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> With more than 230,000 Americans dead from a virus that could have been contained It could not have been "contained" in the United States. Half the (ineffect

by m0zg 6y ago

> With more than 230,000 Americans dead from a virus that could have been contained It could not have been "contained" in the United States. Half the (ineffectual) stuff we do now is unconstitutional. You cannot restrict religious or other forms of peaceable assembly under our constitution. We've observed quite a bit of that in the past few months. Moreover, 230K is 1/10th the projected number of deaths (2.2M). The "if we do everything almost perfectly" scenario according to Dr Deborah Birx: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzl1E4x-k2w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzl1E4x-k2w

eecc 6y ago
Hold on, the third surge is coming and your country doesn’t seem to be willing to take it seriously...
w0utert 6y ago
This part of the US perspective on covid-19 I don't understand. Everywhere I keep reading comments that suggest you pretty much deserved what you got and americans only have themselves to blame because 'if everyone just wore masks' it 'could have been contained'. Literally nothing suggests that, no other country in the world shows any statistics to back this up, and the situation is pretty much as bad as or worse in many parts of the world that did mandate masks and had lock-downs, while it is much better in other parts of the world that did none of these things. Europe is the prime example of this, there's so much variation in the measures that different countries took, but I literally see zero correlation with infection rates or deaths, not up until the point where countries go into lock-downs that dramatically limit the movement of people and the chance of getting in contact with 'strangers' that you would never get in contact with if you worked from home, did not go to bars or restaurants, did not use public transport, etc. But these measures are not sustainable long-term, so sooner or later they are relaxed and the infections start to go up again, with or without face masks, with or without people doing 'everything in their power to stop the virus' because they are traumatised by the first wave. Just look at Italy, one of the hardest hit countries in Europe in the first wave, and the place they are now in again. If anything, the countries that were the first to issue mask mandates and kept expanding them (Italy, France, Spain, Belgium) are now all at the bottom of the list in terms of covid infections and deaths in the second wave. I'll probably get downvoted into oblivion by saying as much because it's already clear to me that in the US wearing face masks is more like a religion or a political statement, but alas... The main point I wanted to make is that blaming yourself and others for the situation you are in because it 'would have been easy to contain, if only...' is not backed up by any evidence, and IMO just a form of self-torture.
- garmaine 6y ago
  > Literally nothing suggests that, no other country in the world has any statistics to back this up New Zealand. Taiwan. Vietnam. South Korea.
  - w0utert 6y ago
    Yeah it's a lot easier if you are an island, go into super strict lock-down, and can do super-efficient (and privacy invasive) contact tracing before the number of infections even goes over 1 in 100K, like in the countries you mentioned. .. That doesn't contradict anything I said though, I was only commenting on the US situation and whether it could have been contained by 'just wearing masks'.
    - _Microft 6y ago
      To all intents and purposes, the USA are an island. They have just two land borders with neighbours they have somewhat acceptable relations with. I think the real issue they have is the unwillingness to cooperate with the other two measures: lockdowns (clashes with "freedom", at least temporarily) to reduce the number of cases to a range where they can be contact traced and then to allow contact tracing (I would guess this is because of a lack of trust in the government) to actually find people that might become infectious before they actually do. BTW "Just wearing masks" is not the solution but part of it.
    - jmull 6y ago
      Few think wearing masks alone could contain the virus. (Be wary of inventing quotes to make your argument.) It’s just the simplest, easiest thing most people can do that is effective. A no-brainer first step that slows down the spread, and consequently saves lives and/or lessens the need for harsher measures, like lockdowns.
  - yread 6y ago
    Mongolia, Thailand
    - 6y ago
hellotomyrars 6y ago
The 2.2 million number was the projected number (In March) of deaths with no mitigation taken. 200,000 is what Dr. Birx said then, in March. We're in November now, and it's surging again. Less people are dying as we've learned how to best treat it, but the biggest risks are with overwhelming healthcare resources and that's exactly what is starting to happen as cases begin to surge, once again. We could have done better as a country. It's hard to see how anyone could argue against that. Regardless of how you feel politically, the response in the US has been poorly coordinated at best.
- m0zg 6y ago
  People are dying at a much lower rate, we have the highest testing throughput in the world (and still growing), and if mainstream press is to be believed, we're a month or two from deploying a "95% effective" vaccine. We'll be fine.
  - exogeny 6y ago
    Will be fine, future tense. The future tense being “fine” does not mean that intolerable incompetence didn’t already occur.
  - hellotomyrars 6y ago
    There are also plenty deleterious long-term effects from Covid infections that aren't outright dying. We'll be fine (most of us, eventually, on a long enough timeline). That doesn't excuse the failure to meaningfully respond to the issue in the first place.

by m0zg 6y ago

eecc 6y ago

Hold on, the third surge is coming and your country doesn’t seem to be willing to take it seriously...

w0utert 6y ago

This part of the US perspective on covid-19 I don't understand. Everywhere I keep reading comments that suggest you pretty much deserved what you got and americans only have themselves to blame because 'if everyone just wore masks' it 'could have been contained'. Literally nothing suggests that, no other country in the world shows any statistics to back this up, and the situation is pretty much as bad as or worse in many parts of the world that did mandate masks and had lock-downs, while it is much better in other parts of the world that did none of these things. Europe is the prime example of this, there's so much variation in the measures that different countries took, but I literally see zero correlation with infection rates or deaths, not up until the point where countries go into lock-downs that dramatically limit the movement of people and the chance of getting in contact with 'strangers' that you would never get in contact with if you worked from home, did not go to bars or restaurants, did not use public transport, etc. But these measures are not sustainable long-term, so sooner or later they are relaxed and the infections start to go up again, with or without face masks, with or without people doing 'everything in their power to stop the virus' because they are traumatised by the first wave. Just look at Italy, one of the hardest hit countries in Europe in the first wave, and the place they are now in again. If anything, the countries that were the first to issue mask mandates and kept expanding them (Italy, France, Spain, Belgium) are now all at the bottom of the list in terms of covid infections and deaths in the second wave. I'll probably get downvoted into oblivion by saying as much because it's already clear to me that in the US wearing face masks is more like a religion or a political statement, but alas... The main point I wanted to make is that blaming yourself and others for the situation you are in because it 'would have been easy to contain, if only...' is not backed up by any evidence, and IMO just a form of self-torture.

garmaine 6y ago
> Literally nothing suggests that, no other country in the world has any statistics to back this up New Zealand. Taiwan. Vietnam. South Korea.
- w0utert 6y ago
  Yeah it's a lot easier if you are an island, go into super strict lock-down, and can do super-efficient (and privacy invasive) contact tracing before the number of infections even goes over 1 in 100K, like in the countries you mentioned. .. That doesn't contradict anything I said though, I was only commenting on the US situation and whether it could have been contained by 'just wearing masks'.
  - _Microft 6y ago
    To all intents and purposes, the USA are an island. They have just two land borders with neighbours they have somewhat acceptable relations with. I think the real issue they have is the unwillingness to cooperate with the other two measures: lockdowns (clashes with "freedom", at least temporarily) to reduce the number of cases to a range where they can be contact traced and then to allow contact tracing (I would guess this is because of a lack of trust in the government) to actually find people that might become infectious before they actually do. BTW "Just wearing masks" is not the solution but part of it.
  - jmull 6y ago
    Few think wearing masks alone could contain the virus. (Be wary of inventing quotes to make your argument.) It’s just the simplest, easiest thing most people can do that is effective. A no-brainer first step that slows down the spread, and consequently saves lives and/or lessens the need for harsher measures, like lockdowns.
- yread 6y ago
  Mongolia, Thailand
  - 6y ago

hellotomyrars 6y ago

The 2.2 million number was the projected number (In March) of deaths with no mitigation taken. 200,000 is what Dr. Birx said then, in March. We're in November now, and it's surging again. Less people are dying as we've learned how to best treat it, but the biggest risks are with overwhelming healthcare resources and that's exactly what is starting to happen as cases begin to surge, once again. We could have done better as a country. It's hard to see how anyone could argue against that. Regardless of how you feel politically, the response in the US has been poorly coordinated at best.

m0zg 6y ago
People are dying at a much lower rate, we have the highest testing throughput in the world (and still growing), and if mainstream press is to be believed, we're a month or two from deploying a "95% effective" vaccine. We'll be fine.
- exogeny 6y ago
  Will be fine, future tense. The future tense being “fine” does not mean that intolerable incompetence didn’t already occur.
- hellotomyrars 6y ago
  There are also plenty deleterious long-term effects from Covid infections that aren't outright dying. We'll be fine (most of us, eventually, on a long enough timeline). That doesn't excuse the failure to meaningfully respond to the issue in the first place.