7 ms·

Ridiculous response - travel bans are not effective (the strain is definitely already here) and punish countries for transparency.

hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
The US has been pretty transparent on that, that the goal is not to prevent it from coming here (that's impossible), but to slow its spread here to give scientists more time to evaluate its impact.
- spookthesunset 5y ago
  And what evidence suggests that travel bans actually do anything to "slow the spread"?
  - hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
    Math? Any particular transmission event is chance of someone being infected X probability of transmission. Reduce the first term and the total number of infected individuals at a given time T is reduced (until any exponential growth swamps the terms). Point of saying "it's impossible to prevent" is that it's not possible to reduce the first term to 0.
    - spookthesunset 5y ago
      Okay, even if it works (which is unlikely), what about the costs to society? Do the benefits outweigh those costs? There are other things in life to worry about than slowing the spread of exactly one illness... is it worth continuing to put those on the backburner? When does this end?
      - somewhereoutth 5y ago
        It might end when universal vaccination and other measures suppress COVID to occasional outbreaks that can be quickly put down. Otherwise it may never end. With widespread circulation, and selection pressure to evade immunity from vaccines and prior infection, escape variants may become the norm. Each new escape variant will require lockdowns, travel restrictions, and new vaccination. Pretending it is not happening is not an option either, when basic medical services are not available due to overwhelmed healthcare systems.
        adam_arthur 5y ago
        Vaccines do reduce the spread, but breakthrough infections are common. Even with 100% vaccination rate, we should expect new variants to continue to appear. The only way for covid to "end" is to accept that it's endemic and change our mentality towards living with it. Truthfully even if everybody on earth caught it simultaneously tomorrow, only a few percent would die, and society would not fundamentally change. It may sound heartless, but that's the truth. 1-2% of US population dies every year as a baseline as it is.
        nradov 5y ago
        The actual infection fatality rate in the US isn't "a few percent". It's more like 0.6%. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burden.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd...
        rapjr9 5y ago
        "Confronting Our Next National Health Disaster — Long-Haul Covid" https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2109285 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2109285 "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that more than 114 million Americans had been infected with Covid-19 through March 2021. Factoring in new infections in unvaccinated people, we can conservatively expect more than 15 million cases of long Covid resulting from this pandemic. And though data are still emerging, the average age of patients with long Covid is about 40, which means that the majority are in their prime working years. Given these demographics, long Covid is likely to cast a long shadow on our health care system and economic recovery." "COVID-19 Associated with Long-Term Cognitive Dysfunction, Acceleration of Alzheimer’s Symptoms" https://www.alz.org/aaic/releases_2021/covid-19-cognitive-impact.asp https://www.alz.org/aaic/releases_2021/covid-19-cognitive-im... COVID-19 is having harmful medical effects beyond killing people. These long term effects may be the true reason behind at least part of the Great Resignation. If so this is already having large economic effects and unless it turns out than many people recover, worker shortages and supply chain snarls may last a very long time. And the cost of all those people going onto disability will be enormous, both in terms of the disability payments and the number of health care workers needed to help them all. You can't just tally up the deaths and say that is acceptable, there are other big factors to take into account. In addition to the fallout from long covid many of those fatalities will have held jobs, controlled assets, volunteered time, babysat for relatives, and more. If eventually everyone gets covid, then eventually 10% to 30% of _everyone_ will have long covid. That would be a really big deal.
      - robomartin 5y ago
        > When does this end? I think this is a fair question many people are asking. I also think a simple answer does not exist. It's interesting. This is the first pandemic of what I might describe as the most connected version of humanity in the history of our species. I mean this in every possible sense, not just electronic communications (for example, travel is massively easier and faster than, say, one hundred years ago). This means this is new to us (the world). In the prior pandemic people died by the tens of millions and that was that. This time we have a fairly reasonable ability to slow it down and fight it. Yet, I don't think anyone truly understands how far this goes and where the end of the "event" might be. I happen to be travelling outside the US at the moment and, at least where I am (Mexico) they seem to be taking it far more seriously than in Los Angeles. For example, I have yet to see people complaining about mask usage as some form of reduction-of-freedom issue.
    - Barrin92 5y ago
      >until any exponential growth swamps the terms but isn't that almost immediately the case? Let's say you have only 50 people in the States who have the new variant before you notice it, with an r naught of 2-6 that most of these strains seem to have after a few days you're probably already way beyond the few falsely negatively tested people who come in by plane. (the US still requires tests right?)
- somewhereoutth 5y ago
  and if that impact is bad (i.e. vaccine escape, severe illness, and outcompetes Delta) then lockdowns are our only option.
- archsurface 5y ago
  The reasons are irrelevant - South Africa still ends up effectively "punished", and encourages reduced transparency, and delayed announcement. Personally, I don't care, but the mechanism is clear.

hn_throwaway_99 5y ago

The US has been pretty transparent on that, that the goal is not to prevent it from coming here (that's impossible), but to slow its spread here to give scientists more time to evaluate its impact.

spookthesunset 5y ago
And what evidence suggests that travel bans actually do anything to "slow the spread"?
- hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
  Math? Any particular transmission event is chance of someone being infected X probability of transmission. Reduce the first term and the total number of infected individuals at a given time T is reduced (until any exponential growth swamps the terms). Point of saying "it's impossible to prevent" is that it's not possible to reduce the first term to 0.
  - spookthesunset 5y ago
    Okay, even if it works (which is unlikely), what about the costs to society? Do the benefits outweigh those costs? There are other things in life to worry about than slowing the spread of exactly one illness... is it worth continuing to put those on the backburner? When does this end?
    - somewhereoutth 5y ago
      It might end when universal vaccination and other measures suppress COVID to occasional outbreaks that can be quickly put down. Otherwise it may never end. With widespread circulation, and selection pressure to evade immunity from vaccines and prior infection, escape variants may become the norm. Each new escape variant will require lockdowns, travel restrictions, and new vaccination. Pretending it is not happening is not an option either, when basic medical services are not available due to overwhelmed healthcare systems.
      - adam_arthur 5y ago
        Vaccines do reduce the spread, but breakthrough infections are common. Even with 100% vaccination rate, we should expect new variants to continue to appear. The only way for covid to "end" is to accept that it's endemic and change our mentality towards living with it. Truthfully even if everybody on earth caught it simultaneously tomorrow, only a few percent would die, and society would not fundamentally change. It may sound heartless, but that's the truth. 1-2% of US population dies every year as a baseline as it is.
        nradov 5y ago
        The actual infection fatality rate in the US isn't "a few percent". It's more like 0.6%. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burden.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd...
        rapjr9 5y ago
        "Confronting Our Next National Health Disaster — Long-Haul Covid" https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2109285 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2109285 "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that more than 114 million Americans had been infected with Covid-19 through March 2021. Factoring in new infections in unvaccinated people, we can conservatively expect more than 15 million cases of long Covid resulting from this pandemic. And though data are still emerging, the average age of patients with long Covid is about 40, which means that the majority are in their prime working years. Given these demographics, long Covid is likely to cast a long shadow on our health care system and economic recovery." "COVID-19 Associated with Long-Term Cognitive Dysfunction, Acceleration of Alzheimer’s Symptoms" https://www.alz.org/aaic/releases_2021/covid-19-cognitive-impact.asp https://www.alz.org/aaic/releases_2021/covid-19-cognitive-im... COVID-19 is having harmful medical effects beyond killing people. These long term effects may be the true reason behind at least part of the Great Resignation. If so this is already having large economic effects and unless it turns out than many people recover, worker shortages and supply chain snarls may last a very long time. And the cost of all those people going onto disability will be enormous, both in terms of the disability payments and the number of health care workers needed to help them all. You can't just tally up the deaths and say that is acceptable, there are other big factors to take into account. In addition to the fallout from long covid many of those fatalities will have held jobs, controlled assets, volunteered time, babysat for relatives, and more. If eventually everyone gets covid, then eventually 10% to 30% of _everyone_ will have long covid. That would be a really big deal.
    - robomartin 5y ago
      > When does this end? I think this is a fair question many people are asking. I also think a simple answer does not exist. It's interesting. This is the first pandemic of what I might describe as the most connected version of humanity in the history of our species. I mean this in every possible sense, not just electronic communications (for example, travel is massively easier and faster than, say, one hundred years ago). This means this is new to us (the world). In the prior pandemic people died by the tens of millions and that was that. This time we have a fairly reasonable ability to slow it down and fight it. Yet, I don't think anyone truly understands how far this goes and where the end of the "event" might be. I happen to be travelling outside the US at the moment and, at least where I am (Mexico) they seem to be taking it far more seriously than in Los Angeles. For example, I have yet to see people complaining about mask usage as some form of reduction-of-freedom issue.
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    >until any exponential growth swamps the terms but isn't that almost immediately the case? Let's say you have only 50 people in the States who have the new variant before you notice it, with an r naught of 2-6 that most of these strains seem to have after a few days you're probably already way beyond the few falsely negatively tested people who come in by plane. (the US still requires tests right?)
somewhereoutth 5y ago
and if that impact is bad (i.e. vaccine escape, severe illness, and outcompetes Delta) then lockdowns are our only option.
archsurface 5y ago
The reasons are irrelevant - South Africa still ends up effectively "punished", and encourages reduced transparency, and delayed announcement. Personally, I don't care, but the mechanism is clear.