The Corona Virus

[Brother Oni]

We have 400 dead out of what really is something like 200.000 infected.

As others have said, you seem determined to use Denmark as the yardstick for how everybody should treat the disease. Denmark has a population of 5,792,202 according to an estimate from UN Data. That's less than some cities.

For example New York with a population of 8.399 million reported 824 deaths in a day and the current count is 12,067. Looking at the relative population densities, NYC has ~26,400 people per km² while Copenhagen (presumably your most densely populated city) has ~6,800 people/km².

Is it any wonder that the disease spreads differently and has different mortality rates, depending on the viral load that people are subjected to? If they followed the 'carry on as normal, let everybody not immunocompromised get infected and get back to normal as soon as possible' plan, do you really think the death toll in New York would stay that 'low'?


You also seem to be overlooking the fact that deaths from the disease isn't the only consequence. You seem to be looking into nice controlled conditions, so take a look at the USS Theodore Roosevelt; 94% testing rate, 710 positive and 3,872 negative, with 1 fatality.

So far, it's nice and low, but you're missing the point that an entire carrier group has been taken out of operation. There's a number of potentially worrying developments in the Far East that might necessitate an overwhelming large military presence in the area to keep things calm, and you don't get much bigger than a US carrier group.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

If they followed the 'carry on as normal, let everybody not immunocompromised get infected and get back to normal as soon as possible' plan, do you really think the death toll in New York would stay that 'low'?

And equally damning, this fantasy that if we kept everything open "at least the economy wouldn't tank" is also ridiculous. Enough people would've started avoiding restaurants, cinemas, etc. that theirs collapse would've happened anyway, except on a backdrop of even more people dead. Businesses can be reopened or recovered. Loss of a significant portion of the population cannot.

Grey Wolf

[Kaptin Keen]

As others have said, you seem determined to use Denmark as the yardstick for how everybody should treat the disease. Denmark has a population of 5,792,202 according to an estimate from UN Data. That's less than some cities.

Denmark - for mysterious and arcane reasons I'm not even going to try and explain, it's so weird - is what I know best. I don't use my home as an example trying to map us onto the entirety of the multiverse, I use Denmark because I don't know the figures for anywhere else.

Also, I think we're fairly standard. Edit: That's not true. We're fairly standard for the .. I dunno, western world?

For example New York with a population of 8.399 million reported 824 deaths in a day and the current count is 12,067. Looking at the relative population densities, NYC has ~26,400 people per km² while Copenhagen (presumably your most densely populated city) has ~6,800 people/km².

Almost any city you'd care to count has higher population than Denmark.

Is it any wonder that the disease spreads differently and has different mortality rates, depending on the viral load that people are subjected to? If they followed the 'carry on as normal, let everybody not immunocompromised get infected and get back to normal as soon as possible' plan, do you really think the death toll in New York would stay that 'low'?

Did I .... say: Carry on as normal? Can I just ask you to quote where I said that?

You also seem to be overlooking the fact that deaths from the disease isn't the only consequence. You seem to be looking into nice controlled conditions, so take a look at the USS Theodore Roosevelt; 94% testing rate, 710 positive and 3,872 negative, with 1 fatality.

Yes, that sounds about right.

So far, it's nice and low, but you're missing the point that an entire carrier group has been taken out of operation. There's a number of potentially worrying developments in the Far East that might necessitate an overwhelming large military presence in the area to keep things calm, and you don't get much bigger than a US carrier group.

Edit: Actually, I have nothing to say to this.

[Strigon]

My care for carrier groups is .... zero. Absolute zero, like ... you know, -262. Most particularly, in the context of a pandemic, the reduction of offensive military power of anywhere is even less than -262. I think it's a point on this board to keep RL issues and politics out of things, so I'll state this clearly: Any weapons of any power large or small, real or imagined, past, present or future - does not concern me. In the least. But I'll tell you this: In no scenario (.. large or small, real or imagined, past (other than perhaps WWII), present or future ..) do I consider a carrier group to be part of the solution.

The carrier group itself is not the point. The point is that the United States Navy considers them very important, and there are very few things that would cause the Navy to take one out of action. The fact that coronavirus is one of those things is very telling about how serious the spread of this disease is. Armed forces are, quite reasonably, known for continuing to do their job in adverse or even dangerous conditions. If they start shutting down multi-billion dollar operations, it's for a very good reason.

Saying it doesn't matter because you don't care for carrier groups is ridiculous. That would be like a coal miner seeing a dead canary and staying in the mine because he doesn't like birds.

[Rockphed]

The carrier group itself is not the point. The point is that the United States Navy considers them very important, and there are very few things that would cause the Navy to take one out of action. The fact that coronavirus is one of those things is very telling about how serious the spread of this disease is. Armed forces are, quite reasonably, known for continuing to do their job in adverse or even dangerous conditions. If they start shutting down multi-billion dollar operations, it's for a very good reason.

They took the carrier out of action because they thought the virus would do it for them if they didn't get to port. Being taken out of action does not show how damaging the virus is, only how damaging the US government thought it would be.

[Peelee]

Did I .... say: Carry on as normal? Can I just ask you to quote where I said that?

Your very first post in this thread:

It's .. the flu. Like all the other flu's the world has been panicking over, it's totally harmless to the vast majority of everyone - but if you're old and/or infirm, maybe be a little more careful than usual.

Now, I'll be the first to agree, you didn't exactly say "carry on as normal." You did say the old and/or infirm should be more careful than usual.

A little.

Maybe.

[Aedilred]

It seems to be neurological. First tests seems to show the loss of taste is not an effect on the receptors in the tongue, but either in the brain or the nerves between tongue and brain.

Speaking entirely from experience, it's definitely not a direct effect on the tastebuds, or at least not just that, because that was the first thing to return. While I lost my sense of taste (and smell) completely initially, what returned first, within a week or so, was my ability to taste whether food was salty, bitter, etc. - the flavours detected by the tastebuds themselves - but nothing more complex. The remainder is returning very gradually: it's been about a month since the primary symptoms wore off, and my sense of smell and correspondingly taste are still very weak.

Businesses can be reopened or recovered. Loss of a significant portion of the population cannot.

Sure it can. It'll just take a while. You won't get those exact people back, obviously, but everyone dies at some point.

The Black Death killed a lot more people than this. Both in absolute and in relative terms. The population recovered.

Of course, we shouldn't just let everyone die. Societies ought to care for their most vulnerable citizens. I'd also hope we can cope with a pandemic better than mediaeval governments did in the Black Death (albeit I'm not sure we are doing...)

But, callous as it sounds, you can't save everyonen and you can't throw everyone under the bus to save a few. The people who are paid to make the hard decisions know that, or at least ought to, and if they don't then they shouldn't be doing their job. Because if you're not careful, people will start taking that into their own hands.

If this goes on too long, and we somehow manage to survive without serious civil unrest, it'll still create breaches of trust between population groups that will be extremely difficult to undo or overcome. It won't take much to create an entire generation who believe their futures have been sold down the river to pay for the protection of their grandparents. Even before the lockdown I was hearing otherwise sensible people saying in all seriousness that we should just lock up all the old and sick people and let everyone else get on with their lives. Equally, we've got people willing to torch all our hard-fought privacy rights and liberties if it'll let us get out of the house again. As long as this lasts, and unless properly managed, those voices are only going to get louder, and angrier, and that's not good for anyone.

I don't pretend to have an answer, but what worries me is that I don't think anyone else has one either. Or at least not a good one.

[Vinyadan]

a look at the USS Theodore Roosevelt; 94% testing rate, 710 positive and 3,872 negative, with 1 fatality.

I think this is a good case to show the lower mortality for young people (I doubt they have many septuagenarians on board). By now, however, I'm not really convinced that it's a matter of age, and it looks to me like the underlying conditions are the only thing that matters; even in this case, I think it works, since I expect navy members to be physically fit. To make a comparison, these data seem to show a fairly even distribution of deaths, if there aren't preexisting conditions, even at different ages.

The result is more or less the same as if going by raw age, because older people have more chances of having chronic health problems, and one can object that I didn't check the proportion of the total population made up by different age groups, but I think it's interesting.

I also assume that the ships were retired because there were worries that the local "hospital" would have been insufficient to handle the situation, or that enough people would become sufficiently sick to make the ship unacceptably vulnerable or unready.

[Strigon]

I think this is a good case to show the lower mortality for young people (I doubt they have many septuagenarians on board). By now, however, I'm not really convinced that it's a matter of age, and it looks to me like the underlying conditions are the only thing that matters; even in this case, I think it works, since I expect navy members to be physically fit. To make a comparison, these data seem to show a fairly even distribution of deaths, if there aren't preexisting conditions, even at different ages.

The result is more or less the same as if going by raw age, because older people have more chances of having chronic health problems, and one can object that I didn't check the proportion of the total population made up by different age groups, but I think it's interesting.

Not only by different age groups, but by the proportion of the population without underlying conditions.
Those numbers show a pretty consistent number of deaths (~25) among those without underlying conditions for each age range. However, not only are there different numbers of people within those age ranges, but - as you pointed out - the rate of underlying conditions varies. There are a lot more 20-40 year olds without underlying conditions than 80-100 year olds. With that in mind, if age weren't a factor by itself, you should see more deaths among the younger population. As it stands, it trends upward with age even among those without underlying conditions - though not enough to prove correlation without more numbers.

Anyway, of course underlying conditions will play a big role, but age is, itself, and underlying condition. Even if there isn't any diagnosable condition present, like heart disease or diabetes, the body deteriorates in a hundred different ways with age. Even if none of them, by themselves, would be severe enough to be qualified a medical condition, the aggregate effect is quite significant.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Sure it can. It'll just take a while. You won't get those exact people back, obviously, but everyone dies at some point.

The Black Death killed a lot more people than this. Both in absolute and in relative terms. The population recovered.

But the economy did not. And indeed that is my whole point: "the cure is worse than the sickness" is a ridiculous position, because in a pandemic, people are too scared to take part in the economy. There is no scenario where people like you get to be happy that the economy is chugging along on the backs of the deaths of 2% of the population. The economy would have shut down regardless - by shutting it down in advance, and with care, you reduce the mortality, which allows the economy to recover more gracefully when the coast is clear.

Leaving aside the utter immorality of "I don't care how many old people die, I want the economy working, and besides, we' all will die someday, so what do I care if they die years before they could've" vibe these "arguments" give, the reality is that there was no saving the economy the moment this started. It is a fantasy to pretend otherwise.

Grey Wolf

[theNater]

I don't pretend to have an answer, but what worries me is that I don't think anyone else has one either. Or at least not a good one.

It's not really that complicated.

1)Use a universal basic income(UBI) to allow people to stay at home as long as they need to without going broke.
2)Provide financial relief for industries hardest hit(note: they don't need to pay employees, because of UBI, so this will be less than it might sound initially).
3)Test everybody.
4)Start opening up for those who are negative or immune.
5)Retest regularly, with anybody who tests positive going into personal quarantine for 2-3 weeks.
6)Recoup expenditures with tax increases on those for whom the UBI was a tiny portion of their income and industries that saw financial gain(medical supply, for example).

[Aedilred]

It's not really that complicated.

1)Use a universal basic income(UBI) to allow people to stay at home as long as they need to without going broke.
2)Provide financial relief for industries hardest hit(note: they don't need to pay employees, because of UBI, so this will be less than it might sound initially).
3)Test everybody.
4)Start opening up for those who are negative or immune.
5)Retest regularly, with anybody who tests positive going into personal quarantine for 2-3 weeks.
6)Recoup expenditures with tax increases on those for whom the UBI was a tiny portion of their income and industries that saw financial gain(medical supply, for example).

(1) and (6) are sufficiently political in nature that I'll leave those, but regarding the remainder, the problem is the scale of the job and the availability of the tests. If the UK were to do 100,000 tests per day, starting today, it would have done enough tests to have tested everyone by about next Christmas. Which is far too long.

And 100,000 is an aspirational target which the UK will miss by its self-imposed deadline. The USA is currently hitting about that number, but it's got a much larger population.

And that assumes that the tests are reliable, which they may not be.

And you'll have to test some - probably most - people more than once.

Of course, we could solve this with a vaccine, or with massively ramped-up testing, but the reality of getting those produced and into circulation is more taxing: it's going to take months at minimum before it even starts to work.

But the economy did not. And indeed that is my whole point: "the cure is worse than the sickness" is a ridiculous position, because in a pandemic, people are too scared to take part in the economy. There is no scenario where people like you get to be happy that the economy is chugging along on the backs of the deaths of 2% of the population. The economy would have shut down regardless - by shutting it down in advance, and with care, you reduce the mortality, which allows the economy to recover more gracefully when the coast is clear.

Debatable. The end of the Black Death was not far off the start of the Renaissance. Wages soared. It led to a flourishing of urban business and the growth of a whole new entrepreneurial class. If anything the economy recovered more quickly than the population.

And I'm not quite sure where you're coming from. You said initially that the economy would recover but the population wouldn't; I said that the population did and you answer that the economy didn't, so you seem to have reversed your position.

Leaving aside the utter immorality of "I don't care how many old people die, I want the economy working, and besides, we' all will die someday, so what do I care if they die years before they could've" vibe these "arguments" give, the reality is that there was no saving the economy the moment this started. It is a fantasy to pretend otherwise.

... and this is where I'm done with the thread. Never mind that that is explicitly not what I said, and that the economy was only part of what I was talking about, I am utterly fed up with the aggressive groupthink in this thread. In particular the call-and-response "oh boy I bet those naysayers feel stupid now" and then whenever anyone dares to say "no I don't, and here's why" they get called, to use your word, "utterly immoral". Even under lockdown I've got better things to do with my time than to have this discussion if that's the way it's going to go.

So if you agree not to take my silence as assent the next time someone ventures to say something about how me or my ilk must be feeling silly and take my disagreemtn as read, I'll leave you all to congratulate yourselves about how seriously you're taking this without the trouble of dissenting opinion.

[NichG]

It's not really that complicated.

1)Use a universal basic income(UBI) to allow people to stay at home as long as they need to without going broke.
2)Provide financial relief for industries hardest hit(note: they don't need to pay employees, because of UBI, so this will be less than it might sound initially).
3)Test everybody.
4)Start opening up for those who are negative or immune.
5)Retest regularly, with anybody who tests positive going into personal quarantine for 2-3 weeks.
6)Recoup expenditures with tax increases on those for whom the UBI was a tiny portion of their income and industries that saw financial gain(medical supply, for example).

It's funny... I wouldn't mind a bit about emergency taxes, I could tolerate a reasonable privacy-preserving contact tracing policy, masks are fine, etc. But the idea of being tested periodically is so off-putting given how painful the nasopharyngeal tests are supposed to be, I think I'd rather just stay in for the next 4 years.

Makes me wonder whether it'd actually fly if there's so much fuss already about people putting a piece of cloth on their face.

[Bobb]

It's not really that complicated.

2)Provide financial relief for industries hardest hit(note: they don't need to pay employees, because of UBI, so this will be less than it might sound initially).

Don't take my only quoting 2) to mean I'm on board with you for the other bits, I'm not.


But {scrubbed}.

[Peelee]

But the idea of being tested periodically is so off-putting given how painful the nasopharyngeal tests are supposed to be, I think I'd rather just stay in for the next 4 years.

I wouldn't call it painful, but it's certainly one of the most uncomfortable procedures I've had done. I certainly would not want to repeat the experience.

I even asked if they could just take my blood instead. I have tons of blood, so much blood, I told 'em! They could take as much as they wanted! But no, they refused not matter how much I offered.

[Joran]

I wouldn't call it painful, but it's certainly one of the most uncomfortable procedures I've had done. I certainly would not want to repeat the experience.

I even asked if they could just take my blood instead. I have tons of blood, so much blood, I told 'em! They could take as much as they wanted! But no, they refused not matter how much I offered.

The immunity tests will be blood-based (I think they're called serology tests). At the moment, it appears they're dicey in terms of accuracy and we still don't know how many antibodies would show immunity.

Also, when I read/saw how Coronavirus tests were administered, I winced. I have very small nasal passages and it'd be very uncomfortable for me to have that test; when I went to the ENT, I had to get the pediatric probes along with a dose of anesthetic to get the probe to fit.

From an article about new ways of making swabs in the WaPo (3-D printing!):

“A nasopharyngeal swab is not a joke. It goes about four inches into your head,” Arnaout said. “It has to be thin, long and flexible enough to get around the nasal anatomy, but it has to be stiff enough that you can twirl it to pick up nasal secretions you’re going to do testing on. They tell us in medical school that if the patient isn’t complaining, then you’re not doing it right.”

[Peelee]

The immunity tests will be blood-based (I think they're called serology tests). At the moment, it appears they're dicey in terms of accuracy and we still don't know how many antibodies would show immunity.

Don't care, would rather they take a full liter than do that swab again.

They tell us in medical school that if the patient isn’t complaining, then you’re not doing it right.

That is 100% no joke. The nurses who did my wife and me were pretty nice about it, they let us take a breather after the first one (it helped that I was coughing a bit after the first nostril. I also suspect my humorous pleas for bloodletting warmed them up to me). A coworker had his nurse just plow it in right after the other immediately.

[theNater]

...it's going to take months at minimum before it even starts to work.

That's correct. That's why we need UBI (to prevent people starving) and financial relief for heavily affected business(so they don't have to close) in the meantime.

It's funny... I wouldn't mind a bit about emergency taxes, I could tolerate a reasonable privacy-preserving contact tracing policy, masks are fine, etc. But the idea of being tested periodically is so off-putting given how painful the nasopharyngeal tests are supposed to be, I think I'd rather just stay in for the next 4 years.

Makes me wonder whether it'd actually fly if there's so much fuss already about people putting a piece of cloth on their face.

The periodic retesting doesn't have to be super frequent, and may be skippable under certain conditions. But at least periodic sampling per community would be a good idea, especially in regions where the virus has been particularly widespread.

I said it wasn't complicated, not that it would be easy or fun.

But {scrub the post, scrub the quote}

I am aware, and it sucks. But it doesn't change the fact that certain businesses won't have income under lockdown and will need to pay for basic maintenance for the duration.

You can say you don't care, and I'll happily agree to disagree, but I would like movie theaters and restaurants to still exist when they are safe to visit again.

[Peelee]

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Friendly reminder to give a wide berth when it comes to potentially political topics, even as they may intersect with COVID-19.

[NichG]

The periodic retesting doesn't have to be super frequent, and may be skippable under certain conditions. But at least periodic sampling per community would be a good idea, especially in regions where the virus has been particularly widespread.

I said it wasn't complicated, not that it would be easy or fun.

Funnily enough, something can be a 'good idea' from an infection control or economic reopening perspective, and also be something that personally I know that I would be non-compliant with. For me personally, suffering physical discomfort so that restaurants and theatres can receive my custom isn't actually a trade I'm willing to make. It crosses some kind of line.

I'm sure others have these lines too, though likely elsewhere, and if your lines don't line up it probably looks insane or unreasonable.

I guess I would describe it as a feeling of betrayal somehow. Like, on one side of the line there is 'by complying even if it requires some compromise, it will be better for all of us in the end'. But on the other side its 'by complying, it primarily serves the interests of others but makes things strictly worse for me in the end even if everyone else does it too'.

I think this is probably how some people feel about the lockdowns.

[veti]

Zero percent of the numbers are correct. Not mine, either. But you have to take into consideration that
- Every time you have a nice, controlled environment (like the Diamond Princess, or the survey of all blood donors), the number are very, very non-threatening
- And every other survey - in non-controlled environments - have tonnes and tonnes of unknowns ... primarily all those who are infected, and never noticed, or never went to a doctor

The Diamond Princess where 13 people have died out of 713 infections? Or is there some other Diamond Princess I haven't heard of? Because 13/713 is pretty darn' close to the standard 2% figure that you seem intent on denying.

If there were lots and lots of people, here in New Zealand, who have been infected and never noticed, why didn't they spread the disease any further? Why has testing - we've done quite a lot of that now - not picked up any new cases not closely connected to known clusters? The theory that some substantial percentage of the population has it but never gets officially recorded - was tenable a month ago, at the start of our lockdown period, but not now. We would have noticed it by now.

[Kaptin Keen]

The Diamond Princess where 13 people have died out of 713 infections? Or is there some other Diamond Princess I haven't heard of? Because 13/713 is pretty darn' close to the standard 2% figure that you seem intent on denying.

If there were lots and lots of people, here in New Zealand, who have been infected and never noticed, why didn't they spread the disease any further? Why has testing - we've done quite a lot of that now - not picked up any new cases not closely connected to known clusters? The theory that some substantial percentage of the population has it but never gets officially recorded - was tenable a month ago, at the start of our lockdown period, but not now. We would have noticed it by now.

Look ... you seem to be upset. Or at least - very insistent.

I'm not denying anything. Ok?

Let me give you some numbers. Here: 2%, 10%, 0,13%.

See? All those are correct numbers. Each for their specific scenario. Each for their data set.

None of those numbers are right.

The mortality rate of the disease isn't 2%, or 10%, or 0,13%. The mortality rate in each narrow, specific case, is 2%, or 10%, or 0,13%. It's 2% if you're a cruise ship passenger, or 10% if you're above the age of 80 (in Denmark), or 0,13% if you're a blood donor (again, Denmark).

I'm not denying any of that.

What I am trying to get across is that if you focus on one number, in isolation, without looking at the context - then you are deluding yourself. Most particularly, if you listen to the media - then spreading what they report - then you are being deluded, deluding yourself, and if you spread that, you are deluding others.

None of it is correct. Except when viewed in the proper context.

Where did you get 13? I still get 7 as the highest I can find. Not that I doubt it - I just can't verify myself.

[NichG]

I'm seeing 13 deaths on https://www.worldometers.info/corona...navirus-cases/ and the same here: https://www.statista.com/statistics/...mond-princess/

[Liquor Box]

But the economy did not. And indeed that is my whole point: "the cure is worse than the sickness" is a ridiculous position, because in a pandemic, people are too scared to take part in the economy. There is no scenario where people like you get to be happy that the economy is chugging along on the backs of the deaths of 2% of the population. The economy would have shut down regardless - by shutting it down in advance, and with care, you reduce the mortality, which allows the economy to recover more gracefully when the coast is clear.

You are absolutely right that the economy will suffer significant damage even if a light touch approach is taken to dealing with the virus. But it will probably be much less bad than if lockdown occurs.

On the flipside there will be a significant number of deaths from the virus even if lockdown is implemented. But there will probably be many more deaths is a light touch is taken.

It is open to discussion how many more deaths there would be from one approach, or how much worse the economic crash would be from the other, or what priority should be given to either. But it is not ridiculous to suggest that the cure is worse than the sickness at all (in fact watering down the cure seems to be the more popular course of action amongst most countries).

Leaving aside the utter immorality of "I don't care how many old people die, I want the economy working, and besides, we' all will die someday, so what do I care if they die years before they could've" vibe these "arguments" give, the reality is that there was no saving the economy the moment this started. It is a fantasy to pretend otherwise.

I don't think morality comes into it. We are not talking about a risk of others dying vs a risk to our own financial state - we are not putting our own economic interests ahead of others' health. The risks on each side of the equation effect all of us (admittedly to differing degrees - the economic impact will probably effect the young and poor more, the health impact will probably effect the old more).

We are discussing it in aggregate terms - the impact on the world, or a country. But one can look at it from their own perspective. Would I rather a 0.5% higher chance of dying from the virus, or a 20% higher chance of losing my job (obviously a simplification on both sides)? Everyone's answer may be different depending on their perspective and circumstances, but I don't think either answer is morally questionable.

[Kaptin Keen]

I'm seeing 13 deaths on https://www.worldometers.info/corona...navirus-cases/ and the same here: https://www.statista.com/statistics/...mond-princess/

Granted. I never did argue on the basis of infected/dead, though. I argued that 4800 were exposed to the virus, and 7 died (which was wrong, or changed since). Neither here nor there, though - like with each and every one of these figures or statistics, it's entirely irrelevant how many died on Diamond Princess, if one doesn't understand the context.

Now, it remains a nice, closed and controlled environment, and a case that's run it's course.

We do not know whether 2% is high or low or right on par, until we know who was on the ship. If it was primarily the elderly - ages 65 and up - then the number is low. If it was primarily people of the ages of 35-65, it's absurdly high. Worse still, if from 20-35.

[Friv]

Granted. I never did argue on the basis of infected/dead, though. I argued that 4800 were exposed to the virus, and 7 died (which was wrong, or changed since). Neither here nor there, though - like with each and every one of these figures or statistics, it's entirely irrelevant how many died on Diamond Princess, if one doesn't understand the context.

Now, it remains a nice, closed and controlled environment, and a case that's run it's course.

We do not know whether 2% is high or low or right on par, until we know who was on the ship. If it was primarily the elderly - ages 65 and up - then the number is low. If it was primarily people of the ages of 35-65, it's absurdly high. Worse still, if from 20-35.

Here's what we know. Strip away your theories on mortality rates, infection rates, whatever. We know two things for absolute certainty:

1. Covid-19 has killed over 212,000 people in under four months. This is true after incredibly unique and serious lockdown rules have been put in place worldwide.
2. Last year, over twelve months, the flu killed slightly under 400,000 people.

Those are the only two facts you need to disprove "Covid-19 is just a flu". It's killed half as many people in four months as the flu kills in twelve, and it's done it despite heroic measures to contain it. Anyone claiming that this is not a massive, massive problem that did, in fact, need a massive solution is just flat-out wrong.

And the reason that people are getting annoyed that you're insisting that the problem isn't that bad is that right now, several countries are in the middle of a political crisis in which vulnerable people are potentially going to be forced back to work and into the path of the disease. Right now, claiming that things aren't that bad could actually kill people.

We also are learning that (3) there seem to be a huge amount more secondary and long-term damage effects from Covid than from the flu, but I expect that you won't believe those until they're proven by a double-blind study that tracks cases over a five-year period.

[Imbalance]

Lol at "absolute certainty." Over 200 victims miraculously came back to life in Pennsylvania last week, according to the "absolutely certain" official count. You're riding these numbers on a great deal of faith, believing that the people that are doing the counting are infallible, and preaching worse things to come based on a different set of theories, yet no closer to "absolute certainty" than anyone else. It's rather idiotic for anyone to argue absolutes until the dust settles, and even then the numbers need to be taken with a wide range of error.

That's not to disown the seriousness of the current pandemic or claim that it is or is not worse than any previous metric, but |certainty| is not what we have. What we have is a lot of scared people making a lot of fearful claims.

[Bartmanhomer]

Here's what we know. Strip away your theories on mortality rates, infection rates, whatever. We know two things for absolute certainty:

1. Covid-19 has killed over 212,000 people in under four months. This is true after incredibly unique and serious lockdown rules have been put in place worldwide.
2. Last year, over twelve months, the flu killed slightly under 400,000 people.

Those are the only two facts you need to disprove "Covid-19 is just a flu". It's killed half as many people in four months as the flu kills in twelve, and it's done it despite heroic measures to contain it. Anyone claiming that this is not a massive, massive problem that did, in fact, need a massive solution is just flat-out wrong.

And the reason that people are getting annoyed that you're insisting that the problem isn't that bad is that right now, several countries are in the middle of a political crisis in which vulnerable people are potentially going to be forced back to work and into the path of the disease. Right now, claiming that things aren't that bad could actually kill people.

We also are learning that (3) there seem to be a huge amount more secondary and long-term damage effects from Covid than from the flu, but I expect that you won't believe those until they're proven by a double-blind study that tracks cases over a five-year period.

OMG! That's a lot of numbers.

[Friv]

Lol at "absolute certainty." Over 200 victims miraculously came back to life in Pennsylvania last week, according to the "absolutely certain" official count. You're riding these numbers on a great deal of faith, believing that the people that are doing the counting are infallible, and preaching worse things to come based on a different set of theories, yet no closer to "absolute certainty" than anyone else. It's rather idiotic for anyone to argue absolutes until the dust settles, and even then the numbers need to be taken with a wide range of error.

That's not uncertainty, that's statistics. 200 people is nothing for numbers of this scale.

Specifically, Pennsylvania revised its metrics for "probable deaths" and a small number fluctuated. Small numbers fluctuate a lot in reporting. The nature of statistics is that those fluctuations even out when pulled out to a large enough scale, such as the entire planet. They don't always even out entirely, which is why I said "over 212,000 people" and not "the current coronavirus death toll is 216,221 people" (it went up another 4,000 between my last post and this one.)

It would be absurd to give an exact death toll down to the last person. It is not absurd to say that mathematics are real. Even a variation of plus or minus 10%, which would be absolutely staggering for a sample of this magnitude, doesn't contradict anything in my post; if the numbers were off by a full 15% too high, coronavirus would still have killed half the number of people in four months that the flu managed in twelve.

So yes. Absolute certainty.

[Rockphed]

1. Covid-19 has killed over 212,000 people in under four months. This is true after incredibly unique and serious lockdown rules have been put in place worldwide.

This evidence points to one of two things: either the disease is really good at killing people, or the lock-downs didn't do anything. Without the proper scientific studies I doubt we will ever know which is the truth.