9 ms·

Why does faith in humanity need to be restored? Are we corrupted?

by calsy 5y ago

ClumsyPilot 5y ago
I mean, we do have literal corruption in most countries, so yes.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
throwawayboise 5y ago
Maybe not humanity, but trust in institutions has been badly fractured recently. Relevant to this story, the CDC in particular is no longer trusted by roughly half the country.
- ars 5y ago
  Which half is that? The half that continued to wear masks after the CDC said it wasn't necessary? Or the half the refuses to wear masks when the CDC says it is necessary? Neither side are actually listening to the CDC, both sides just do whatever they want, and attempt to justify it by pointing to the CDC.
  - sellyme 5y ago
    > The half that continued to wear masks after the CDC said it wasn't necessary? If you posed the question I presume the CDC would say that it's not necessary to wear hats. I don't think it's a reasonable conclusion to then say that everyone wearing hats distrusts the CDC.
    - brigandish 5y ago
      Even if we accept that wearing a mask is equivalent to wearing a hat - it's not at all - but still, even if we were to, if the CDC initially said you should wear a hat and later said that you shouldn't wear a hat, and if no member of the public was wearing hats prior to these pronouncements, what else would continued hat wearing imply? This Atlantic article[1] seems to imply that it would be "an expression of political identity". These Pew Research results[2] titled Partisan Differences Over the Pandemic Response Are Growing would seem to back that up. It's not the only research they've done of this nature[3]. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/liberals-covid-19-science-denial-lockdown/618780/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/liberal... [2] https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2020/06/03/partisan-differences-over-the-pandemic-response-are-growing/ https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2020/06/03/partisan-diff... [3] https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2021/03/05/growing-share-of-americans-say-they-plan-to-get-a-covid-19-vaccine-or-already-have/ https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2021/03/05/growing-share...
      - Talanes 5y ago
        >and later said that you shouldn't wear a hat "Shouldn't" is very different than "not necessary." In a way that changes the entire premise of the discussion.
        brigandish 5y ago
        That's splitting hairs, no one was wearing masks before their guidance came in. For them to say you shouldn't wear masks or you don't need to has exactly the same meaning given their previous stance. Maybe we should now quibble about my use of "no one"?
        Talanes 5y ago
        No it's not. The minute I start doing something, whether I continue to do it or not is a complex decision that comes down to many more factors other than why I started doing it. The most common stated reason amongst my peers for not stopping mask usage during the short summer detente we had locally was a desire to get their moneys worth from all the masks they had already bought.
        brigandish 5y ago
        > The most common stated reason amongst my peers for not stopping mask usage during the short summer detente we had locally was a desire to get their moneys worth from all the masks they had already bought. As that’s fallacious on its face, I’d have to assume that wasn’t the actual reason. Regardless, it’s still a quibble given we’re talking about actual guidance, if there’s a point to arguing about s hypothetical set of guidelines that will never be issued and would provide a distinction if they were , I might be interested. It wasn’t, won’t, and wouldn’t.
  - pryce 5y ago
    The half that is oddly combative over basic attempts to reduce risk of transmission of a disease that has now killed nearly 5 million people worldwide, 750,000 of whom lived in the USA, a nation that for many decades, until quite recently, people worldwide looked to for leadership in the fight against global infectious diseases.
    - BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
      I’m really starting to question just how much of the rest of the world actually looks towards the United States for leadership. I think most countries leadership just does whatever they think is best for their own countries and it’s always been like that. I think the whole “look towards America” thing is some comforting line Americans tell ourselves because we like to think we’re superior. And you can always invoke the actions of the administration you don’t like to claim we’ve lost that special status / respect. Edit: I’m talking about the whole “Leader of the free world” schtick. Not so much industry standards and funding.
      - pryce 5y ago
        Having been a medical student in NZ attached to an infectious diseases team, the idea that NZ research (or even our ideas of best practice) are not heavily dependent on R&D and standards institutes from the USA isn't plausible. I find it likely that Australia is in a similar position. We are lucky in that NZ and Australia have sufficient political will to create and maintain socialized healthcare systems independent of the approach the US has taken. The shortfall in global leadership during this pandemic is, in part, from philosophical differences over whether -and, to what extent- it is a duty of "the state" to respond to phenomena like pandemics that tend to kill a large amount of people without a state-level response.
      - mechanical_bear 5y ago
        I think you should travel abroad a bit more. There is a love/hate relationship in some countries, but we really do set the tone widely, and steer things. It’s a combination of official stick and carrot, and our enormous soft power apparatus.
    - 5y ago
  - version_five 5y ago
    Ah, the danger of a neutral comment, nobody likes it and they all mod it down
    - tapland 5y ago
      It isn't neutral. These two statements are not equivalent. The CDC says x should be done -> not doing so is contrary to CDC recommendations. The CDC says you don't have to do x anymore -> still doing x is not contrary to CDC recommendations. The case that was equivalent didn't occur: The CDC says you should stop doing x -> not doing so is contrary to CDC recommendations.
      - sjg007 5y ago
        The CDC recommends masks. This is the scientific consensus. If you google back in the past you see consistency in their policies with respect to all communicable respiratory diseases. Measles, H1N1 etc.. It's all there in Google. For the current pandemic, they did not initially recommend masking because they could not justify it for the general population over the medical community. They wanted to avoid a tragedy of the commons of PPE. The covid19 prevalence was low so the appropriate path was to protect those most likely to be exposed rather than enact a universal blanket. Any blanket has holes regardless of how fine the weave is and the doctors/nurses/hospitals are the choke points. And they are ultimately the carers who save lives. So this nonsense of the CDC said this and that is just that: nonsense.
        LurkingPenguin 5y ago
        > For the current pandemic, they did not initially recommend masking because they could not justify it for the general population over the medical community. They wanted to avoid a tragedy of the commons of PPE. The covid19 prevalence was low... I posted links in this thread which discuss how the CDC was negligent in studying the possibility of asymptomatic spread early in the pandemic, and knowingly released test kits that were faulty. What this means is that the CDC didn't actually know what the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 was in the US in the early days of the pandemic. It was flying totally blind and as we eventually learned, the virus was silently spreading and establishing a foothold throughout parts of the country while the CDC was assuring Americans it had everything under control and the threat was low. My family and friends in the US were able to stock up on medical masks and N95s in January before they were pulled from the shelves because I was living in Taiwan, where it was abundantly clear in January that there was a very serious respiratory pathogen on the loose.
  - idiotsecant 5y ago
    The CDC currently suggests wearing masks in indoor public places. Is there some super secret CDC info source you have other than the CDC website?
    - brigandish 5y ago
      I would assume it's for outside, as the CDC has changed its guidance on outdoor use, as we can see from this earlier, archived, guidance page[1]; this later guidance[2] which is more relaxed; and in particular this order[3]: > The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an Order pdf icon[PDF – 11 pages] on January 29, 2021 requiring the wearing of masks by people on public transportation conveyances or on the premises of transportation hubs to prevent spread of the virus that causes COVID-19. This Order was effective as of 11:59 p.m. February 1, 2021 and was published in the Federal Registerexternal icon on February 3, 2021. CDC will be amending this Order as soon as practicable, to not require that people wear masks while outdoors on conveyances or while outdoors on the premises of transportation hubs. [1] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/cloth-face-cover-guidance.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-si... [2] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/about-face-coverings.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-si... [3] https://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/masks/mask-travel-guidance.html https://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/masks/mask-travel-guidance.ht... Edit: managed to muck up the links, fixed.
  - raverbashing 5y ago
    The half that dies of preventable diseases because of hubris. Funnily enough, diseases and viruses don't care.
  - mschuster91 5y ago
    > The half that continued to wear masks after the CDC said it wasn't necessary? Wearing a mask in public transport and crowds has always been a good idea, even before coronavirus hit.
- LurkingPenguin 5y ago
  > Relevant to this story, the CDC in particular is no longer trusted by roughly half the country. See https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-cdc-response-speci/special-report-how-u-s-cdc-missed-chances-to-spot-covids-silent-spread-idUSKBN29R1E7 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-cdc-re... > Yet Reuters has found new evidence that the CDC’s response to the pandemic also was marred by actions - or inaction - by the agency’s career scientists and frontline staff. > At a crucial moment in the pandemic when Americans were quarantined after possible exposure to the virus abroad, the agency declined or resisted potentially valuable opportunities to study whether the disease could be spread by those without symptoms, according to previously undisclosed internal emails, other documents and interviews with key players. Well worth a read, as is https://www.npr.org/2020/11/06/929078678/cdc-report-officials-knew-coronavirus-test-was-flawed-but-released-it-anyway https://www.npr.org/2020/11/06/929078678/cdc-report-official... The headline says it all: CDC Report: Officials Knew Coronavirus Test Was Flawed But Released It Anyway > In addition to learning of the early warning, reviewers determined the Respiratory Viruses Diagnostic Laboratory, run by a highly regarded scientist named Stephen Lindstrom, was beset with problems, including "process failures, a lack of appropriate recognized laboratory quality standards, and organizational problems related to the support and management of a laboratory supporting an outbreak response," the review said. > The CDC declined to make Lindstrom or anyone else available for an interview and declined to discuss the unreleased internal review. A spokesman would only say that the agency had "acknowledged and corrected mistakes along the way." Is it unreasonable for people to have lost faith and trust in the CDC based on its many pandemic failures?
  - GuB-42 5y ago
    The CDC is not perfect, no agency in any country is. The thing is, we were hit by a pandemic that was practically impossible to stop. Some countries did better than others for a variety of reasons but it was bad times for everyone. And when times are bad, we look for people to blame. The virus is terrible, the agencies tasked with dealing with it did what they could, and that they couldn't solve an impossible problem in a superhuman way doesn't mean that they are unable to solve the easier problem of tracing back an infection.
human 5y ago
It really does have to be restored. This story sounds straight out of a CSI episode. But when you deal with the “real” police, you’re in for a world of disappointment.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- MBCook 5y ago
  I imagine almost no one remembers, but that show existed. After CSI exploded in 2000 everyone wanted to hit it big with forensics. That’s how we gif thinks like Bones and Crossing Jordan. In 2004 we got me season three f Medical Investigation. It was about a team from the NIH that went around trying to solve disease outbreaks. It was a nice change from everything else being crime focused. But it didn’t make it.

Why does faith in humanity need to be restored? Are we corrupted?

by calsy 5y ago

Why does faith in humanity need to be restored? Are we corrupted?

ClumsyPilot 5y ago

I mean, we do have literal corruption in most countries, so yes.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

throwawayboise 5y ago

Maybe not humanity, but trust in institutions has been badly fractured recently. Relevant to this story, the CDC in particular is no longer trusted by roughly half the country.

ars 5y ago
Which half is that? The half that continued to wear masks after the CDC said it wasn't necessary? Or the half the refuses to wear masks when the CDC says it is necessary? Neither side are actually listening to the CDC, both sides just do whatever they want, and attempt to justify it by pointing to the CDC.
- sellyme 5y ago
  > The half that continued to wear masks after the CDC said it wasn't necessary? If you posed the question I presume the CDC would say that it's not necessary to wear hats. I don't think it's a reasonable conclusion to then say that everyone wearing hats distrusts the CDC.
  - brigandish 5y ago
    Even if we accept that wearing a mask is equivalent to wearing a hat - it's not at all - but still, even if we were to, if the CDC initially said you should wear a hat and later said that you shouldn't wear a hat, and if no member of the public was wearing hats prior to these pronouncements, what else would continued hat wearing imply? This Atlantic article[1] seems to imply that it would be "an expression of political identity". These Pew Research results[2] titled Partisan Differences Over the Pandemic Response Are Growing would seem to back that up. It's not the only research they've done of this nature[3]. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/liberals-covid-19-science-denial-lockdown/618780/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/liberal... [2] https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2020/06/03/partisan-differences-over-the-pandemic-response-are-growing/ https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2020/06/03/partisan-diff... [3] https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2021/03/05/growing-share-of-americans-say-they-plan-to-get-a-covid-19-vaccine-or-already-have/ https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2021/03/05/growing-share...
    - Talanes 5y ago
      >and later said that you shouldn't wear a hat "Shouldn't" is very different than "not necessary." In a way that changes the entire premise of the discussion.
      - brigandish 5y ago
        That's splitting hairs, no one was wearing masks before their guidance came in. For them to say you shouldn't wear masks or you don't need to has exactly the same meaning given their previous stance. Maybe we should now quibble about my use of "no one"?
        Talanes 5y ago
        No it's not. The minute I start doing something, whether I continue to do it or not is a complex decision that comes down to many more factors other than why I started doing it. The most common stated reason amongst my peers for not stopping mask usage during the short summer detente we had locally was a desire to get their moneys worth from all the masks they had already bought.
        brigandish 5y ago
        > The most common stated reason amongst my peers for not stopping mask usage during the short summer detente we had locally was a desire to get their moneys worth from all the masks they had already bought. As that’s fallacious on its face, I’d have to assume that wasn’t the actual reason. Regardless, it’s still a quibble given we’re talking about actual guidance, if there’s a point to arguing about s hypothetical set of guidelines that will never be issued and would provide a distinction if they were , I might be interested. It wasn’t, won’t, and wouldn’t.
- pryce 5y ago
  The half that is oddly combative over basic attempts to reduce risk of transmission of a disease that has now killed nearly 5 million people worldwide, 750,000 of whom lived in the USA, a nation that for many decades, until quite recently, people worldwide looked to for leadership in the fight against global infectious diseases.
  - BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
    I’m really starting to question just how much of the rest of the world actually looks towards the United States for leadership. I think most countries leadership just does whatever they think is best for their own countries and it’s always been like that. I think the whole “look towards America” thing is some comforting line Americans tell ourselves because we like to think we’re superior. And you can always invoke the actions of the administration you don’t like to claim we’ve lost that special status / respect. Edit: I’m talking about the whole “Leader of the free world” schtick. Not so much industry standards and funding.
    - pryce 5y ago
      Having been a medical student in NZ attached to an infectious diseases team, the idea that NZ research (or even our ideas of best practice) are not heavily dependent on R&D and standards institutes from the USA isn't plausible. I find it likely that Australia is in a similar position. We are lucky in that NZ and Australia have sufficient political will to create and maintain socialized healthcare systems independent of the approach the US has taken. The shortfall in global leadership during this pandemic is, in part, from philosophical differences over whether -and, to what extent- it is a duty of "the state" to respond to phenomena like pandemics that tend to kill a large amount of people without a state-level response.
    - mechanical_bear 5y ago
      I think you should travel abroad a bit more. There is a love/hate relationship in some countries, but we really do set the tone widely, and steer things. It’s a combination of official stick and carrot, and our enormous soft power apparatus.
  - 5y ago
- version_five 5y ago
  Ah, the danger of a neutral comment, nobody likes it and they all mod it down
  - tapland 5y ago
    It isn't neutral. These two statements are not equivalent. The CDC says x should be done -> not doing so is contrary to CDC recommendations. The CDC says you don't have to do x anymore -> still doing x is not contrary to CDC recommendations. The case that was equivalent didn't occur: The CDC says you should stop doing x -> not doing so is contrary to CDC recommendations.
    - sjg007 5y ago
      The CDC recommends masks. This is the scientific consensus. If you google back in the past you see consistency in their policies with respect to all communicable respiratory diseases. Measles, H1N1 etc.. It's all there in Google. For the current pandemic, they did not initially recommend masking because they could not justify it for the general population over the medical community. They wanted to avoid a tragedy of the commons of PPE. The covid19 prevalence was low so the appropriate path was to protect those most likely to be exposed rather than enact a universal blanket. Any blanket has holes regardless of how fine the weave is and the doctors/nurses/hospitals are the choke points. And they are ultimately the carers who save lives. So this nonsense of the CDC said this and that is just that: nonsense.
      - LurkingPenguin 5y ago
        > For the current pandemic, they did not initially recommend masking because they could not justify it for the general population over the medical community. They wanted to avoid a tragedy of the commons of PPE. The covid19 prevalence was low... I posted links in this thread which discuss how the CDC was negligent in studying the possibility of asymptomatic spread early in the pandemic, and knowingly released test kits that were faulty. What this means is that the CDC didn't actually know what the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 was in the US in the early days of the pandemic. It was flying totally blind and as we eventually learned, the virus was silently spreading and establishing a foothold throughout parts of the country while the CDC was assuring Americans it had everything under control and the threat was low. My family and friends in the US were able to stock up on medical masks and N95s in January before they were pulled from the shelves because I was living in Taiwan, where it was abundantly clear in January that there was a very serious respiratory pathogen on the loose.
- idiotsecant 5y ago
  The CDC currently suggests wearing masks in indoor public places. Is there some super secret CDC info source you have other than the CDC website?
  - brigandish 5y ago
    I would assume it's for outside, as the CDC has changed its guidance on outdoor use, as we can see from this earlier, archived, guidance page[1]; this later guidance[2] which is more relaxed; and in particular this order[3]: > The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an Order pdf icon[PDF – 11 pages] on January 29, 2021 requiring the wearing of masks by people on public transportation conveyances or on the premises of transportation hubs to prevent spread of the virus that causes COVID-19. This Order was effective as of 11:59 p.m. February 1, 2021 and was published in the Federal Registerexternal icon on February 3, 2021. CDC will be amending this Order as soon as practicable, to not require that people wear masks while outdoors on conveyances or while outdoors on the premises of transportation hubs. [1] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/cloth-face-cover-guidance.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-si... [2] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/about-face-coverings.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-si... [3] https://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/masks/mask-travel-guidance.html https://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/masks/mask-travel-guidance.ht... Edit: managed to muck up the links, fixed.
- raverbashing 5y ago
  The half that dies of preventable diseases because of hubris. Funnily enough, diseases and viruses don't care.
- mschuster91 5y ago
  > The half that continued to wear masks after the CDC said it wasn't necessary? Wearing a mask in public transport and crowds has always been a good idea, even before coronavirus hit.
LurkingPenguin 5y ago
> Relevant to this story, the CDC in particular is no longer trusted by roughly half the country. See https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-cdc-response-speci/special-report-how-u-s-cdc-missed-chances-to-spot-covids-silent-spread-idUSKBN29R1E7 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-cdc-re... > Yet Reuters has found new evidence that the CDC’s response to the pandemic also was marred by actions - or inaction - by the agency’s career scientists and frontline staff. > At a crucial moment in the pandemic when Americans were quarantined after possible exposure to the virus abroad, the agency declined or resisted potentially valuable opportunities to study whether the disease could be spread by those without symptoms, according to previously undisclosed internal emails, other documents and interviews with key players. Well worth a read, as is https://www.npr.org/2020/11/06/929078678/cdc-report-officials-knew-coronavirus-test-was-flawed-but-released-it-anyway https://www.npr.org/2020/11/06/929078678/cdc-report-official... The headline says it all: CDC Report: Officials Knew Coronavirus Test Was Flawed But Released It Anyway > In addition to learning of the early warning, reviewers determined the Respiratory Viruses Diagnostic Laboratory, run by a highly regarded scientist named Stephen Lindstrom, was beset with problems, including "process failures, a lack of appropriate recognized laboratory quality standards, and organizational problems related to the support and management of a laboratory supporting an outbreak response," the review said. > The CDC declined to make Lindstrom or anyone else available for an interview and declined to discuss the unreleased internal review. A spokesman would only say that the agency had "acknowledged and corrected mistakes along the way." Is it unreasonable for people to have lost faith and trust in the CDC based on its many pandemic failures?
- GuB-42 5y ago
  The CDC is not perfect, no agency in any country is. The thing is, we were hit by a pandemic that was practically impossible to stop. Some countries did better than others for a variety of reasons but it was bad times for everyone. And when times are bad, we look for people to blame. The virus is terrible, the agencies tasked with dealing with it did what they could, and that they couldn't solve an impossible problem in a superhuman way doesn't mean that they are unable to solve the easier problem of tracing back an infection.

human 5y ago

It really does have to be restored. This story sounds straight out of a CSI episode. But when you deal with the “real” police, you’re in for a world of disappointment.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
MBCook 5y ago
I imagine almost no one remembers, but that show existed. After CSI exploded in 2000 everyone wanted to hit it big with forensics. That’s how we gif thinks like Bones and Crossing Jordan. In 2004 we got me season three f Medical Investigation. It was about a team from the NIH that went around trying to solve disease outbreaks. It was a nice change from everything else being crime focused. But it didn’t make it.