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We had an emergency health situation and the government made emergency rules. Those rules were rescinded later when the emergency was reduced, partly because of

by rnk 3y ago

We had an emergency health situation and the government made emergency rules. Those rules were rescinded later when the emergency was reduced, partly because of widespread vaccination. This is not the first time that during a health emergency the US govt at various levels made temporary stringent rules. It turned out that our political argument against the rules is probably why the u.s had a much higher death rate from covet than other industrialized countries.

lmm 3y ago
Why do you believe that? The best available evidence (e.g. the cochrane review) suggests those stringent rules were not effective. Where I live (Japan) there were very few stringent rules and despite a high population density and an elderly population the number of excess deaths in covid waves was negative. Conversely China imposed some of the strictest rules in the world and has had one of the worst affected populations. Authoritarianism is a very natural human response to a crisis. But the biggest lesson of the Covid-19 era is that it's thoroughly counterproductive. Responding to an uncertain situation, that everyone involved should have known was uncertain, with strict rules, that naturally had to be revised back and forth, destroyed the authorities' credibility, polarized the public, and did a lot of harm. We need to make sure it doesn't happen again.
- zimpenfish 3y ago
  > Where I live (Japan) [...] the number of excess deaths in covid waves was negative. Not in 2021 or 2022 according to [1]: "Japan had excess deaths of up to 113,000 in 2022, more than double the figure of up to 50,000 the year before, according to newly released health ministry statistics" [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/06/national/science-health/excess-deaths-doubled-2022-covid19/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/06/national/scienc...
jazzyjackson 3y ago
Governments love emergencies. Also Americans have a lot of co-morbidities besides ignoring government orders.
ETH_start 3y ago
Absent a feasible zero-COVID strategy, which for most countries was never in the books due to their geographical situation, lockdowns have been found to have virtually no impact on reducing the spread of COVID. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13571516.2021.1976051 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13571516.2021.19... https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/iae/files/2022/01/A-Literature-Review-and-Meta-Analysis-of-the-Effects-of-Lockdowns-on-COVID-19-Mortality.pdf https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/iae/files/2022/01/A-Literature... >>It turned out that our political argument against the rules That framing is very disdainful toward the perspective that human rights should not be violated.

by rnk 3y ago

lmm 3y ago

Why do you believe that? The best available evidence (e.g. the cochrane review) suggests those stringent rules were not effective. Where I live (Japan) there were very few stringent rules and despite a high population density and an elderly population the number of excess deaths in covid waves was negative. Conversely China imposed some of the strictest rules in the world and has had one of the worst affected populations. Authoritarianism is a very natural human response to a crisis. But the biggest lesson of the Covid-19 era is that it's thoroughly counterproductive. Responding to an uncertain situation, that everyone involved should have known was uncertain, with strict rules, that naturally had to be revised back and forth, destroyed the authorities' credibility, polarized the public, and did a lot of harm. We need to make sure it doesn't happen again.

zimpenfish 3y ago
> Where I live (Japan) [...] the number of excess deaths in covid waves was negative. Not in 2021 or 2022 according to [1]: "Japan had excess deaths of up to 113,000 in 2022, more than double the figure of up to 50,000 the year before, according to newly released health ministry statistics" [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/06/national/science-health/excess-deaths-doubled-2022-covid19/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/06/national/scienc...

jazzyjackson 3y ago

Governments love emergencies. Also Americans have a lot of co-morbidities besides ignoring government orders.

ETH_start 3y ago

Absent a feasible zero-COVID strategy, which for most countries was never in the books due to their geographical situation, lockdowns have been found to have virtually no impact on reducing the spread of COVID. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13571516.2021.1976051 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13571516.2021.19... https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/iae/files/2022/01/A-Literature-Review-and-Meta-Analysis-of-the-Effects-of-Lockdowns-on-COVID-19-Mortality.pdf https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/iae/files/2022/01/A-Literature... >>It turned out that our political argument against the rules That framing is very disdainful toward the perspective that human rights should not be violated.