4 ms·

Right? This idea that just because we're at the levels we were over the summer means we can open everything up is just insane. We're so close to the end of this

Right? This idea that just because we're at the levels we were over the summer means we can open everything up is just insane. We're so close to the end of this so why risk it. Why do schools need to open right before the end of the school year? Certainly don't think theme parks and movie theaters (which are serving food) should be open. Ah well, I got my first shot yesterday so soon I wont have to worry about everyone else.

wffurr 6y ago
My state (MA) is at 5X over summer case levels and somehow proceeding with reopening. It boggles my mind.
- BurningFrog 6y ago
  I have the same reaction to this as one year ago when people said "only X people have died, so what's the big deal?". In both cases, the important thing is the exponential growth (shrinkage?) in the other direction. Not the absolute numbers right now.
- tjs8rj 6y ago
  New infections isn’t the metric people care about - if young people get sick then there’s little harm. The metric is deaths, and MA is trending with its lowest new deaths from covid since nearly the beginning of the pandemic
  - wffurr 6y ago
    "little harm" is an anodyne way to talk about people dying and suffering. Maybe not as many, but I sure as hell don't want to take my chances and catch it. Also are you sure about that metric? This chart looks like deaths/day are 2X above summer levels (30 vs 15): https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/10/nation/latest-coronavirus-numbers-massachusetts/?p1=Covid_Widget https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/10/nation/latest-coronav... "Only" 2X deaths per day when cases are 5X per day is an improvement, but I am not rushing to eat indoors or go to a concert or gym. In fact, I am nervous as hell that loosened restrictions are going to increase spread the way they did last fall, and a bunch of people are going to get sick, suffer, and maybe die who wouldn't if we just buckled down for another month or two and got vaccinated.
  - wffurr 6y ago
    "Little harm": https://twitter.com/a_straight_line/status/1371492539451183106 https://twitter.com/a_straight_line/status/13714925394511831...
kaczordon 6y ago
Because schools should never have been closed. People keep talking about “the science” yet refuse to follow it when it’s been shown many times that schools are safe to open.
- fossuser 6y ago
  Because the arguments are bad. It’s not “the science” it’s the arguments. Throughout this pandemic “science” as authority has argued masks don’t work, or that they only work for healthcare workers, or that second order effects make it worse, or that it’s not spread via the air, etc. The school arguments are similarly dumb. In an enclosed poorly ventilated space the disease will spread and infect parents at home. I don’t buy that schools are somehow magic places not affected by this. Just because kids don’t have severe cases often doesn’t mean they don’t transmit the disease. Unless there’s a compelling mechanism that suggests otherwise I put “schools are safe to open” alongside “masks don’t work” in the group of dumb arguments that don’t make sense when you think about it for ten seconds.
  - disgruntledphd2 6y ago
    Well, the evidence from Europe (which mostly re-opened schools in Sept/Oct) would suggest that schools weren't a major source of transmission. And to be brutally honest, closing bars and restaurants so that schools can open seems like a fair trade to me (and our child is six months old, so this isn't a self-serving argument).
- tdeck 6y ago
  Look at these data: https://data.chhs.ca.gov/dataset/covid-19-outbreak-data/resource/165980a2-ecb7-464a-980e-f432701d77ef?filters=IndividualSetting%3AElementary+and+secondary+schools https://data.chhs.ca.gov/dataset/covid-19-outbreak-data/reso... There have been 119 outbreaks at California schools in the last 2 months. That's hardly what I'd call "safe".

wffurr 6y ago

My state (MA) is at 5X over summer case levels and somehow proceeding with reopening. It boggles my mind.

BurningFrog 6y ago
I have the same reaction to this as one year ago when people said "only X people have died, so what's the big deal?". In both cases, the important thing is the exponential growth (shrinkage?) in the other direction. Not the absolute numbers right now.
tjs8rj 6y ago
New infections isn’t the metric people care about - if young people get sick then there’s little harm. The metric is deaths, and MA is trending with its lowest new deaths from covid since nearly the beginning of the pandemic
- wffurr 6y ago
  "little harm" is an anodyne way to talk about people dying and suffering. Maybe not as many, but I sure as hell don't want to take my chances and catch it. Also are you sure about that metric? This chart looks like deaths/day are 2X above summer levels (30 vs 15): https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/10/nation/latest-coronavirus-numbers-massachusetts/?p1=Covid_Widget https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/10/nation/latest-coronav... "Only" 2X deaths per day when cases are 5X per day is an improvement, but I am not rushing to eat indoors or go to a concert or gym. In fact, I am nervous as hell that loosened restrictions are going to increase spread the way they did last fall, and a bunch of people are going to get sick, suffer, and maybe die who wouldn't if we just buckled down for another month or two and got vaccinated.
- wffurr 6y ago
  "Little harm": https://twitter.com/a_straight_line/status/1371492539451183106 https://twitter.com/a_straight_line/status/13714925394511831...

kaczordon 6y ago

Because schools should never have been closed. People keep talking about “the science” yet refuse to follow it when it’s been shown many times that schools are safe to open.

fossuser 6y ago
Because the arguments are bad. It’s not “the science” it’s the arguments. Throughout this pandemic “science” as authority has argued masks don’t work, or that they only work for healthcare workers, or that second order effects make it worse, or that it’s not spread via the air, etc. The school arguments are similarly dumb. In an enclosed poorly ventilated space the disease will spread and infect parents at home. I don’t buy that schools are somehow magic places not affected by this. Just because kids don’t have severe cases often doesn’t mean they don’t transmit the disease. Unless there’s a compelling mechanism that suggests otherwise I put “schools are safe to open” alongside “masks don’t work” in the group of dumb arguments that don’t make sense when you think about it for ten seconds.
- disgruntledphd2 6y ago
  Well, the evidence from Europe (which mostly re-opened schools in Sept/Oct) would suggest that schools weren't a major source of transmission. And to be brutally honest, closing bars and restaurants so that schools can open seems like a fair trade to me (and our child is six months old, so this isn't a self-serving argument).
tdeck 6y ago
Look at these data: https://data.chhs.ca.gov/dataset/covid-19-outbreak-data/resource/165980a2-ecb7-464a-980e-f432701d77ef?filters=IndividualSetting%3AElementary+and+secondary+schools https://data.chhs.ca.gov/dataset/covid-19-outbreak-data/reso... There have been 119 outbreaks at California schools in the last 2 months. That's hardly what I'd call "safe".