5 ms·

> Models showing 4% IFRs without drastic measures like lockdowns seem fairly accurate to me. The infection fatality rate is: deaths / anybody who is infected.

> Models showing 4% IFRs without drastic measures like lockdowns seem fairly accurate to me. The infection fatality rate is: deaths / anybody who is infected. Everybody is gonna get Covid, mitigations or not, so the denominator is always going to be the same. IFR is independent of mitigations. The only way the IFR might change is if healthcare systems got so overrun that they could no longer give care. This did not happen anywhere in the industrialized world. In fact all of the temporary field hospitals here in the states were closed virtually. The models showing a 4% IFR were pure fantasy. The IFR for a healthy human under like 65 is something less than %0.1. If you are a kid, your risks are lower than dying in a house fire.

Retric 4y ago
You can’t argue about a zero social distancing world based on data from countries that implemented social distancing. Doing nothing means seeing what IFR rakes look like without a healthcare system. Even with all the existing measures, many areas ran out of ICU beds. All those deferred surgeries had an actual cost in human lives because you can’t simply delay cancer treatment without issue. I will say it again, some people with cancer died because of the COVID pandemic even without getting infected. Anything less than what we did would have further overburdened the healthcare system. Doing absolutely nothing and even less serious cases that responded to such basic measures as IV fluids would have killed people without a functioning healthcare system.
- GeekyBear 4y ago
  > You can’t argue about a zero social distancing world based on data from countries that implemented social distancing. You can very easily argue that the mitigations we put in place were based on the theory that Covid only had a droplet based spread, like the flu. The problem is that Covid is fully airborne, like measles, so the mitigations we put into place were ineffective. Social distancing is a good example: A person infected with a virus that has a droplet based spread will spray out droplets when they cough or sneeze and those droplets will fall to the ground within six feet of their emission. An airborne virus is emitted by people even when they are just breathing normally, and can stay suspended in the air for hours. An airborne virus will spread throughout an enclosed space. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00925-7 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00925-7
  - Retric 4y ago
    Your argument falls apart when you consider closing down movie theaters and schools stops both. The initial version of COVID was airborne but didn’t spread that fast compared to say measles so it didn’t take much to bring transmission below replacement rate in most areas. More recent versions are more easily transmissible but are dealing with higher levels of immunity due to vaccination and prior exposure. When modeling such repeated outbreaks people who where at the highest risk for transmission due to coming into contact with others regularly where also the first to gain immunity from less easily transmissible strains.
    - GeekyBear 4y ago
      Your argument falls apart when you remember that the mitigations we put into place were highly effective against the Flu, which does have a droplet based spread, but were completely ineffective at stopping the spread of Covid, which continued to spread like wildfire. >CDC says seasonal flu cases hit record lows around the world https://www.nbcnews.com/health/cold-and-flu/cdc-says-seasonal-flu-cases-hit-record-lows-around-world-n1240333 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/cold-and-flu/cdc-says-seasona... > COVID may have pushed a leading seasonal flu strain to extinction https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/09/covid-may-have-pushed-a-leading-seasonal-flu-strain-to-extinction/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/09/covid-may-have-pushe...
      - Retric 4y ago
        Being effective for the flu doesn’t prevent them from being less effective but still critical for COVID. Multiple COVID trackers shows a response to COVID mitigation strategies and their removal well outside of seasonal trends. Demonstrating unsurprisingly that transmission goes down when people spend less time around each other.
        GeekyBear 4y ago
        The thing that keeps six feet of social distancing from being effective against Covid is that the virus floats in the air for hours. The initial theory on how Covid spreads was just wrong. Following the science requires that you be capable of changing your mind when you have proof that you were wrong.
PuppyTailWags 4y ago
> The only way the IFR might change is if healthcare systems got so overrun that they could no longer give care. This did not happen anywhere in the industrialized world. In fact all of the temporary field hospitals here in the states were closed virtually. Are you sure, especially particularly early & also this late? My understanding is that several crucial treatments were mass-deferred, several places had no beds, the dead were literally stacked on trucks, and the medical system has been utterly destroyed either from staff falling ill or getting so emotionally destroyed that they've quit. Wasn't there a mainstream situation a bit ago where a nurse literally had to call the fire department because of lack of medical staff? My understanding is that hospitals still haven't recovered in terms of staffing.
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  Yes, the person you’re replying to is clueless. Even with all of the lockdowns, distancing, masking, and tons of other interventions - hospitals all over were on the brink of collapse. I have 3 immediate family members who are hospitalists in the US and each of their hospitals was in extremely dire straits. 100% bed occupancy, no non-emergent surgeries, diverting patients to neighboring states.
nightski 4y ago
Not sure where you are getting your information, even in our city of 250k the hospitals were full and turning away care.
- slaw 4y ago
  Hospitals were close to full before covid and are full now. Op is talking about temporary hospitals for covid patients which were empty. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/wa-hospitals-are-far-over-capacity-as-backlogs-and-staff-shortages-add-up/ https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/wa-hospital...
  - Retric 4y ago
    That’s talking about a recent snapshot not what things where like at the peak of the pandemic. In 2022 hospitals are as it says getting back to patients who’s treatment where deferred during earlier peaks.
devmor 4y ago
> The only way the IFR might change is if healthcare systems got so overrun that they could no longer give care. This did not happen anywhere in the industrialized world. What world do you live in? It certainly isn't mine. One of my co-workers passed away in her home after being turned away from the ER in part due to no hospitals in the area having available ventilators.
brnaftr361 4y ago
My worry is that we've displaced the casualties to a far less visible causal agent. There's a lot of economic variables that have been pulled at every level, from the individual to the state, to global concerns. And I think these are more pernicious and difficult to track than would be a disease, but I do expect the impact to, overall, be more severe that it otherwise would've been without the (perhaps naive) interventionism. That's just a hypothesis.

Retric 4y ago

You can’t argue about a zero social distancing world based on data from countries that implemented social distancing. Doing nothing means seeing what IFR rakes look like without a healthcare system. Even with all the existing measures, many areas ran out of ICU beds. All those deferred surgeries had an actual cost in human lives because you can’t simply delay cancer treatment without issue. I will say it again, some people with cancer died because of the COVID pandemic even without getting infected. Anything less than what we did would have further overburdened the healthcare system. Doing absolutely nothing and even less serious cases that responded to such basic measures as IV fluids would have killed people without a functioning healthcare system.

GeekyBear 4y ago
> You can’t argue about a zero social distancing world based on data from countries that implemented social distancing. You can very easily argue that the mitigations we put in place were based on the theory that Covid only had a droplet based spread, like the flu. The problem is that Covid is fully airborne, like measles, so the mitigations we put into place were ineffective. Social distancing is a good example: A person infected with a virus that has a droplet based spread will spray out droplets when they cough or sneeze and those droplets will fall to the ground within six feet of their emission. An airborne virus is emitted by people even when they are just breathing normally, and can stay suspended in the air for hours. An airborne virus will spread throughout an enclosed space. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00925-7 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00925-7
- Retric 4y ago
  Your argument falls apart when you consider closing down movie theaters and schools stops both. The initial version of COVID was airborne but didn’t spread that fast compared to say measles so it didn’t take much to bring transmission below replacement rate in most areas. More recent versions are more easily transmissible but are dealing with higher levels of immunity due to vaccination and prior exposure. When modeling such repeated outbreaks people who where at the highest risk for transmission due to coming into contact with others regularly where also the first to gain immunity from less easily transmissible strains.
  - GeekyBear 4y ago
    Your argument falls apart when you remember that the mitigations we put into place were highly effective against the Flu, which does have a droplet based spread, but were completely ineffective at stopping the spread of Covid, which continued to spread like wildfire. >CDC says seasonal flu cases hit record lows around the world https://www.nbcnews.com/health/cold-and-flu/cdc-says-seasonal-flu-cases-hit-record-lows-around-world-n1240333 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/cold-and-flu/cdc-says-seasona... > COVID may have pushed a leading seasonal flu strain to extinction https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/09/covid-may-have-pushed-a-leading-seasonal-flu-strain-to-extinction/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/09/covid-may-have-pushe...
    - Retric 4y ago
      Being effective for the flu doesn’t prevent them from being less effective but still critical for COVID. Multiple COVID trackers shows a response to COVID mitigation strategies and their removal well outside of seasonal trends. Demonstrating unsurprisingly that transmission goes down when people spend less time around each other.
      - GeekyBear 4y ago
        The thing that keeps six feet of social distancing from being effective against Covid is that the virus floats in the air for hours. The initial theory on how Covid spreads was just wrong. Following the science requires that you be capable of changing your mind when you have proof that you were wrong.

PuppyTailWags 4y ago

> The only way the IFR might change is if healthcare systems got so overrun that they could no longer give care. This did not happen anywhere in the industrialized world. In fact all of the temporary field hospitals here in the states were closed virtually. Are you sure, especially particularly early & also this late? My understanding is that several crucial treatments were mass-deferred, several places had no beds, the dead were literally stacked on trucks, and the medical system has been utterly destroyed either from staff falling ill or getting so emotionally destroyed that they've quit. Wasn't there a mainstream situation a bit ago where a nurse literally had to call the fire department because of lack of medical staff? My understanding is that hospitals still haven't recovered in terms of staffing.

mikeyouse 4y ago
Yes, the person you’re replying to is clueless. Even with all of the lockdowns, distancing, masking, and tons of other interventions - hospitals all over were on the brink of collapse. I have 3 immediate family members who are hospitalists in the US and each of their hospitals was in extremely dire straits. 100% bed occupancy, no non-emergent surgeries, diverting patients to neighboring states.

nightski 4y ago

Not sure where you are getting your information, even in our city of 250k the hospitals were full and turning away care.

slaw 4y ago
Hospitals were close to full before covid and are full now. Op is talking about temporary hospitals for covid patients which were empty. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/wa-hospitals-are-far-over-capacity-as-backlogs-and-staff-shortages-add-up/ https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/wa-hospital...
- Retric 4y ago
  That’s talking about a recent snapshot not what things where like at the peak of the pandemic. In 2022 hospitals are as it says getting back to patients who’s treatment where deferred during earlier peaks.

devmor 4y ago

> The only way the IFR might change is if healthcare systems got so overrun that they could no longer give care. This did not happen anywhere in the industrialized world. What world do you live in? It certainly isn't mine. One of my co-workers passed away in her home after being turned away from the ER in part due to no hospitals in the area having available ventilators.

brnaftr361 4y ago

My worry is that we've displaced the casualties to a far less visible causal agent. There's a lot of economic variables that have been pulled at every level, from the individual to the state, to global concerns. And I think these are more pernicious and difficult to track than would be a disease, but I do expect the impact to, overall, be more severe that it otherwise would've been without the (perhaps naive) interventionism. That's just a hypothesis.