John Fedup
The Bunker Group
The consumption of internet “news” without critical thinking wrt COVID, what could possibly go wrong? The answer is apparently nothing according to a certain “base”.
Covid-19 pandemic & Fake News - How you can help
- Thread starter AustinPowers
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Of course "it's Covid-19", but:
"Two or three times as many in city X" would be a likely statistical effect of an imperfect subsample. The number of weekly excess deaths spiked in early April nationwide in the US at about 140% of the seasonal average of the last couple years.
There are some analyses that claim a 300% excess death spike for Italy, although apparently Italy has a relatively high variation in its seasonal excess death rate and possibly - similar to Germany - has problems aggregating such data at national levels.
When compared to only 2016 the same spike in the first half of March there shortly reached around 200%, then went rapidly back down to plateau below seasonal comparison data at the end of the month. That spike coincided with the time when they were running full-on triage on patients in Lombardy.
IIRC Bergamo went over 300%. I think that was the highest in Lombardy, & Lombardy was the highest in Italy.
The USA had huge local variations in numbers of deaths in the spring peak. The New York metropolitan area was very hard hit. New Jersey has recorded 2.5 times the US national average Covid-19 deaths in proportion to population, with New York state just behind, & the death rate in upstate New York was much lower than in the city & its suburbs. Massachusetts has also recorded twice the national average. Some states have recorded less than a quarter of the average.
I'm pretty sure that New York city had over twice the expected death rate in the spring, & that's a big population.
The USA had huge local variations in numbers of deaths in the spring peak. The New York metropolitan area was very hard hit. New Jersey has recorded 2.5 times the US national average Covid-19 deaths in proportion to population, with New York state just behind, & the death rate in upstate New York was much lower than in the city & its suburbs. Massachusetts has also recorded twice the national average. Some states have recorded less than a quarter of the average.
I'm pretty sure that New York city had over twice the expected death rate in the spring, & that's a big population.
With 279 electoral college votes, the Biden/Harris team has won the #USA2020election.
Trump and his supporters have lost Fox News.
GSA Administrator Emily Murphy, a political appointee named to the post by Trump, has not yet begun the process, and a spokeswoman told Reuters she is waiting to determine that "a winner is clear."
More long term data is needed. 7 days just isn’t enough. This Pfizer vaccine is also a 2-dose vaccine requiring the booster later on too, because many vaccines need that second dose to be effective for more long term. This is why we do trials and WAIT for more data.
Biden's transition team wasted no time, naming its own Covid-19 advisory board. The Biden-Harris campaign laid out a step-by-step plan for addressing the coronavirus pandemic that includes more testing, increasing use of the Defense Production Act to make protective equipment for frontline workers and restoring the U.S. relationship with the World Health Organization. The transition team wasted no time, announcing Monday its own Covid-19 advisory board co-chaired by former FDA Commissioner Dr. David Kessler, former Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy and Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith, the associate dean for health equity research at the Yale School of Medicine.
- Biden’s lead in Pennsylvania has grown to 43,194.
- Biden’s lead in Georgia is now 10,353.
Trump and his supporters have lost Fox News.
GSA Administrator Emily Murphy, a political appointee named to the post by Trump, has not yet begun the process, and a spokeswoman told Reuters she is waiting to determine that "a winner is clear."
More long term data is needed. 7 days just isn’t enough. This Pfizer vaccine is also a 2-dose vaccine requiring the booster later on too, because many vaccines need that second dose to be effective for more long term. This is why we do trials and WAIT for more data.
Biden's transition team wasted no time, naming its own Covid-19 advisory board. The Biden-Harris campaign laid out a step-by-step plan for addressing the coronavirus pandemic that includes more testing, increasing use of the Defense Production Act to make protective equipment for frontline workers and restoring the U.S. relationship with the World Health Organization. The transition team wasted no time, announcing Monday its own Covid-19 advisory board co-chaired by former FDA Commissioner Dr. David Kessler, former Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy and Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith, the associate dean for health equity research at the Yale School of Medicine.
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John Fedup
The Bunker Group
This link describes the consequences of large gatherings with no social distancing or masks on neighbouring jurisdictions. South Dakota, a state which has minimal to zero containment rules hosted this large motorcycle rally and as the report indicates, neighbouring states were burdened with huge health care costs as a result. It explains why containment is so difficult for the US when a few poorly run states can undo the efforts of other states.
PhysicsMan
Member
Poorly run states huh. To me there is a strong correlation between how well US states are run in general and how much obedience they demand from their citizens on the covid issue.
The article you linked explains very little about how effective the current containment policies are. Governments treat their people as mindless herds by the blanket rules requiring anything from mandatory masks all the time everywhere (like in California now) to curfews on outdoors presence to closing hiking in natural parks. And the less the government repects an individual as a rational being the more of these regulations you get. Many people, especially outside the US, fail to grasp the fundamental importance of independence and liberty the citizen is given in USA, or to be more correct, was given by the founding fathers and the spirit of this country, and which has been faltering in recent history. And how, they say, do you maintain these freedoms in the face of such a calamity? In my opinion, not by instituting obedience laws, but by encouraging personal responsibility and educating on the issue. Such as the mask wearing thing. I am sure most people on here, just like most people in general, do not realize how little effectiveness they provide in 90% of normal life situations. I say it as an aerosol and flow dynamics physicist. It is nearly impossible to get infected outdoors, whether you wear a mask or you don't, unless someone literally spits or sneezes in your face and you are standing right up against the infected person. Aerosols behave very differently depending on the size, dropping to the ground like little rocks when the size is above a dozen of micron or so (the larger the droplets the more infectious) and present no danger to anyone who is further than a meter away. The smaller stuff behaves pretty much like cigarette smoke, which means that outdoors it almost instantly dissipates from the source to very low concentrations which are insufficient to cause a transmission and, again, present no danger to anyone further than a meter from the infected. And all this assuming there was a very large sneeze. If a person breezes or talks normally than the concentration is low to begin with and the risk is even lower. Plus, this smaller aerosol that is carried by air flows is far smaller than the pore sizes of most masks, such as the surgical ones or anything from cloth, and will go through them like knife through butter. The bottom line is, mandating masks outdoors at all times is ignorant idiocy, and the data suggests as much. Presumably, over 90% of all infections are caused by less than 10% of the infected, essentially meaning that the transmission predominantly happens during superspreading events, like the one mentioned above. So, wouldn't it be more reasonable to limit the regulations to address such superspreading events and not go full retard California style and ban everything? Banning hiking? Tennis courts? Curfews? Closed National Forests? It is a disgrace and an embarassment how they treat people. And I didn't even mention the psychological effects this fear mongering has been producing in people. Suicide rates in some states are exceeding those of Covid apparently (do not have link but even if that is an overstimation I find it reasonable to assume there is a huge problem there).
I agree that people living outside the US, totally fail to grasp the significance of individual independence and liberty as given by the founding American fathers. But here is the bit that often left out; YOUR desire for individual independence and liberty DOES NOT cancel the next mans rights or independence.
The US concept of individual independence and liberty was
(a) a colonial response to the oppression of the British crown
(b) made possible by the HUGE expanse of land available (for takeover)
ie: your rights, independence and liberty are 100% upheld on your land
BUT once you are in shops, town/cities public areas, hospitals, schools etc.
your rights MUST come 2nd to the groups rights, for better law and order, health and social outcomes
YOUR desire for no masks DOES NOT cancel the next mans rights, for example
YOUR desire for no masks DOES NOT cancel the store owners independence to set his own rules.
This can be demonstrated by looking at the countries that got it (COVID) right
Vietnam, Taiwan, Iceland, New Zealand, Singapore, -
“Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
The US concept of individual independence and liberty was
(a) a colonial response to the oppression of the British crown
(b) made possible by the HUGE expanse of land available (for takeover)
ie: your rights, independence and liberty are 100% upheld on your land
BUT once you are in shops, town/cities public areas, hospitals, schools etc.
your rights MUST come 2nd to the groups rights, for better law and order, health and social outcomes
YOUR desire for no masks DOES NOT cancel the next mans rights, for example
YOUR desire for no masks DOES NOT cancel the store owners independence to set his own rules.
This can be demonstrated by looking at the countries that got it (COVID) right
Vietnam, Taiwan, Iceland, New Zealand, Singapore, -
“Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
Boagrius
Well-Known Member
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PhysicsMan
Member
Few would argue for complete personal liberty, as we are bound by social contracts of all kinds. Liberty is curbed in every social system, but to various degrees. My argument is not for removing such barriers altogether, but for following principles of a free society as the main guideline - in accord with relevant science. When the monkeys in power in California (I keep coming back to it because I live there) proudly announce their protective care measures because they follow science, it is nothing but a spit in the face of both liberty AND science. The only place where rules should be free to be as silly or smart as they wish is private business with public clientelle. It is government's accountability to preserve our freedoms. And nowadays the assault on these freedoms is rampant. And as we know, governments rarely give back the freedoms they take away.
Boagrius
Well-Known Member
This strikes me as a paranoid way to view the problem. Multiple free western democracies (NZ, Australia, South Korea, Singapore etc etc) have managed to implement effective public lockdowns that have temporarily restricted or suspended the personal freedoms of individual citizens before relaxing again (multiple times in some cases).
The countries that have performed best in the pandemic so far seem to be those that have been able to temporarily and collectively set aside personal freedoms for the greater good. I'd posit that the inability of the US to respond to the crisis in this unified and coordinated way has been a key contributor to the horrid mess it currently finds itself in.
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PhysicsMan
Member
A healthy dose of paranoia is never a bad idea when it comes to your personal freedoms being tampered with. And it calls for deeper scrutiny. What you and others posit as the reason for the spread in US is not very obvious to me. The dynamics of infection spreading in population is very complex, even more so than the notoriously difficult to master weather forecast. It is a multivariable problem and anyone claiming that this or that variable is the reason for this or that should be viewed with a grain of salt. I just came back from Florida and Illinois. Two drastically different approaches. One is similar to California's - obey or be punished, the other is the opposite - no one wears any masks anywhere in public (maybe 10%). Guess what, their Covid rates are similar (per population). Now go ahead and explain that.
Am I saying masks are a bad idea? No, but when governments institute sweeping rules that make no sense in many cases ( as I described earlier) it leaves me wondering if it should be left to the public's sense of self preservation backed up by a solid educational effort instead.
Boagrius
Well-Known Member
Do you have any data to support this? The success of lockdowns/suppression in countries like Singapore, China, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand and South Korea is not consistent with your view. Simply hand waving the issue away as a multivariate problem ignores the fact that a suppression based strategy involving the temporary sacrifice of personal freedoms has been demonstrably effective in a variety of countries and contexts.
Rather, it strikes me that the failure to implement suppression early, widely and decisively enough is what has gotten other nations (like the US) into trouble. The genie is out of the bottle, hence the difficulty now being faced.
Feasibility study of mitigation and suppression strategies for controlling COVID-19 outbreaks in London and Wuhan
Recent outbreaks of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has led a global pandemic cross the world. Most countries took two main interventions: suppression like immediate lockdown cities at epicenter or mitigation that slows down but not stopping epidemic for reducing peak healthcare demand. Both...
journals.plos.org
Importance of suppression and mitigation measures in managing COVID-19 outbreaks
I employ a simple mathematical model of an epidemic process to evaluate how four basic quantities: the reproduction number (ℛ), the numbers of sensitive (S) and infectious individuals (I), and total community size (N) affect strategies to control COVID-19. Numerical simulations show that strict...
www.medrxiv.org
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PhysicsMan
Member
What exactly is it that's doing the suppressing? Sure, locking everyone down China-style is going to work, that will do the supression. But like I said, a civilized society must look at how to approach the problem and minimize the attack on personal freedoms. And that means you go beyond a computer program and examine what it is that actually works. Which government actually bothered to study how infectious the virus is in open air? And if there are studies (which will show what I wrote before), do you think they are being followed by any government? They are not, because no government cares if it's being heavyhanded or not. It's the same everywhere, except the definition of "heavyhanded" is different in China, Korea, Australia, and US, that's all.Do you have any data to support this? The success of lockdowns/suppression in countries like Singapore, China, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand and South Korea is not consistent with your view. Simply hand waving the issue away as a multivariate problem ignores the fact that a suppression based strategy involving the temporary sacrifice of personal freedoms has been demonstrably effective in a variety of countries and contexts.
Rather, it strikes me that the failure to implement suppression early, widely and decisively enough is what has gotten other nations (like the US) into trouble. The genie is out of the bottle, hence the difficulty now being faced.
Feasibility study of mitigation and suppression strategies for controlling COVID-19 outbreaks in London and Wuhan
Recent outbreaks of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has led a global pandemic cross the world. Most countries took two main interventions: suppression like immediate lockdown cities at epicenter or mitigation that slows down but not stopping epidemic for reducing peak healthcare demand. Both...Importance of suppression and mitigation measures in managing COVID-19 outbreaks
I employ a simple mathematical model of an epidemic process to evaluate how four basic quantities: the reproduction number (ℛ), the numbers of sensitive (S) and infectious individuals (I), and total community size (N) affect strategies to control COVID-19. Numerical simulations show that strict...
@PhysicsMan I acknowledge your expertise in your field. However like me you are not a medical specialist or epidemiologist and therein lies the problem. This COVID-19 virus has proven to be one nasty cunning little bugger and its only going to get worse before it gets better. In this case I prefer to put my trust in the medical professionals, especially the epidemiologists.
Freedom is a great thing, but like any right it has responsibilities. If a society accepts that individual freedoms also have those responsibilities to the greater good of the population then that society is a fair society. However when a society places the rights of the individual above the society at all costs, then that society is not a fair society, but a selfish egotistical self centred and narcissistic one, because the individuals within that society don't care about society members, whether they live or die. It's not their problem. History has shown us that such societies are doomed to fail because they eventually fall into anarchy and chaos.
You claim that us foreigners don't understand the freedoms that you Americans are so fond of claiming, but we actually do and whilst we see the benefits, we also see the fallacies as well, especially at the moment. We cannot understand why you have let 260,000 of your people die from a pandemic when you have the capabilities to have prevented a significant proportion of those deaths. We cannot understand why you let the virus ravage your nation without you doing anything substantive to mitigate it. To us this is not about individual freedoms, but plain callousness on the part of the White House and significant portions of the population in general.
Freedom is a great thing, but like any right it has responsibilities. If a society accepts that individual freedoms also have those responsibilities to the greater good of the population then that society is a fair society. However when a society places the rights of the individual above the society at all costs, then that society is not a fair society, but a selfish egotistical self centred and narcissistic one, because the individuals within that society don't care about society members, whether they live or die. It's not their problem. History has shown us that such societies are doomed to fail because they eventually fall into anarchy and chaos.
You claim that us foreigners don't understand the freedoms that you Americans are so fond of claiming, but we actually do and whilst we see the benefits, we also see the fallacies as well, especially at the moment. We cannot understand why you have let 260,000 of your people die from a pandemic when you have the capabilities to have prevented a significant proportion of those deaths. We cannot understand why you let the virus ravage your nation without you doing anything substantive to mitigate it. To us this is not about individual freedoms, but plain callousness on the part of the White House and significant portions of the population in general.
Boagrius
Well-Known Member
This is simply not a viable or productive way to respond to a novel virus pandemic. When a brand new disease appears and starts spreading and killing people at the rate COVID19 has there is no time to wait around and study how infectious the virus is "in open air" (although that is being actively studied) before formulating a government response. Imagine using this attitude if the disease had an IFR north of 10%, rather than the ~1% COVID19 has been displaying. The results would be utterly catastrophic. Like ngati, I think you'd be best off leaving the matter to the experts...
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PhysicsMan
Member
I don't want such a society either. What I want is for the governments to at least try to preserve their societies' hard gained liberties (for those that have them). It may sound like paranoia, but history shows it is much harder to regain those freedoms once they are lost than to preserve them.
PhysicsMan
Member
Aerosol behavior is very well known to those in the field. As soon as it was known that this virus is aerosol-transmitted they should've taken that into consideration. I am not a medical professional, but from the little I know even the most aggressive viruses require certain concentration to be inhaled to infect. It was known fairly early on what the ball park concentration limit figure for this particular virus was. Linking the two together shouldn't be taking half a year.
Boagrius
Well-Known Member
What's your point?
PhysicsMan
Member
The point is simple. I don't want to do stupid things my government makes me do.