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> Isn't Africa doing surprisingly well? I've always wanted to ask someone personally: why is the fact that African nations haven't been overrun by COVID-19 sur

> Isn't Africa doing surprisingly well? I've always wanted to ask someone personally: why is the fact that African nations haven't been overrun by COVID-19 surprising? I mean, I live here and I'm certainly very pleased that we've had such positive outcomes. But the constant tone of surprise from foreigners was funny at first but is now mildly annoying if I'm being honest; not you, obviously, but I've read one too many op-eds that seem somewhat upset that we aren't dying in droves.

jobigoud 6y ago
The unspoken assumption is that everything else being equal african countries should have been impacted at least as much as other countries, but probably more impacted for having less intensive care units per inhabitant.
- filleduchaos 6y ago
  But everything else is not equal, is it? Ignoring material conditions is "assume a spherical cow in a vacuum" levels of bad analysis. Even at that, using intensive care unit counts as the metric worth paying attention to in a public health crisis seems rather off; public health is and should be the domain of the community, not of the hospitals. To be fair, "how likely are people to do what they're supposed to to protect their communities" is far trickier to measure than just counting hospital beds.
neuronic 6y ago
AFAIK it's basically demographics. Younger, less obese overall, not stuffed with industrial trash food over decades resulting in less comorbidities. Also, if the vitamin D angle holds, Africa is probably pretty well positioned on that front. I would REALLY like to see COVID ICU numbers in regions with a significant marine/fish diet versus others. (Although, imho, nutritional science is largely opinionated guess work with no basis in reality but an incredible ability to sell books off it).
- filleduchaos 6y ago
  I mean, I for one wouldn't be so bold as to claim that people are less sick here. For example the vast majority of my country is a holoendemic area for one of the world's deadliest diseases (malaria). Although, speaking of which, it seems nearly certain to me that there could be an interaction between malaria [antibodies] and SARS-CoV2, but very few people indeed seem interested in researching that. Oh well

jobigoud 6y ago

The unspoken assumption is that everything else being equal african countries should have been impacted at least as much as other countries, but probably more impacted for having less intensive care units per inhabitant.

filleduchaos 6y ago
But everything else is not equal, is it? Ignoring material conditions is "assume a spherical cow in a vacuum" levels of bad analysis. Even at that, using intensive care unit counts as the metric worth paying attention to in a public health crisis seems rather off; public health is and should be the domain of the community, not of the hospitals. To be fair, "how likely are people to do what they're supposed to to protect their communities" is far trickier to measure than just counting hospital beds.

neuronic 6y ago

AFAIK it's basically demographics. Younger, less obese overall, not stuffed with industrial trash food over decades resulting in less comorbidities. Also, if the vitamin D angle holds, Africa is probably pretty well positioned on that front. I would REALLY like to see COVID ICU numbers in regions with a significant marine/fish diet versus others. (Although, imho, nutritional science is largely opinionated guess work with no basis in reality but an incredible ability to sell books off it).

filleduchaos 6y ago
I mean, I for one wouldn't be so bold as to claim that people are less sick here. For example the vast majority of my country is a holoendemic area for one of the world's deadliest diseases (malaria). Although, speaking of which, it seems nearly certain to me that there could be an interaction between malaria [antibodies] and SARS-CoV2, but very few people indeed seem interested in researching that. Oh well