 6y ago
Rural places in the US are doing a dandy job of spreading it right now. In this rural county, daily new infections are at something like 400/million. That rate is arrived at with a big enough multiplier, but it is a reasonable basis for comparison. Our cumulative case / million is ~23000.
throw0101a 6y ago
At a country-level, I'm not sure any conclusion can be drawn for density versus (per capita) infection rates: * https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-19-death-rate-vs-population-density https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-19-death-rate-vs-po... See also: > We also find that after controlling for metropolitan population, county density is not significantly related to the infection rate, possibly due to more adherence to social distancing guidelines. However, counties with higher densities have significantly lower virus-related mortality rates than do counties with lower densities, possibly due to superior health care systems. * https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01944363.2020.1777891 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01944363.2020.1... * https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1777891 https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1777891
- chongli 6y ago
  I think that’s because population density is notoriously hard to measure. The problem is that most countries have a mixture of big cities, rural areas, and uninhabited wilderness. Taking the total population and dividing by the total land area does not tell you anything useful about the actual proximity in which most people live in a country. On that scatterplot you linked, Canada is way down there in terms of population density. Yet the vast majority of Canada’s land area is uninhabited wilderness to the north. Most Canadians live within a narrow band of cities running parallel to the U.S. border. In addition, a significant minority live in many scattered rural areas outside of that band. So the question is: how do you measure Canada’s true population density? Do you only look at the high density band? Or do you include the rural areas? Where do you draw the line between rural and wilderness? There’s no easy answer.