3 ms·

> Perhaps unpopular opinion If I was responsible for policy, I would ask (have asked) a scientist to model this rather than stating it as opinion. I suspect t

> Perhaps unpopular opinion If I was responsible for policy, I would ask (have asked) a scientist to model this rather than stating it as opinion. I suspect that any model would just show you to be extremely wrong, for a virus which is already circulating freely.

8ytecoder 6y ago
It’s not a scientific problem. The scientific solution to contain the pandemic would be a full 21 day absolute shutdown of everything with people surviving on rations. It becomes a political problem if you try to do that in any functioning democracy. Decisions made about people must have a feedback loop to learn from how people react to it. For example, the lockdown became ineffective when it was extended too long. People were initially very compliant. We were told it’s only till we can prepare our hospitals and prepare a contact tracing strategy. It was convenient for politicians to extend the lockdown than solve those two problems. Net result was that people started ignoring the lockdown more and more. Police can enforce bans on outdoor gatherings; people simply gather at home. It’s precisely because we ignore the human element that we keep dragging this.
- statstutor 6y ago
  None of that is relevant to vaccination. I agree it's a political problem - a political solution is proven by Asian democracies and Australasian democracies. As you say, it was pretty obvious that a 21-day lockdown with appropriate testing and follow-up would have resolved this issue in any country. The people's right to have an opinion does not change the truth, that an indefinitely long half-lockdown is a bad compromise between opinions.
  - sharken 6y ago
    We all want to resume our normal lives, but introducing lockdowns as mentioned here in a european country would just not be acceptable. If the alternative is the imperfect half-lockdown then so be it. What matters now is a sharp focus on when normal life can resume. In my view that point is when the elderly and people with comorbidities have been vaccinated, which is within reach now.
    - statstutor 6y ago
      > would just not be acceptable. Why not? Just because a bunch of people hold that opinion? Political change happens despite groups of people not wanting it - that's almost the definition of politics. Scientists working for the UK government at Imperial College rejected lockdown as a plan (even what we have now in the UK) because they found it not politically viable: that's a danger to everyone.
- ryandrake 6y ago
  There was no lockdown in any state in the USA. There were instead these totally unenforced “stay at home” orders which people ignored with no consequences. Emergency public health directives during a catastrophe do not need a feedback loop: they need to be enforced, regularly and visibly. That never happened on the USA, and the results have been tragic and predictable.
- GuB-42 6y ago
  > The scientific solution to contain the pandemic would be a full 21 day absolute shutdown of everything with people surviving on rations. It is not even a guaranteed solution. It will bring back cases to almost zero. In some rare cases, incubation time can be way longer than 21 days, you are also going to have people with weak immune systems that can contain the infection but not eliminate it completely, plus all the bad things that can happen: mutations, animal transmission, etc... Then, if we just go back to business as usual after the super-lockdown, it will spread again, just as it started. As long as R>1 there is no way to win. And for now the only way to keep R<1 is to make our lives more or less miserable (today's solution), herd immunity through infections (and let millions die), and herd immunity though vaccines (our goal).
  - statstutor 6y ago
    > plus all the bad things that can happen: mutations, animal transmission, etc... I believe that no significant mutation has been sourced to any country with less than a million cases. That's not a coincidence. Increased cases = increased mutation incubators.

8ytecoder 6y ago

It’s not a scientific problem. The scientific solution to contain the pandemic would be a full 21 day absolute shutdown of everything with people surviving on rations. It becomes a political problem if you try to do that in any functioning democracy. Decisions made about people must have a feedback loop to learn from how people react to it. For example, the lockdown became ineffective when it was extended too long. People were initially very compliant. We were told it’s only till we can prepare our hospitals and prepare a contact tracing strategy. It was convenient for politicians to extend the lockdown than solve those two problems. Net result was that people started ignoring the lockdown more and more. Police can enforce bans on outdoor gatherings; people simply gather at home. It’s precisely because we ignore the human element that we keep dragging this.

statstutor 6y ago
None of that is relevant to vaccination. I agree it's a political problem - a political solution is proven by Asian democracies and Australasian democracies. As you say, it was pretty obvious that a 21-day lockdown with appropriate testing and follow-up would have resolved this issue in any country. The people's right to have an opinion does not change the truth, that an indefinitely long half-lockdown is a bad compromise between opinions.
- sharken 6y ago
  We all want to resume our normal lives, but introducing lockdowns as mentioned here in a european country would just not be acceptable. If the alternative is the imperfect half-lockdown then so be it. What matters now is a sharp focus on when normal life can resume. In my view that point is when the elderly and people with comorbidities have been vaccinated, which is within reach now.
  - statstutor 6y ago
    > would just not be acceptable. Why not? Just because a bunch of people hold that opinion? Political change happens despite groups of people not wanting it - that's almost the definition of politics. Scientists working for the UK government at Imperial College rejected lockdown as a plan (even what we have now in the UK) because they found it not politically viable: that's a danger to everyone.
ryandrake 6y ago
There was no lockdown in any state in the USA. There were instead these totally unenforced “stay at home” orders which people ignored with no consequences. Emergency public health directives during a catastrophe do not need a feedback loop: they need to be enforced, regularly and visibly. That never happened on the USA, and the results have been tragic and predictable.
GuB-42 6y ago
> The scientific solution to contain the pandemic would be a full 21 day absolute shutdown of everything with people surviving on rations. It is not even a guaranteed solution. It will bring back cases to almost zero. In some rare cases, incubation time can be way longer than 21 days, you are also going to have people with weak immune systems that can contain the infection but not eliminate it completely, plus all the bad things that can happen: mutations, animal transmission, etc... Then, if we just go back to business as usual after the super-lockdown, it will spread again, just as it started. As long as R>1 there is no way to win. And for now the only way to keep R<1 is to make our lives more or less miserable (today's solution), herd immunity through infections (and let millions die), and herd immunity though vaccines (our goal).
- statstutor 6y ago
  > plus all the bad things that can happen: mutations, animal transmission, etc... I believe that no significant mutation has been sourced to any country with less than a million cases. That's not a coincidence. Increased cases = increased mutation incubators.