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If it had been 2 million dead in the same period, it would still have been a fairly tame global pandemic, by the standards of deadly global pandemics. It was p

If it had been 2 million dead in the same period, it would still have been a fairly tame global pandemic, by the standards of deadly global pandemics. It was pretty clear after the first few weeks that Covid was not the horrible killer that leaves people literally dropping dead in the streets, yet the response continued as if it were. Given the incredible disruption our response to it has caused, that I predict will continue for years and decades, the fact that we can't even say (and probably never will be able to) whether it was worth it, is damning enough. Most kids lose a grandparent at a young age (I did). I really disagree that it was worse than losing a year of school, and being shut in the house for a considerable period of that. If anything, we have forgotten the lessons that death teaches us, and have lost touch with the cycle of life and death. The incredible aversion to a relatively harmless (for most) disease shows this is the case.

lambdaba 5y ago
Moreso, I sincerely believe the fear exacerbated by the ridiculous measures and the social isolation especially of the vulnerable and sick (no visits etc.) caused a substantial proportion of the deaths. We are not isolated organisms. Fear causes stress. Chronic fear causes chronic stress. Chronic stress causes chronic cortisol. Chronic cortisol causes immunosupression.
- lithium_throw 5y ago
  At least where I am (UK, and in particular, Wales), it seems our healthcare system is in the process of failing. It was already doing badly, and our response to Covid has tipped it over the edge. That alone will cause a significant amount of suffering and death.
- __blockcipher__ 5y ago
  Indeed. And to flesh out in more detail, we caused: - lack of sleep/exercise (which destroys the body's immunoregulatory capacities, leading to either a sort of acute immunosenescence like you said wrt fear, or alternatively leading to an overreactive immune system that kills via cytokine storm) - decline in social interaction - more time spent inside (which apart from the other correlates, very obviously leads to less sunlight). sunlight => vitamin d + nitric oxide; vitamin d is critical for respiratory pathology specifically, as well as just general health, and nitric oxide is very important as an immunoregulatory compound and as a preventer of strokes - the general environment of fear/stress/anxiety (again, going to screw up the immunoregulatory balance of the body)
r00fus 5y ago
> If it had been 2 million dead in the same period, it would still have been a fairly tame global pandemic Untrue, at least for all of US history [1]. I honestly think this downplaying of the deadliness of COVID belies an agenda. If it was 3x more deadly... [1] https://www.statnews.com/2021/09/20/covid-19-set-to-overtake-1918-spanish-flu-as-deadliest-disease-in-american-history/ https://www.statnews.com/2021/09/20/covid-19-set-to-overtake...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- lithium_throw 5y ago
  So according to that article, Covid so far has been 1/3rd as deadly as the Spanish Flu, yet any comparison drawn to the flu would elicit the response of "ITS NOTHING LIKE THE FLU, IDIOT!" ?? Interesting. I'm not downplaying the deadliness of Covid. The numbers speak for themselves. Spanish Flu had a mortality rate of between 2% and 10%, and mostly killed healthy young adults. Estimates for Covid put its IFR somewhere aruond 0.4%, and it killed almost entirely elderly people.
KittenInABox 5y ago
I think this is being too light on the impact of covid. In places like NYC, where they had refrigerated trucks full of bodies because their morgues were full, or India where the oxygen shortage killed many many people from Delta infection... I would argue the severe aversion in reaction to the news coming out of NYC wasn't unreasonable, even if it was an overreaction.
- spookthesunset 5y ago
  > where they had refrigerated trucks full of bodies because their morgues were full Is that really true though? Because what the headlines of these kinds of stories say vs. what the article itself says usually never match.
  - tinus_hn 5y ago
    It’s kind of true. These refrigerated trucks were on standby anyway because they are needed every time there’s a bad flu season.
    - spookthesunset 5y ago
      And that is what I found for almost all articles of that type. If you read into the article it was never “this is happening” but “we are getting prepared”.
  - handoflixue 5y ago
    While the overall death rate isn't up that much, I've heard that it's clustering a lot more, which means various systems are overwhelmed: We can process X bodies per day but we have a couple weeks where we're getting 1.5X bodies, and so for a while we have a few bodies in refrigerated trucks or other overflow systems. So... it's sort of true, but it's more of a congestion issue (like rush hour traffic), not a sign of systemic collapse.
    - lithium_throw 5y ago
      Heard from where? Got any numbers for this "clustering"?
spookthesunset 5y ago
> the fact that we can't even say (and probably never will be able to) whether it was worth it, is damning enough. Exactly. I assert that for any of these non pharmaceutical interventions to have been worthwhile their effect on “the charts” should be plain and dramatic. You should be able to pull anybody off the street and show them a lockdown state vs a non-lockdown state and have them see plain as day the profound difference. If you need grad student level statistics to tease apart differences it means even if these things worked, their impact was so minor that the extreme social costs made them not worthwhile at all.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- handoflixue 5y ago
  > You should be able to pull anybody off the street and show them a lockdown state vs a non-lockdown state Keep in mind that the constitution protects free travel between states, so such an analysis only shows what results a mixed response gives. If you compare Australia to the US, you can see that lockdowns very clearly do work: 1K vs 600K deaths. Even accounting for relative size, that suggests lockdowns produced a 50x effect. (of course, if the question is "should California be draconian" then this is still very useful information! I'm just saying the answer changes depending on whether California is doing this while still being forced to have open borders with states that aren't locking down, or if the entire country coordinate a federal lockdown)
  - jaywalk 5y ago
    You cannot simply compare Australia's deaths to US deaths, "account for relative size" and then proclaim that lockdowns are responsible for a 99.99% decrease in deaths. There are countless other factors that have to be considered.
    - handoflixue 5y ago
      Please read the comment before replying. I said it suggests a difference, which is very different from proclaiming that there's definitely one. And I said 98%, not 99.99%. The 50x difference is a starting point, not a declaration that there's no other factors.

lambdaba 5y ago

Moreso, I sincerely believe the fear exacerbated by the ridiculous measures and the social isolation especially of the vulnerable and sick (no visits etc.) caused a substantial proportion of the deaths. We are not isolated organisms. Fear causes stress. Chronic fear causes chronic stress. Chronic stress causes chronic cortisol. Chronic cortisol causes immunosupression.

lithium_throw 5y ago
At least where I am (UK, and in particular, Wales), it seems our healthcare system is in the process of failing. It was already doing badly, and our response to Covid has tipped it over the edge. That alone will cause a significant amount of suffering and death.
__blockcipher__ 5y ago
Indeed. And to flesh out in more detail, we caused: - lack of sleep/exercise (which destroys the body's immunoregulatory capacities, leading to either a sort of acute immunosenescence like you said wrt fear, or alternatively leading to an overreactive immune system that kills via cytokine storm) - decline in social interaction - more time spent inside (which apart from the other correlates, very obviously leads to less sunlight). sunlight => vitamin d + nitric oxide; vitamin d is critical for respiratory pathology specifically, as well as just general health, and nitric oxide is very important as an immunoregulatory compound and as a preventer of strokes - the general environment of fear/stress/anxiety (again, going to screw up the immunoregulatory balance of the body)

r00fus 5y ago

> If it had been 2 million dead in the same period, it would still have been a fairly tame global pandemic Untrue, at least for all of US history [1]. I honestly think this downplaying of the deadliness of COVID belies an agenda. If it was 3x more deadly... [1] https://www.statnews.com/2021/09/20/covid-19-set-to-overtake-1918-spanish-flu-as-deadliest-disease-in-american-history/ https://www.statnews.com/2021/09/20/covid-19-set-to-overtake...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
lithium_throw 5y ago
So according to that article, Covid so far has been 1/3rd as deadly as the Spanish Flu, yet any comparison drawn to the flu would elicit the response of "ITS NOTHING LIKE THE FLU, IDIOT!" ?? Interesting. I'm not downplaying the deadliness of Covid. The numbers speak for themselves. Spanish Flu had a mortality rate of between 2% and 10%, and mostly killed healthy young adults. Estimates for Covid put its IFR somewhere aruond 0.4%, and it killed almost entirely elderly people.

KittenInABox 5y ago

I think this is being too light on the impact of covid. In places like NYC, where they had refrigerated trucks full of bodies because their morgues were full, or India where the oxygen shortage killed many many people from Delta infection... I would argue the severe aversion in reaction to the news coming out of NYC wasn't unreasonable, even if it was an overreaction.

spookthesunset 5y ago
> where they had refrigerated trucks full of bodies because their morgues were full Is that really true though? Because what the headlines of these kinds of stories say vs. what the article itself says usually never match.
- tinus_hn 5y ago
  It’s kind of true. These refrigerated trucks were on standby anyway because they are needed every time there’s a bad flu season.
  - spookthesunset 5y ago
    And that is what I found for almost all articles of that type. If you read into the article it was never “this is happening” but “we are getting prepared”.
- handoflixue 5y ago
  While the overall death rate isn't up that much, I've heard that it's clustering a lot more, which means various systems are overwhelmed: We can process X bodies per day but we have a couple weeks where we're getting 1.5X bodies, and so for a while we have a few bodies in refrigerated trucks or other overflow systems. So... it's sort of true, but it's more of a congestion issue (like rush hour traffic), not a sign of systemic collapse.
  - lithium_throw 5y ago
    Heard from where? Got any numbers for this "clustering"?

spookthesunset 5y ago

> the fact that we can't even say (and probably never will be able to) whether it was worth it, is damning enough. Exactly. I assert that for any of these non pharmaceutical interventions to have been worthwhile their effect on “the charts” should be plain and dramatic. You should be able to pull anybody off the street and show them a lockdown state vs a non-lockdown state and have them see plain as day the profound difference. If you need grad student level statistics to tease apart differences it means even if these things worked, their impact was so minor that the extreme social costs made them not worthwhile at all.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
handoflixue 5y ago
> You should be able to pull anybody off the street and show them a lockdown state vs a non-lockdown state Keep in mind that the constitution protects free travel between states, so such an analysis only shows what results a mixed response gives. If you compare Australia to the US, you can see that lockdowns very clearly do work: 1K vs 600K deaths. Even accounting for relative size, that suggests lockdowns produced a 50x effect. (of course, if the question is "should California be draconian" then this is still very useful information! I'm just saying the answer changes depending on whether California is doing this while still being forced to have open borders with states that aren't locking down, or if the entire country coordinate a federal lockdown)
- jaywalk 5y ago
  You cannot simply compare Australia's deaths to US deaths, "account for relative size" and then proclaim that lockdowns are responsible for a 99.99% decrease in deaths. There are countless other factors that have to be considered.
  - handoflixue 5y ago
    Please read the comment before replying. I said it suggests a difference, which is very different from proclaiming that there's definitely one. And I said 98%, not 99.99%. The 50x difference is a starting point, not a declaration that there's no other factors.