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The thing about excess deaths that I hope we can all appreciate is that it is not a political measure. We can argue about if those deaths were caused by COVID o

The thing about excess deaths that I hope we can all appreciate is that it is not a political measure. We can argue about if those deaths were caused by COVID or by the response to it. But we can’t argue about the magnitude of the catastrophe overall. The body bags don’t lie.

cycrutchfield 5y ago
Oh, you will find plenty of people that are more than happy to argue about the magnitude of body bags. We are no longer bound by the strictures of objective facts.
- jensv 5y ago
  What about deaths due to smoking or obesity? Should we ban bacon and cigarettes? "Smoking is the leading cause of preventable death. Worldwide, tobacco use causes more than 7 million deaths per year. If the pattern of smoking all over the globe doesn't change, more than 8 million people a year will die from diseases related to tobacco use by 2030.Mar. 23, 2020" "Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally, with at least 2.8 million people dying each year as a result of being overweight or obese. Once associated with high-income countries, obesity is now also prevalent in low- and middle-income countries.Jun. 9, 2021"
  - 8note 5y ago
    Relevance?
  - commandlinefan 5y ago
    Well, not that I remotely agree with the ridiculous overreaction to COVID, world-wide, nor do I think any of this is reasonable, but you can’t give somebody smoking or obesity by sneezing on them - you can with Coronavirus. So it’s still apples to oranges.
    - lambdaba 5y ago
      Isn't it probable that people most at risk are also more likely to spread the virus? They would shed much more virus, wouldn't they? So it's not so simple, someone who has a better functioning immune system represents a lesser risk to others. Is there a counterargument? I do recall some studies acknowledge this, but I don't have a reference.
      - mlac 5y ago
        Yes - the counter argument is that people who are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic (think seasonal allergies or “it’s just a cold”) will go about their lives as normal. And this, for many, involves not washing hands after using the restroom, mild coughing and sneezing into their hand and touching things, and spreading germs through close conversations. There were always people at the office that showed up with a fever, clearly exposing everyone on the bus and at the office, but for a large number of people, this is just one that we would have pushed through. If you get covid with moderate symptoms, you (hopefully) stay home. People with severe symptoms go to the hospital or die. You don’t need to worry about those people being super spreaders. It’s the people that push through or feel mild symptoms and carry on without thought that are giving it to others, and those in turn may accidentally give it to the most vulnerable in their bubble. And I hope when you or I get it, that it does feel just like a cold - or is even asymptomatic. But I know that for some percentage of the world it is not, and it will kill them. This is probably too simple, but: Transmission = infectiousness x interactions. In your example, People with weak immune systems, who are more infectious, are less likely to have interactions.
  - gilbetron 5y ago
    We did ban smoking in public spaces because of the same reasoning as with Covid - it's ok to do dumb things that affect yourself, but not if it affects others.
    - josephcsible 5y ago
      Why don't we ban driving? We'd save a lot of lives lost to car crashes. And a lot of those lives are passengers and pedestrians, i.e., "others".
      - galago 5y ago
        Driving is heavily regulated in terms of what kind of cars are legal and how and where they can be operated. Its just a matter of degrees and cost/benefit as assessed by the public. We don't ban driving outright but be ban all kinds of automotive use.
        josephcsible 5y ago
        > Its just a matter of degrees and cost/benefit as assessed by the public. That's the point, though: COVID lockdowns happened even though much of the public said the benefits of locking down weren't worth the costs.
        nwiswell 5y ago
        > much of the public Was it at least half of the public, though? Just because cars are a less contentious subject doesn't mean that public opinion doesn't ultimately dictate how they are regulated.
      - nwiswell 5y ago
        Because the modern world depends on the automobile, and from a utilitarian point of view the modern world has still had a positive effect on life expectancy. Car culture should not be a foregone conclusion, though -- you are right about that. Many European nations -- the Netherlands being the typical example -- have done a pretty good job of fostering a bike culture in their cities. But us Americans sure love our cars, and so it's ultimately a political question, not a moral one.
nickff 5y ago
If everyone accepts the statistics, the argument usually moves to the counter-factuals.
nraynaud 5y ago
We are talking about statistics that a machine created here, not body bags. They trained a machine on a subset and generated the unknown values.
- jmalicki 5y ago
  The machine is generating the counter-factual baseline, the body bags are very real and only counted.

cycrutchfield 5y ago

Oh, you will find plenty of people that are more than happy to argue about the magnitude of body bags. We are no longer bound by the strictures of objective facts.

jensv 5y ago
What about deaths due to smoking or obesity? Should we ban bacon and cigarettes? "Smoking is the leading cause of preventable death. Worldwide, tobacco use causes more than 7 million deaths per year. If the pattern of smoking all over the globe doesn't change, more than 8 million people a year will die from diseases related to tobacco use by 2030.Mar. 23, 2020" "Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally, with at least 2.8 million people dying each year as a result of being overweight or obese. Once associated with high-income countries, obesity is now also prevalent in low- and middle-income countries.Jun. 9, 2021"
- 8note 5y ago
  Relevance?
- commandlinefan 5y ago
  Well, not that I remotely agree with the ridiculous overreaction to COVID, world-wide, nor do I think any of this is reasonable, but you can’t give somebody smoking or obesity by sneezing on them - you can with Coronavirus. So it’s still apples to oranges.
  - lambdaba 5y ago
    Isn't it probable that people most at risk are also more likely to spread the virus? They would shed much more virus, wouldn't they? So it's not so simple, someone who has a better functioning immune system represents a lesser risk to others. Is there a counterargument? I do recall some studies acknowledge this, but I don't have a reference.
    - mlac 5y ago
      Yes - the counter argument is that people who are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic (think seasonal allergies or “it’s just a cold”) will go about their lives as normal. And this, for many, involves not washing hands after using the restroom, mild coughing and sneezing into their hand and touching things, and spreading germs through close conversations. There were always people at the office that showed up with a fever, clearly exposing everyone on the bus and at the office, but for a large number of people, this is just one that we would have pushed through. If you get covid with moderate symptoms, you (hopefully) stay home. People with severe symptoms go to the hospital or die. You don’t need to worry about those people being super spreaders. It’s the people that push through or feel mild symptoms and carry on without thought that are giving it to others, and those in turn may accidentally give it to the most vulnerable in their bubble. And I hope when you or I get it, that it does feel just like a cold - or is even asymptomatic. But I know that for some percentage of the world it is not, and it will kill them. This is probably too simple, but: Transmission = infectiousness x interactions. In your example, People with weak immune systems, who are more infectious, are less likely to have interactions.
- gilbetron 5y ago
  We did ban smoking in public spaces because of the same reasoning as with Covid - it's ok to do dumb things that affect yourself, but not if it affects others.
  - josephcsible 5y ago
    Why don't we ban driving? We'd save a lot of lives lost to car crashes. And a lot of those lives are passengers and pedestrians, i.e., "others".
    - galago 5y ago
      Driving is heavily regulated in terms of what kind of cars are legal and how and where they can be operated. Its just a matter of degrees and cost/benefit as assessed by the public. We don't ban driving outright but be ban all kinds of automotive use.
      - josephcsible 5y ago
        > Its just a matter of degrees and cost/benefit as assessed by the public. That's the point, though: COVID lockdowns happened even though much of the public said the benefits of locking down weren't worth the costs.
        nwiswell 5y ago
        > much of the public Was it at least half of the public, though? Just because cars are a less contentious subject doesn't mean that public opinion doesn't ultimately dictate how they are regulated.
    - nwiswell 5y ago
      Because the modern world depends on the automobile, and from a utilitarian point of view the modern world has still had a positive effect on life expectancy. Car culture should not be a foregone conclusion, though -- you are right about that. Many European nations -- the Netherlands being the typical example -- have done a pretty good job of fostering a bike culture in their cities. But us Americans sure love our cars, and so it's ultimately a political question, not a moral one.

nickff 5y ago

If everyone accepts the statistics, the argument usually moves to the counter-factuals.

nraynaud 5y ago

We are talking about statistics that a machine created here, not body bags. They trained a machine on a subset and generated the unknown values.

jmalicki 5y ago
The machine is generating the counter-factual baseline, the body bags are very real and only counted.