4 ms·

Sorry, not assumption then. Same point though, I could take a different example number for a wildly different result. And so, if Africa is doing well because

Sorry, not assumption then. Same point though, I could take a different example number for a wildly different result. And so, if Africa is doing well because of prior infection, why the hell are we madly rushing to vaccination (that continues to fail at each mutation) if actually getting infected is giving the desired longer term outcome (and there doesn't appear to be reports of widespread mass mortality in Africa to date, at the least no worse than other nations)?

SideburnsOfDoom 5y ago
> I could take a different example number for a wildly different result. The actual point of contrasting a constant reduction with an exponential increase is that no, it does not work like that. You can take some quite different example numbers and get a broadly similar result. Top comment here has it right (put in the language of computer science): "Even if hospitalisation rates are a small constant factor lower, doesn’t everyone remember from CS101 that O(k^x) is bad news ... constant factor ain’t gonna save your assignment once the problem size grows just a little more." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29622438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29622438 > And so, if Africa is doing well because of prior infection, why the hell are we madly rushing to vaccination because population immunity gained through a huge number of prior infections, is gained at a far higher cost in lives ,than population immunity gained through a huge number of vaccinations given. That's an obvious given. > (and there doesn't appear to be reports of widespread mass mortality in Africa to date Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, especially with modern media bubbles. How deeply have you looked for this data? Don't expect this to be a top story in the US or Europe, it never is. FYI, here it a bit of it: https://twitter.com/tomtom_m/status/1472561150097342464 https://twitter.com/tomtom_m/status/1472561150097342464 Whole thread is good.
- headsoup 5y ago
  The source for that graph says Human Mortality Database and World Mortality Dataset. The HMD does not list Africa as one of the countries it covers and the WMD states they had no pre-2020 data available from South Africa so only offer a projection. Is there a clear source dataset that can be referenced here?
  - SideburnsOfDoom 5y ago
    Ask the author maybe, since the tweet says "Their SA data are ours" Tom Moultrie http://www.care.uct.ac.za/care/staff-members http://www.care.uct.ac.za/care/staff-members UCT = University of Cape Town, South Africa.

SideburnsOfDoom 5y ago

> I could take a different example number for a wildly different result. The actual point of contrasting a constant reduction with an exponential increase is that no, it does not work like that. You can take some quite different example numbers and get a broadly similar result. Top comment here has it right (put in the language of computer science): "Even if hospitalisation rates are a small constant factor lower, doesn’t everyone remember from CS101 that O(k^x) is bad news ... constant factor ain’t gonna save your assignment once the problem size grows just a little more." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29622438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29622438 > And so, if Africa is doing well because of prior infection, why the hell are we madly rushing to vaccination because population immunity gained through a huge number of prior infections, is gained at a far higher cost in lives ,than population immunity gained through a huge number of vaccinations given. That's an obvious given. > (and there doesn't appear to be reports of widespread mass mortality in Africa to date Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, especially with modern media bubbles. How deeply have you looked for this data? Don't expect this to be a top story in the US or Europe, it never is. FYI, here it a bit of it: https://twitter.com/tomtom_m/status/1472561150097342464 https://twitter.com/tomtom_m/status/1472561150097342464 Whole thread is good.

headsoup 5y ago
The source for that graph says Human Mortality Database and World Mortality Dataset. The HMD does not list Africa as one of the countries it covers and the WMD states they had no pre-2020 data available from South Africa so only offer a projection. Is there a clear source dataset that can be referenced here?
- SideburnsOfDoom 5y ago
  Ask the author maybe, since the tweet says "Their SA data are ours" Tom Moultrie http://www.care.uct.ac.za/care/staff-members http://www.care.uct.ac.za/care/staff-members UCT = University of Cape Town, South Africa.