3 ms·

Is there any scientific evidence that this kind of excessive cleaning had any impact on COVID? What was the cost-benefit-analysis, how many years of life were s

Is there any scientific evidence that this kind of excessive cleaning had any impact on COVID? What was the cost-benefit-analysis, how many years of life were saved per $, and how does that compare to other health interventions? If we just banned junk food at these schools, but let COVID run rampant (the number of children and teenagers dead from COVID is essentially statistical noise), would we have improved health in the long-run? My impression is that many of these cleaners realised they had a 'bullshit job' and were slacking off or not actually at the premises, particularly if the work was done after-hours. I think the bigger issue here is that we need to unwind all of these COVID distortions and get back to normal.

yoz-y 6y ago
> I think the bigger issue here is that we need to unwind all of these COVID distortions and get back to normal. At >110% ICU occupancy (and >150% in my city), let's not yet.
loloquwowndueo 6y ago
Way to deflect the actual issue. The things you mention can be solved by actual supervision (you know, a supervisor doing their job) and old-fashioned time clock. The issue here is expecting the employee to install a spying app on their personal phone. If it’s that important, they should give the employee a work phone with the app.
- ArkanExplorer 6y ago
  Its not economically realistic to expect physical supervision, when this kind of cleaning work is typically fully distributed across multiple sites. As part of the contract a worker would probably drive to a school at 5pm, clean it for a few hours, drive home. Some workers probably realised that there was no one actually validating their work, and didn't show up or only 'worked' for a short period of time. Its unreasonable to provide a work phone which then comes with a lot of corporate overhead and device management, for something which is probably just a temporary contract. It seems completely reasonable to agree to location tracking as part of these jobs, since it makes the management and supervision process more efficient. Workers can buy cheap Android phones and run them on WiFi if they wish to separate their work device from their personal device.
  - JanisL 6y ago
    If it's cheap to buy a phone then I think the management at the company absolutely should be buying the phone, I just fail to see why the employee should be forced to install something on their own phone for work. It sounds all this "efficiency" ends up in the favor of the company and in a way that just seems out of balance.
  - loloquwowndueo 6y ago
    Sure but this will not help the actual “employee cheats” problem :) just buy that cheap android phone, leave it in the locker, and set a network scheduler app up to enable/disable at specific times so it doesn’t look like the device is there all the time. Also if these cheap Android phones exist and are usable, you’re contradicting yourself when saying it can’t be provided by the employer. They could allow employee to expense the device.
MagnumOpus 6y ago
Measures taken in schools are/were not to save lives of kids (who die in 0.0001% of cases). They are to prevent kids catching it and infecting teachers and grandparents at home. This latter risk is not hypothetical - anecdotally my kid's primary school had one teacher die (in their early 50s), and in more general terms, school re-openings after lockdowns reliably seem to lead to spikes in deaths in elderly a month later.
moystard 6y ago
So your reaction to this article is to assume that she was actually guilty of slacking off, and that was the reason for her not installing the application. All that because she had a "bullshit" job with poor cost-benefit. This is surreal. We should all be concerned, as employees and as citizens, of companies asking their staff to install monitoring applications (especially on their personal devices). These applications are not open-source, there is no way to audit what they do with the collected data. Worse, there is nothing preventing them from changing their collection, sharing, storage practices, and those employees would be unable to remove the said application because they would be fired. What a sad world we live in, where employees are assumed to be slacking off (like you just did with your extremely caricatural comment) if they are not tracked. The relationship should be built on trust, and common interest, not fear.
- moystard 6y ago
  I cannot edit my comment, and want to clarify one point: I don't think that she had a "bullshit" job, nor did I draw any conclusion on the effectiveness of frequent cleaning and disinfection. I was referring to the statement of the parent comment.

yoz-y 6y ago

> I think the bigger issue here is that we need to unwind all of these COVID distortions and get back to normal. At >110% ICU occupancy (and >150% in my city), let's not yet.

loloquwowndueo 6y ago

Way to deflect the actual issue. The things you mention can be solved by actual supervision (you know, a supervisor doing their job) and old-fashioned time clock. The issue here is expecting the employee to install a spying app on their personal phone. If it’s that important, they should give the employee a work phone with the app.

ArkanExplorer 6y ago
Its not economically realistic to expect physical supervision, when this kind of cleaning work is typically fully distributed across multiple sites. As part of the contract a worker would probably drive to a school at 5pm, clean it for a few hours, drive home. Some workers probably realised that there was no one actually validating their work, and didn't show up or only 'worked' for a short period of time. Its unreasonable to provide a work phone which then comes with a lot of corporate overhead and device management, for something which is probably just a temporary contract. It seems completely reasonable to agree to location tracking as part of these jobs, since it makes the management and supervision process more efficient. Workers can buy cheap Android phones and run them on WiFi if they wish to separate their work device from their personal device.
- JanisL 6y ago
  If it's cheap to buy a phone then I think the management at the company absolutely should be buying the phone, I just fail to see why the employee should be forced to install something on their own phone for work. It sounds all this "efficiency" ends up in the favor of the company and in a way that just seems out of balance.
- loloquwowndueo 6y ago
  Sure but this will not help the actual “employee cheats” problem :) just buy that cheap android phone, leave it in the locker, and set a network scheduler app up to enable/disable at specific times so it doesn’t look like the device is there all the time. Also if these cheap Android phones exist and are usable, you’re contradicting yourself when saying it can’t be provided by the employer. They could allow employee to expense the device.

MagnumOpus 6y ago

Measures taken in schools are/were not to save lives of kids (who die in 0.0001% of cases). They are to prevent kids catching it and infecting teachers and grandparents at home. This latter risk is not hypothetical - anecdotally my kid's primary school had one teacher die (in their early 50s), and in more general terms, school re-openings after lockdowns reliably seem to lead to spikes in deaths in elderly a month later.

moystard 6y ago

So your reaction to this article is to assume that she was actually guilty of slacking off, and that was the reason for her not installing the application. All that because she had a "bullshit" job with poor cost-benefit. This is surreal. We should all be concerned, as employees and as citizens, of companies asking their staff to install monitoring applications (especially on their personal devices). These applications are not open-source, there is no way to audit what they do with the collected data. Worse, there is nothing preventing them from changing their collection, sharing, storage practices, and those employees would be unable to remove the said application because they would be fired. What a sad world we live in, where employees are assumed to be slacking off (like you just did with your extremely caricatural comment) if they are not tracked. The relationship should be built on trust, and common interest, not fear.

moystard 6y ago
I cannot edit my comment, and want to clarify one point: I don't think that she had a "bullshit" job, nor did I draw any conclusion on the effectiveness of frequent cleaning and disinfection. I was referring to the statement of the parent comment.