Doesn't seem very well thought out. The economic cost of the first scenario (numerous deaths in peak period) would likely be the highest with the impact both on workforce and market sentiment. The impact of long tail scenarios lower because death toll would not be just redistributed but also reduced by likely an order of magnitude.
The outcome may sound dystopian. But once you put monetary value on a life - I think insurances do around a few million per person - then the economic damage will be worth several lives anyway no matter which scenario you choose. And that kind of calculation does make sense because at some point economic damage starts to translate directly to deaths, at the latest when your food and medical supply collapses, probably sooner than that. So you end up trading some deaths for other deaths.
Of course I'm not saying that anyone has done those tradeoffs optimally, especially considering that those relations probably are non-linear in practice.
But we are nowhere near that point. Issue some Fiat money to businesses most heavily impacted. Reduce the spread of the virus. Save lives. Worry about the money later.
It is worse than that - a dystopia is a result of humanity's folly. It being favored is a sad inherent result of "evolutionary" systems where it isn't what is more than what is morally right or wrong much less optimal. It rests upon one dumb tautology: All other things equal things which perpetuate spread more than things that do not. The process while producing quite a bit of emergent complexity is fundamentally dumb.
Self perpetuation is fundamentally based only on the implications of the strategy. If keeping elders alive past nominal utility helps spread well then it is effectively favored. Which may or may not be known ahead of time.
That said by being smarter than it we have both the ability and responsibility for the consequences for decisions to follow or defy its nudges as we can and see fit.
Even in the red scenario, the number of people who will end up sick for a long time and require a lot of care outnumbers the death toll.
Caring well is always better than not caring. Unless we won't care in the green scenario either. But then, who think we won't care if we have time and resources?
Not aimed at you, but, I am disgusted at even a mention of these kind of 'calculations'.
And yes, I am prepared to take a hit in my earnings, paying higher taxes if needed after this if that is what it takes for at least one person more to live.
Another way of thinking about it is that there are other non-coronavirus interventions you can perform that will convert money into lives. if you spend money performing coronavirus interventions then you retard your ability to perform these other interventions that might be more efficient at converting money into lives.
What? This has nothing to do with the slippery slope fallacy. . It's not because we're aren't there yet that saying that it could happen is a fallacy. With that logic any type of planning or forecast about the virus is just a slippery slope since we aren't there. And If you agree that forecasts about the virus are okay, I dont see why forecasts about the economy depending on what policy is enforced (full isolation that would ruin the economy or allow people to get infected to keep it going) are worst?
Because grandparent said they would sacrifice a realistic tax increase to save lives in the COVID-19 outbreak, the parent asked about a confiscatory 99% tax rate and asset seizure, which would be wholly unnecessary for paying for the current crisis.
Yes, current crisis. Everyone agrees on the fact that the virus will probably spread and become much more widespread. Isn't it logical that costs will go up too, especially if the state decides that the economy isn't worth the loss of lives? Is slippery slope just saying that cause and effect exist now?
I don't see how the original comment was unreasonable in asking what is the threshold where economic losses are too high. Halting all economic activity to completely stop the spread of the disease and prevent deaths amounts to a 100% taxation since you are forced to not work and generate revenue. Whether that is acceptable or not isn't my point, but asking the question isn't a fallacy
You guys missed the point of my post. GP was saying that he found it reprehensible to make calculations on human life. My point was that he had already made such a calculation, implicitly. The value of a stranger to him is exactly worth however % income decrease he's willing to take + % increase in tax. Everyone makes this calculation every day.
Every second you spend on HN instead of moonlighting for extra cash to donate (it goes without saying you already donate your salary beyond what's required for subsistence) is frankly disgusting to me. You're murdering by the second.
This may explain why sexually-transmitted diseases get so much attention. They're probably the only kind of diseases that hit younger population much harder than senior citizens. THOSE are the diseases that make the rich earn less money.
From an ethical point of view, governments owe seniors the money and care, because they had worked for state prosperity. Also, if young people had more foresight, they would realize the way seniors are treated today will be more less the way they themselves will be treated. But old age and death is a depressing topic and no one likes to dwell on it.
> This may explain why sexually-transmitted diseases get so much attention.
At least in my country, we spend radically more per-capita on healthcare for the old than we do for the young [1] simply because the old need more of it.
For men age 5-45 we spend less than £1000, for men age 80-85 we spend more than £4500. It's a similar story for women, but with a bump for women of childbearing age.
I don't see any evidence of a bias in favour of the working-age population.
As with many things, there are two ways of looking at this. One is that old people need it the most. Another is that helping younger people is more cost-effective because they have more life ahead of them and if you cure them they're unlikely to get another disease soon. The latter is more heartless, but you can't deny there's some merit to it.
"This may explain why sexually-transmitted diseases get so much attention. They're probably the only kind of diseases that hit younger population much harder than senior citizens. THOSE are the diseases that make the rich earn less money."
This seems implausible to me. Given that the rich tend to be of rather old age themselves, I'd wager that they'd invest in preventing their own deaths
Of course it's true, but do we want to live in a society where we prioritize economic output over the life of people? Many do not and governments were elected by those.
>The economic cost of the first scenario (numerous deaths in peak period) would likely be the highest with the impact
This is self-evident, both due to first-order and second-order effects. How the author manages to stand it on its head is amazing. It's worth noting that approaching, or exceeding, the capacity of the medical system (or any other) drives the costs sky high by and of itself - not to mention other, unrelated cases that also need treatment. With a few weeks worth of disruption to healthcare, even mild cases of other illnesses can spiral out of control and become costly (or even deadly) on their own.
I wouldn't read too much into a country having a muted or slow response to the pandemic; it's the expected outcome of political and economical systems differing across the globe. There is always a slow country to act, and its citizens might feel entitled to the kind of far-fetched speculation the author posted.
> There is always the slowest country to act, and its citizens would feel entitled to the kind of far-fetched speculation the author posted.
Sounds about right. Belgium and the Netherlands aren't doing very much yet.
One interesting fact I discovered when discussing with my wife last night that I think does shape the discussion here: In the Netherlands, seasonal influenza has ~1% mortality rate -- in the U.S. it's more like 0.1%. This leads to different framings of the comparative severity of Coronavirus in the Netherlands.
>In the Netherlands, seasonal influenza has ~1% mortality rate -- in the U.S. it's more like 0.1%.
(I'm not a healthcare professional nor actuarian; the following is freehand speculation)
There are two key factors. Firstly, USA is much less densely populated, with various additional compounding aspects: social stratification, with many segments of society living mostly in their own areas, and lesser dependence on mass transport. Modern technology and abundance of land allows maintaining a degree of isolation when needed.
Secondly, the healthcare system in USA vs Netherlands is tale of semi-private vs nationalized system. The former has more incentives to be proactive and minimize costs, vs the later having incentives to make a good showing, with payments being assured anyway.
> The former has more incentives to be proactive and minimize costs
On an individual basis perhaps in theory, but not on a population basis. See underinsured people afraid to go to a doctor until their condition is so bad it warrants an ER visit.
The actual numbers of the cost-effectiveness of US healthcare also shows the complete opposite of "minimizing costs" where it's twice as expensive as any other system
I don't know, but I live in the Netherlands (as an expat) and their approach to healthcare is legendary for its sloppiness. The most common joke is about doctors responding to any health complaint by handing some paracetamol and saying "come back in two weeks if you don't feel better".
Three days ago the government held a special meeting about the coronavirus, in which they deliberated that people should stop shaking hands. That's all. They tell people who have come back from a high risk area and have flu symptoms NOT to call their gp and just stay home.
I'm not saying healthcare is bad ("sloppiness" wasn't a good choice of a term). In fact it's very well organised.
It's more that the Dutch seem to be extremely... relaxed, maybe a bit fatalistic, about illness. It's a "suck it up" attitude. The fact that they're so slow in taking action now doesn't surprise me.
Maybe cultural. One of the reasons I love working with the Dutch is their calm professional approach to things. Not the worst trait to have in times of crisis.
>In the Netherlands, seasonal influenza has ~1% mortality rate -- in the U.S. it's more like 0.1%
Completely false, it seems 0.1% also in the Netherlands.
"In the Netherlands, our closest comparisons are the Mexican flu of 2009/2010, with a mortality rate of just 0.02%, and the regular flu epidemics, with an average mortality rate of 0.1%"
from:
https://healthcare-in-europe.com/en/news/on-the-implications...
No it's not. It's just one guy making up random shit on a blog and is pretending that governments think like him.
The reality is probably closer to the fact that there isn't anything governments can do about it. They can try to shut down the borders of the country, but that is going to a lot worse and probably won't stop it anyways.
Just because governments can do something and do do something doesn't mean that that something is meaningful or will have a positive impact.
Denmark did close every school and most administrations. France did not.
Many decisions can be taken, but are not (for various reasons). Most experts recommend to limit contacts rather than closing down borders, and no one is pretending to stop the virus but they all should try to flatten the curve. You don't seem to pay attention to the current situation.
Afaik in Germany the country's government can't force schools to close or public events to be cancelled. These decisions have to be taken locally (at state/city or even district level). All the health ministry can do is tell people "you shouldn't do A B C and you should do X Y Z"
This is correct afaik, I'm pretty sure the decision to close schools is with the ministries of education of each German state, however if federal institutions put out strong recommendations, state and local administrators will likely follow very soon after. Federal ministries may not have absolute control here (unless they declare a state of emergency or something) but they do have plenty of influence.
Japan has a different culture. When the government puts out a "strong recommendation", the society generally follows. This even happens with corporations. There's a culture of conformity there that just isn't present in western nations.
In the places where they have shut down schools, they can't really do it either. But when government says "do X" and has good reasons, the institutions comply. I'm in the board of a private institution in a country with a shutdown order, and there was really no discussion between the board members that this institution would shut down too, despite there being no legal backing at all.
That seems to be exactly the reason in Germany. The federal government has no say regarding public gatherings or schools. They have given out recommendations, some have followed, others have not. There's no repercussion for cities not following the government's decision.
You can hide behind "I lack the legal authority" or you can act. This is one of the rare occasions that absolutely do call for the old "ask for forgiveness" mentality. Nobody in the lower tiers would complain about central government to take a very difficult decision off their plate. (some people will complain, those who still think they can just pretend that the epidemic does not happen, but they will complain anyways)
The difference is that, in China, if you don't comply the state security detains you and you get sentenced to re-education camp at best.
In other places there are no real consequences for you, even if people die. But there are legal and economic consequences if you shut down without top cover. That is why the government and legislative paralysis is so damaging -- with no safety net, people will prefer the unknown loss over the certain loss.
Has there every been a time when, "Country X can't do what country Y can, because X is too [big/small] while Y is [small/big]" has not been a useless comment?
Is there a generic term for this sort of fallacy, where someone brings up a random difference between [cities/states/countries] as an excuse for why one can't do what the other has already done, without ever bothering to explain why the difference matters?
How is it a useless comment? If you want to compare the actions of Denmark to France, it's more relevant to compare it to a particular region. Grand Est, for example has a similar population as Denmark.
This is almost common sense in the business world. No one thinks BigCo and LittleStartup are capable of the same things or that one's ability or inability to do something is equivalent.
Well, in that case, let's compare: the Grand Est region has about the same population as Denmark, slightly more COVID-19 cases than Denmark (587 vs 514), and more deaths (9 vs 0). And yet, most schools and the administration are still open.
For now. In business, people deciding on the very weak data basis we have to discuss we have, would rightfully be have their asses kicked. Yet, here we are, doing exactly this.
It's even worse than useless. Giant states are often assumed to be much better than small states, because "efficiency". Yet, whenever actual conditions are examined, and (inevitably) small states turn out to be better for humans, we get this sort of "well of course smaller problems are easier to solve" apologia.
I mean, I'm sure in some cases being bigger or smaller is helpful. It just feels incredibly lazy, borderline disingenuous to throw it out there without bothering to connect the dots or analyze how size would matter in that specific case.
> small states turn out to be better for humans
Source/examples of this? In Europe, the larger countries like the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain don't seem obviously worse off to me than their smaller counterparts. Like if you compare the UK to Ireland, Germany to Austria, Spain to Portugal, etc.
The fact that they refuse to do things like closing borders and immediately ceasing all travel by foreigners or citizens who've traveled traveled abroad meanwhile ending arbitrary social events is the reason you know it's hype up media nonsense.
Most of the actions taken are those most likely not affecting those in the target older or immuno-compromised demographic likely to have the serious consequences.
Shutting down borders helps if the virus hasn't reached your country.
If it has, there's no point in banning incoming people (maybe you can stop people from leaving so other regions don't get infected, but that's a less strong incentive). If you already have the virus in your country, the best thing you can do is slow its spreading, by banning large groups of people from congregating.
Yeah, and we don't know the reasoning behind either decision. I can come up with maybe a hundred different parameters that could be relevant or not.
At this point we can trust authorities to have a reasonable approach to this and that they monitor the situation closely. Or we can assume they don't.
In the first case, we follow the action plan. In the latter we do what we can, best based on actions that worked elsewhere. Just complaining about how insufficient actions are in our eyes doesn't help.
Anyway, there plans for stuff like this government drawers everywhere. Ranging from school closures to plan keeping critical infrastructure up. Heritage from the cold war.
And even if the US federal government seems to screw up, states like New York and Washington seem to react rather decisively. And we shouldn't forget that things in China are calming down to an extent ad-hoc hospitals are closed down and medical supplies can be shipped to Italy.
Denmark's case number has increased far more than that of other countries in recent days. They probably had to act as they'd overtake Italy in less than a week with cases/capita if growth continues like that.
The case #'s only go up if you test more people. In Ohio for instance they are only testing very few people and there is now evidence of community spread because the 4th person confirmed had no known contact but you basically need to be in intensive car to get tested or have an obvious connection. So the case # in and of themselves could vary based upon testing criteria. Not sure if they have the same standards in Denmark vs France.
a) There's a time-lag of probably 1-2 weeks between someone becoming infected, until their case hits the official statistics.
b) There will be different rates of testing between different areas, healthcare systems, and countries, which will be hard to quantify.
c) There will be fundamental differences between countries (e.g. patterns of population density, quality/availability of healthcare, etc.) which mean that direct per capita comparisons (as you made) are of little value.
What? There is tons of stuff governments can do to flatten the curve. Educating people, closing schools, people gatherings, obligatory masks for all (or DIY bandanas), testing more.
States struggle to get enough masks for medical staff, diverting any for the general public doesn't seem smart. And self made masks will have so little effect that they could be detrimental if people decide to be less careful because they wear a masks.
To the other points, education about hand washing and behavior in public is the one thing governments have all done for weeks now. It just seems that this isn't nearly enough.
This mentality is just false. If more people of the general populous have masks, how does that not reduce transmission therefore flatten the curve?
Now I understand the logic behind there being shortages. But saying that the general populous shouldn't wear masks because it doesn't do anything doesn't sound accurate.
Without training it is very hard to wear PPE correctly. Even if you change masks regularly, it is hard not to touch the outside (hot side) of the mask with your hands. Reusing masks makes this even more likely.
Most people don't get a good fit of the mask either. Respirators are a bit easier but nowhere near enough of them.
Practically speaking all it does is burn through a small supply of masks.
That's probably not the decision-making strategy of most governments, but it's a compelling POV for looking at the situation. Let it spread fast, wreak havoc and disrupt the social order, or control it within the capacity of health systems, or try to minimise the infections with constant awareness of the society for a prolonged period of time, affecting the economy in the long run.
The actions taken during February in Wuhan and neighboring provinces seem to have stopped the spread there, so effective actions can be taken.
Thing is, it appears that there's little overlap between actions that seem reasonable and actions that are effective. If you wait until drastic actions seem justifiable, then by that time it's too late to be effective (i.e. the Italy lockdown which would have helped Italy if it was done 2-3 weeks earlier); and if you take effective actions, then most people and media will wonder why you're so authorative and unreasonable (e.g. the reaction to early Wuhan containment measure enforcement).
Another interesting penalty of delayed action is that any exponential increase that happened while you were delaying needs to be balanced by a period of exponential decrease once you have measures in place. Exactly how much depends on assumptions, but e.g. delaying applying measures by 2 weeks could mean they need to be kept for 4 additional weeks.
So the overall cost picture is strongly in favor of early action.
Well, there is still no panic and hospitals are not overrun with patients. Russia is not China and far from being able to hide such things from public.
Not being able to hide things from the public has never kept Putin or Trump from lying through their teeth about anything.
The Moscow Times is currently reporting that there are 28 cases so far. We'll see how that turns out, regardless of whether they're currently telling the truth about it.
>"It's going to disappear. One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear," Trump said at the White House Thursday as the virus marched across Asia and Europe after US officials said the US should brace for severe disruption to everyday life.
>The President also warned that things could "get worse before it gets better," but he added it could "maybe go away. We'll see what happens. Nobody really knows."
Yeah, the Russian government seems really trustworthy. /s You can depend on them to investigate the whistleblowers, who will mysteriously die from a sudden case of "community-acquired pneumonia".
Doctors in Russia are accusing the government of covering up its coronavirus outbreak and denying them protective equipment
>“While the whole world is facing an outbreak of a new coronavirus, Russia is facing an outbreak of a community-acquired pneumonia,” Vasilyeva said. “And as usual, we’re facing the lie of the authorities.”
>She said Russian authorities were referring to coronavirus cases as ordinary pneumonia, implying that they’re distinct from the coronavirus pandemic.
>Russian authorities strongly denied her claims. A statement from the Moscow Department of Health accused her of seeking “to discredit Russian medicine and relevant government agencies” and called for authorities to investigate her.
Coronavirus: Reported spike in pneumonia cases in Moscow as Russia accuses critics of fake news
>“I have a feeling they (the authorities) are lying to us,” said Anastasia Vasilyeva, head of Russia's Doctor's Alliance trade union.
>“I don't believe the coronavirus numbers,” said Ekaterina, a Moscow accountant. “I remember what they told us about Chernobyl at the time. It's only now that we're finding out what really happened.”
It looks like a great cover up, which will be used if/when origins of virus will be traced back to RF. Such behavior is typical for RF. IMHO, it's better to watch actions of RF government and army. AFAIK, they already agitated some desperate Chinese, which lost someone they love, to spread virus at Evil West. They have plans to spread virus within Ukraine, as reported by Ukrainian intelligence agency. It looks like they have no fear of this virus and plan to use this situation for their advantage.
> The reality is probably closer to the fact that there isn't anything governments can do about it.
They can proactively close schools, government jobs. They can roll out bailout programs to encourage business closings that would otherwise cause the businesses to go bankrupt. They can aggressively close borders, and enforce quarantines with military force. They can mandate the production of respirators, testing kits and other medical necessities.
Government can do A LOT that no other actor can, so I don't quite get where you're coming from with this statement.
There’s a lot that governments can do. Ireland just closed schools and universities, and banned large indoor gatherings, for instance, and directed companies to make work from home available where possible (though this last one is really more a suggestion). This won’t get rid of the virus, but it may help to slow it and thus reduce deaths.
Closing borders, certainly at this point, seems largely futile.
I've read (true, who knows?) that in the USA this isn't legally possible. Federal government doesn't have that power.
This may be behind Trump's move to stop flights only to Europe, and not domestic flights. He has the power to do the former but not the latter, apparently.
If the internment of Japanese-American citizens during WW2 [1] was legally possible for the federal government, to me it would seem odd if cancelling Coachella wasn't.
The US courts have since explicitly rejected the reasoning used to justify the internment of Japanese-American citizens. It would not be legally possible today.
It has everything to do with deflection, point out that the problem is over there, even though the virus is spreading inside already unchecked. The Governor of Ohio is putting an order to shut down all mass gatherings like sporting events and also suggesting people stay at home. Ohio State was closed before any cases where confirmed but it doesn't seem like other states are taking it as serious outside of California and Washington and testing is still only happening for cases that are in intensive care or had traveled still. So we have no idea what the true lay of the land is at this point.
Govts CAN do plenty: close schools, theaters, offices, events, parades, mandate WfH, quarantine affected areas, distribute supplies, educate... there's a ton governments can do.
> there isn't anything governments can do about it.
Banning public events, locking down geographical areas, closing schools, pulling in retired medical workforce etc.
> doesn't mean that that something is meaningful or will have a positive impact
You can see the impact of measures such as enforcing lockdowns (e.g. Wuhan cases) and you can compare the spread of the virus in countries which take measures vs those that do not.
He's not just making shit up--the curves are reasonable. However, where he's very, very wrong is thinking that the government is deliberately waiting from T1 to T2. We don't have enough data to actually figure where T1, T2 and T3 are, and counting it in terms of known cases ensures you blow past T2. Look how fast Italy went from first infections to T3.
> The economic cost of the first scenario (numerous deaths in peak period) would likely be the highest with the impact both on workforce and market sentiment
The deaths from Coronavirus are mostly not people of working age. The death rate for 50-59 is around 1%, below that it drops to 0.2%. For seniors it's as high as 20%.
If you want to be cold-blooded about it, there is certainly a case to be made for shrugging and plowing on, as that will minimize the duration of the impact (quarantines, etc) and the people who will die are mostly not economically productive.
To be even more crass - before long we will probably be in a triage situation where there are more cases than resources available to treat. There are only about 20 full-service respirators per 100k people, around 62k nationwide, and many of those are already in use (people will still get in car accidents, have strokes, get meningitis, whatever). We can't treat everybody. So who gets it? Little Timmy who has a long and productive life ahead of him, or great-aunt Susan who's 75 and barely gets around anymore?
At a first approximation there will be around 100 times as many seniors who need treatment as youngs. From a social perspective it's pretty obvious that treatment should be prioritized for those younger patients.
(reminder that not making a choice is still making a choice, whether that means treatment ends up being first-come first-serve or a financial/insurance basis. Triage sucks, but you have to prioritize your resources somehow or other, the whole problem is there is not enough treatment to go around.)
After the last elections on 26 May 2019, the winnings parties have been unable to form a coalition, so there is no real cabinet at the moment which has the power to do the things that need to be done.
We do have a government though (quite a few of them even, but the federal government is the one that matters here) with all the power needed to do whatever it deems necessary.
And the federal government has said that indoor meetings with more than 1000 persons are "not recommended". The Brussels government has cancelled those, the Walloon cities don't have events of more than 1000 persons planned in the near future, and the Antwerp government seems to be using the whole thing as an opportunity to criticize and reject any responsibility on the federal government without taking any decision (as far as I know, the Simple Minds concert hasn't been cancelled yet, and is supposed to have a lot more than 1000 people).
There are actually a lot of governments which each have the power to do things. I personally think that the only reason they don't do anything useful is pure incompetence, irresponsibility and political calculations.
> We do have a government though (quite a few of them even, but the federal government is the one that matters here) with all the power needed to do whatever it deems necessary.
Really? Because I seem to have read that budget deficit is getting out of hand because there is no federal government to fix it.
Also, yeah, fair enough. There are a handful of other governments that technically could take a decision, but as you said: it's easy to say: "well, this is a federal decision, so we won't do anything".
Budget is one of those things that cannot be voted by the current affairs government so they just keep renewing the last budget allowances from the last actual government, as far as I understand (I don't know if it's a legal requirement, or just a custom). Don't take my word for it though, I'm definitely not an expert on Belgian politics.
But the coronavirus crisis is definitely a current affair, and the current government has free reign to do anything it deems necessary about it.
Belgium is famous for not having a government many times, and if it has one, it's often not able to act.
Belgium has a pretty divided population (Wallonia/Flanders) and no winner-takes-all election system, and so there's often a stalemate where no majorities can be reached for any votes, including for electing the government officials).
Or perhaps our government is acting and handling the threat, just not in a way mass hysteria on Twitter demands. Knee jerk reaction usually ends up in theater, not proper containment.
(Then again, my government isn't the Belgian government.)
There are countries besides Belgium and the US (thank God!). Sou5 Korea seems to be doing ok, Italy is certainly doing the right things, even China did pretty well, especially considering they didn’t get advanced warning.
In the US, a lot of the action is at the state level, and WA, for example, seems to be doing fine.
The federal response, and especially the testing situation, is complete amateur-hour bordering on negligence-in-the-criminal-sense, yes.
The US is doing particularly badly (and going for nonsensical solutions; note the most recent one). Various Asian and European states are being much more aggressive. Some US states are also doing the best they can.
Exactly! From what i have seen, the governments are acting, even in my country with only 3 confirmed cases, the schools are already shut down. It is media that amplify the panic so that no matter what governments do it seems not enough.
I see how the struggle for economic reasons, but I have too little faith in them being smart enough for that plan and doubt they have good enough data scraping by the max capacity line so closely with confidence.
Even the graph in the article is weird, why is there a sharp limit at max capacity in the T2 curve? the virus doesn't care about max capacity....
Yeah, no. Nice hyperactive imagination to find any plausible justification for inaction.
The intuitive impulse is there (trade off hospitals getting "creamed" vs. shutting down economy), but the implementation isn't realistic, so with the incubation period and lag in testing, all governments act too late. It's an impossible control problem.
On the other hand, maybe the right time to act is to watch your stock market. It's a forward predictor. When it starts to tank, go all out.
Had an interesting thought earlier. Seeing as a majority of deaths are in the range 60 years and above, and very little of the casualties affect younger (working) people, from the governments POV the virus will do well to decrease the disproportionate number of older pension receivers and nursing home residents in comparison with the dwindling number of young people working and paying taxes.
In other words, the government probably realizes that despite the grim reality, their POV may be that the virus will have a net positive effect on the economy and also accommodation affordability for the younger generation.
>their POV may be that the virus will have a net positive effect on the economy and also accommodation affordability for the younger generation.
Stressing systems like that is far more damaging/costly than managing the situation with care. Even if the death toll for the elderly explodes, there will be far more more old people requiring intensive care over time. Don't look at the death tool only, the coronavirus does not "kill clean".
You assume that the government cares about expenditures. Old people vote. So it would be in your best interest to keep the people that voted you into office alive.
I second this. Because of this I don't understand why the German government is not acting more drastically in terms of isolating old people. Especially the current CDU/CSU/SPD leadership was largely voted by the elderly.
More likely. People will see the government is ineffective. This raises questions on why have one at all. Some citizens stop paying taxes because of it. This turns into an actual movement because of compelling arguments now with evidence. Government becomes insolvent and wipes out the bond market. Inflation spirals and a full panic begins.
I think HN should enact stronger Coronavirus-related moderation like Reddit has. This is a bad post from a software engineer (not a health professional) and it offers an amateur analysis without even providing a real suggestion. What benefit does this provide in a crisis?
posts from health professionals can be even worse. this one was not too bad at explaining the thinking of ruling elites (who think they can fine-tune an epidemic)
Not too bad? This is a post from a guy who, from his Twitter, "has been thinking for the last few days" and somehow he knows the thinking of ruling elites?
Honestly, I am really surprised that this post is being upvoted at all. Empty speculation for no reason at all.
It's also very wrong, as it depends on what measures are required for each curve, and as it seems clear, this guy does not seem to know the possible measures at hand, their feasibility and effectiveness.
"this one was not too bad at explaining the thinking of ruling elites"
By inventing a completely unsupported rationalization/conspiracy theory?
"Ruling elites" are not omnipotent, and paradoxically most are in the most vulnerable demographic. And as others said, it is a situation where one can be damned regardless of which way they act.
In the case of strong containment/quarantines, unless you're willing to completely close the borders indefinitely at this point it is futile doing maximum containment: it's past the point where you can stop it, as the world managed to do with SARS and MERS.
At this point every government is vulnerable to every other government, and further vulnerable to the possibility that there are super-carriers spreading it. And FWIW, a number of countries have a done a very good job of managing it, but again it isn't a closed-loop.
French President Macron seems to be doing what this post is writing: trying to fine-tune the spread, and find a balance between economy and health, with proportional measures
They don’t act because they don’t care. It’s people dying, and their eyes are focused on purely economic metrics, not the well-being of the population or its survival. In the particular case of Europe, this is not the first thread that is totally discarded by the ruling elite, it’s the usual way of acting. It’s more visible with the virus because the timescale is shorter, but fundamentally there is no difference with how some other important threats are handled (for instance, see how the current acts of war from Turkey against Greece are handled by France and Germany).
He just relabelled the curves for no apparent reason!
To make it clear: The vertical axis should not be number of deaths. While the number infected remains below the health system capacity the number of deaths should remain relatively low. But once it hits capacity there is a step function that ratchets it up.
And the horizontal axis isn't cost at all. The green line shows something that is within the normal capacity of the health system. There aren't additional costs and so should be relatively cheap.
And the green curve is great - everyone would like that - that's the normal Flu. The Blue curve is the maximum we can sustain without overwhelming the health system.
I think it's a different reason. Let's analyze the outcomes from game theory perspective, along two dimensions: virus becomes pandemic or not, and governments do something or nothing.
1) no pandemic, no action -> government was "right", avoided wasting money -> reelected
2) no pandemic, action -> government was "wrong", wasted a lot of money, damaged the economy, inconvenienced the lives of the population -> voted out
3) pandemic, no action -> government was "wrong", caused loss of lives and damaged the economy -> voted out
4) pandemic, action - this is the trickiest scenario, so let's consider two options:
4a) pandemic, action, it works -> government was "right", saved lives, spared the economy -> reelected
4b) pandemic, action, doesn't work -> government was "wrong", their actions failed, they're incompetent -> voted out
There's two winning scenarios, (1) and (4a), but the problem is that (4a) has vanishingly small probability of success... with little information available about the virus, and rampant globalization, it's hard to know what action makes sense, is correct and viable... Case in point is Italy, which did act in time (they banned flights from China 2 weeks before the outbreak), but still failed (i.e. their action was "correct" but not "correct enough") because their neighboring countries (e.g. Germany - not technically a neighbor but within Schengen Zone) failed to act.
So, politicians choose (1), no action, as the most likely winning scenario.
But all their experts have been telling them that (1) cannot happen, for quite some time.
Another explanation is that government don't realize how much their words and actions have an effect on people's behavior, or they only focus on the worst possible effects ("what if people don't understand or react badly?"). In which case, they downplay the danger only to delay their decision. Because they're afraid of themselves (and can't have trust in the population).
> But all their experts have been telling them that (1) cannot happen, for quite some time.
No, the experts are subject to the same game-theoretic play... e.g. WHO declared it a pandemic only yesterday. The only ones who suggested the correct action (ban all flights from China already during Chinese New Year) are the ones with no skin in the game / no decision-making power / no relevance, who are therefore not subject to the game.
That's now how game theory works, the pandemic is not another player who is 2nd guessing the government or vice versa.
Instead governments are weighing the probabilities (think a probability tree, according to your scenarios) you kind of point to this in your conclusion.
The point of Game Theory is to analyze the situation according to the actual payoff function for each player, not according to the socially (Pareto) optimal outcome.
The 2 players here are the government, and the voters. The socially optimal scenario is action REGARDLESS of whether it's a pandemic or not (in a hyper-globalized world it would hurt a bit, but only the first time, after that the tourists, supply chains, etc. would adapt) but the voters penalize that outcome (they see action with no pandemic as overreaction not as successful prevention) so governments avoid it.
The question here is which actions of what severity, not simple act or not.
There are many ways to handle this, from maximum quarantine and cancellation of medical appointments, through closing mass gatherings (e.g. schools), rationing, enforced testing, closing public transportation, controlling private transportation, closing airports, sea and river ports, mandatory sampling for tests etc.
Each choice comes with a value for disruption and voter groups it will affect, and value for monetary cost.
Game theory is not too helpful here, as disruption does not directly affect discontent and definitely not your chances of getting elected. These are much more complex decisions with many more actions between here and then.
It still isn't game theory, the government acts first, the voters act after after observing the outcome. There is no subsequent game.
It is simply up to the government to estimate probability and expected payoff. Optimal action for government is to take the least amount of action to prevent the voters from thinking its a pandemic. It isn't a game theory scenario, there are no nash equilibria.
Does Japan include the cruise ship? Don't forget, Germany is a major transit country in Europe, everybody traveling back from Italy to the North crossed through. Italy, and the Alps im general, are in the skiing season. So a lot of tourism going on. Plus, 200 to 1,600 in 8 days isn't nearly as bad as you make it sound.
But there is obviously a pandemic. I mean the WHO just called it a pandemic. How is 1) even an option? Do they just pretend it doesn't exist? Do they hope it doesn't kill too many people? People wont buy it, that's for sure.
After Y2K I tried to raise this point that all the work did pay off. I guess people were expecting a control case somewhere, like a random power station in the middle of nowhere crashing, to show what happens if a system remained unpatched. After a while, I started to doubt myself as well. Even going to "Y2k was a hoax", for a brief period. But talking to more programmers from that period snapped me out of it.
But banning direct flights from Italy was definitely not the right action especially since the tourists were just rerouted through other European airports. All the epidimiologists are saying that closing borders doesn't help since the beginning
Dishonest. THe epidemiologists are recommending closing borders, if and only if there is proper enforced quarantine established at those checkpoints who remain open.
The ones recommending a complete, (aka non-discrimnatory open border practice), are the WHO which is basically a discredited ccp mouthpiece by now.
They even pressured the Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases Graph from Johns Hopkins University (JHU) to rename Taiwan into Taipe & Chinese Environment.
Live on twitter.
The very party who caused this epidemic with mismanagement from the start, gets now barely vailed praise from its WHO for not beeing weak and democratic like the west. Including racistic harassment of all non-chinese wanting to travel to china at this point.
Besides, it's a lose/lose proposition for the gov anyway.
If they do act, people will blame them for the cost of the action.
If they don't, people will blame then for the cost of not acting.
Nobody will pat them on the back, except a few intellectuals, for acting.
In fact, economically, the virus spreading is an opportunity to fire people you couldn't fire before, get rid of an old population costing money and have an excuse for a lot of things like passing certain types of law. People will not focus on that, their attention is elsewhere, and you can always invoke the circumstances if they do.
We have created a system in which it's not in the interest of the gov to solve the problem. And in which the population lives in a way that makes it hard to do the right thing by themselves.
At the risk of being down-voted, I'm not trying to start a political debate. I'd just like to know, as someone outside the USA, how this is affecting the election campaigns there.
Are personal costs of the pandemic encouraging people to support subsidised healthcare, and therefore a left-wing party?
Or is the xenophobic rhetoric of "blame China/Europe/travellers/etc" causing people to support a right-wing party?
I also haven't seen a full discussion of the chain of cause and effect. There was a shift from the primary sector to tertiary services, which led to urbanisation to find demand for services. Young people living in cities can make more friends than before, and this is good! It also means that there are more people living in close quarters, who can spread disease more effectively. I'm willing to face the risks of urban life instead of subsistence farming, but I wonder if other generations resent that.
I see a lot of what you mention on online mediums.
But it's usually quite different than what's really happening IRL.
People love to play the panic game online, but I've seen only quiet order around me.
Yesterday, my entire neighborhood has been evacuated because of a bomb, we were all grouped in an hospital, where we were questioned about possible fever.
In airports, I see people wearing masks, facing cancelled flights. I see stores with huge queues to buy stock of food.
It all happens in a calm and civil manner.
Maybe I'm optimistic, but I'm nicely surprised by the way people act right now, despite all the blame we want to place.
Most people do not see any personal cost of healthcare and thus are not turning more left-wing. The left-wing party is pushing that view, but they are not changing anybodies mind.
I doubt it will affect elections directly. Looking around the world, there's mostly bad examples from all kinds of governments - right-wing (Trump in US, Johnson in the UK), centrist (Macron in France, Merkel in Germany), left-wing (Slovenia - was centre-left until a week ago, Denmark), totalitarian (Iran, China)...
not trying to start a political debate but using some very charged rhetoric yourself... right ;)
honestly, this situation is becoming increasingly politicized. bernie supporters/left wing are trying to use it as an excuse/example for pushing their healthcare agenda but the truth is it's not working because not enough people have had to go to the emergency room and received the bill in the mail. More of the criticism seems to focus on trying to make the president appear incompetent. Either way, I don't think it's very effective because the president has destroyed the reputation of most media against him.
the right wing is looking to blame anyone and everyone except themselves and the administration and trump, of course, is trashing democrats and the media saying nothing would have ever been enough.
In short, both sides are just shoring up their existing support. Trump has more to lose right now, and he knows it, due to one of his major selling points being the economic recovery/stock market gains. These are looking very very grim at present. However, he's an excellent salesman and I expect he may find a way through it. He may have to apply a lot of pressure on the democrats for economic stimulus, though, and we will see how that goes. Democrats may hold the line and allow the economy to tank to ensure a Biden victory in November.
I don't know the answer to your question, but in addition to the mechanisms you mention there's at least one more: there's some evidence that fear in general, and fear of death in particular, tends to make people more supportive of right-wing authoritarian government.
(I don't mean to imply that right-wing = authoritarian; I pair them together because my recollection is that the research in question was specifically about right-wing authoritarianism and not about rightism generally or authoritarianism generally.)
So (1) to whatever extent the GOP is authoritarian as well as right-wing, or at least pushes the same psychological buttons that authoritarian rightists do, it might benefit from having a population that feels afraid, and (2) maybe Mr Trump would have done better politically with something along the lines of "This is a deadly epidemic, sweeping in from scary foreign countries, and only your strong President can protect you and keep you safe". I guess the restriction on air travel from Europe may be intended as a bit of a pivot in that direction.
There’s not much right vs left yet. It’s just the Democrats figuring out who their candidate will be. The pandemic has a very small effect on the US right now. Things are closing but mostly in anticipation of the near future. Almost none of it is in the middle where the right lives.
There’s been some yelling at trump over his poor handling but it’s mostly just virtue signaling at this point. When the elections come around for real we will probably see something of this if/when it has evolved into something more serious here.
I say this in Boston, just a few degrees of separation from some of the COVID confirmed individuals.
The long term impact on U.S. politics is hard to gauge. As a member of the Democratic party, I am in favor of emergency legislation that provides direct financial payments to impacted individuals. In particular, we have close to 30 million uninsured and they have a strong disincentive to get tested for Conrna virus due to unexpected/unknown costs.
This is likely the same segment of the population who have a strong incentive to go to work ignoring risks of community spread. They live pay check to pay check and can't afford to be sick and take time off.
As an emergency measure, the federal government should carry all costs associated with virus testing. Any individual who is quarantined or must stay home to care for those quarantined should receive direct cash transfers to off-set the immediate economic dislocations this causes.
The current federal administration's argument for suspending payroll taxes does nothing for those who are unemployed or work in the informal, cash economy.
Luckily, at the state and local level officials appear more competent placing the health related impacts above politics. As an example, the governor of New York took the unprecedented step of quarantining New Rochelle just outside New York city.
If there is any possibility of a silver lining from all of this, it would be how the U.S. electorate might see the true economic cost of allowing roughly 10% of the population to be uninsured. To me, it is immoral that the richest nation on earth permits those who are most vulnerable not having equal access to adequate healthcare.
Finally, as an indication of how the federal government continues to politicize the pandemic, the Secretary of State continues to call the Covid-19 pandemic, Wuhan virus, as an insult to China.
As a US citizen lucky enough to not be significantly impacted by all of this, I'm deeply embarrassed by such an outrageous insult from a federal official.
The natural human instinct is to look to leadership during a crisis. This is why Bush’s competency in the eyes of the public was harmed after Katrina. This is why McCain’s “maverick” rep harmed him against “steady” Obama during the financial crisis.
If the coronavirus starts impacting the lives of Americans in a widespread manner (shuddered schools, closed offices, loss of jobs), the same instinct will kick in.
The economy is going to be in shock, whatever you do.
Don't act, and you'll get a messup economy because of the panic and the sick people.
Act, and you'll get a messup economy because of the panic and the sick people, and the cost of tests+quarantines+curfew. Less people dead is the ethic thing to do, but power is not about morality.
Given what the current POTUS has gotten away with, as with many others in power everywhere, I don't have much faith in the accountability we can expect.
More accurately, I think, we have let very cynical people take control of everything important. So in matters of policy it's reasonable to assume extreme cynicism.
This comment is a perfect example why we won't have the same containment as Japan or South Korea; we in the west, "know" that our government is evil/incompetent/selfish so even if they act, we will not heed their advice.
It's not like they don't have the same incentives in the other countries, the main difference is that we do not trust the government. Might be selection bias, but I do think we have been hammered with a stereotype on modern culture about the incompetent/evil bureaucrat getting in the way of the hero's solution.
The idea of dividing the outcome up into two binary "it works" and "it doesn't work" is a logical fallacy. It's like the ridiculous anti-gun control arguments that say because a measure doesn't stop 100% of gun deaths, it's not worth doing at all.
> 4a) pandemic, action, it works -> government was "right", saved lives, spared the economy -> reelected
This is too optimistic. If it works then people see a tiny death rate and a shutdown forced by the government. The greatest success will look like an overreaction.
Yes, unless your govt is hyper-nationalist and labels the pandemic as a "foreign virus". (Of course dirty foreigners are going to get sick—They're dirty.) We have no fear of pandemics here. We're superior. God protects us. Except for our non-conforming neighbors. They're rat-infested slums, so of course they will get the foreign virus too. God will protect us in our region though because we're clean and white, and we support the hyper-nationalist worldview of Dear Leader.
So it's a complicated problem, with many dynamics at play.
Yeah I'm not so sure. In Poland the actions are on the "extreme" side so far, and not many people complain, because sights and news from Italy are constantly brought up as comparison. It's constantly "unless we want to be as screwed as Italy is, we need to do X" and not many people complain about X.
Same in Lithuania. Closing schools, clubs, gyms, canceling all public events and gatherings. So far we have only three confirmed cases (all came back from Italy), but the public is mostly supportive("finally!"). And that is even our health minister is at the bottom of the popularity rankings and the current goverment is not loved at all.
Yes, this is y2k/ozone hole syndrome. Arguably financial crisis, too; that would have been a lot worse without the quite extreme government intervention round the world, but it generally didn’t work out well for the politicians involved.
That said, a lot of governments are taking serious measures and apparently not counting the electoral cost.
I think we should not attribute to malice what we can explain by not being able to get your sht together. Belgium did't have a government for a very long time because they couldn't get the sht together. I think they are just overwhelmed and scared.
Not attributing it to malice is white-washing, after Steven Miller or somebody equally racist ordered an immigration judge Christopher Santoro to issue an order to take down all Spanish Coronavirus prevention posters from immigration courts. In their way of thinking, the more immigrants who get the virus, the more Trump can say "I told you so" about his border wall. It's biological warfare, in support of a lie.
That and giving smallpox-infested blankets to Native Americans was 100% genocidal malice, not a lack of having their shit together. The problem is that they DO have their shit together, and it's racist xenophobic mendacious destructive shit.
The Trump DOJ’s Crazy Back-and-Forth on Coronavirus Prevention Posters
Just that the majority if governments in Europe are taking steps, pretty radical ones at that. For no other pandemic, SARS, MERS, various flus or Ebola was anything even near to what's done now.
I wouldn't like to be the one to meet the decision, so. Because the cost of closing down a country for a couple of weeks is enormous. So when do put these actions in place? I have no idea, but it seems to be pretty difficult to get the timing right.
There is no point in crying wolf over these actions online, or even worse about what should have been done in hindsight. There are whole staffs doing nothing else right now, experts in their respective fields. So the best we, as a public, can do right now is to get out of these people's way. We follow guidelines like washing hands and reducing contact. We go self quarantine. We take steps we can in our social and professional environment. We send our employees into WFH or close certain cites if that's not possible. We work with authorities to come up with plans and contingencies if our companies are relevant in that regard.
First, there's no "no pandemic" case. Not anymore.
Second, your conclusion says that "politicians choose (1)" but that is not the case at all - almost every country in Europe, Asia, middle east had taken measures, with varying severity, and significant economic cost.
Last but not least, the whole framing is extremely simplistic and follows the "politicians are evil" reddit-like logic.
> First, there's no "no pandemic" case. Not anymore.
I am not saying that the analysis is correct, but information that is disclosed now has no bearing on an explanation of the actions of actors in the past.
> Last but not least, the whole framing is extremely simplistic and follows the "politicians are evil" reddit-like logic.
Politicians are people who happen to really care about being reelected. If you have any contact with them, you will realize that this is the ulterior motive of all of their actions. In a sense, as it should be. Being our democratic-elected representatives, it seems reasonable to me that they behave as slaves to the preferences of those who elected them. Like everything else, this creates a bunch of perverse incentives. You would have to be very naive to overlook these things, and imagine that powerful politicians will no put reelection above all things. The ones that didn't did not get reelected, and are not powerful politicians.
The original post probably uses pandemic in the colloquial sense, not by the WHOs definition which seems widely disagreed on. Remember the last WHO pandemic was the swine flu, which turned out to be more mild than the seasonal flu.
I would say it follows a "politicians act in their own best interest" logic. People with jobs in other industries have similar behavior, but I suppose the politicians have greater impact on society, so most people rally around the cynical view of politicians.
> (i.e. their action was "correct" but not "correct enough") because their neighboring countries (e.g. Germany - not technically a neighbor but within Schengen Zone) failed to act.
The Italian cluster most likely stems from an initial infection in Germany which occurred 10 days before the first flight bans anywhere. Italy probably failed, because it reduced testing to only include symptomatic cases at a critical time ( https://www.adnkronos.com/fatti/cronaca/2020/02/27/coronavir... ), not because Germany did not disallow flights at a time where it was already community spreading in Europe.
Wait, been I've been told "you can't just shut down travel", and that closing borders doesn't work, for reasons that are completely self-evident. So I'm utterly mystified that there are virtually no cases and 0 deaths in countries like Russia and Mongolia that closed their borders.
This may be true if politicians are selfishly focused on reelection, and it’s one of the core reasons western democracies have term limits.
In times of crisis our system needs leaders who do the right thing over the popular thing, even when it means risking losing office. This is called statesmanship.
Voters would do well to remember this when choosing leaders, it’s an increasingly rare quality we select for.
The president may have term limit but the party might want to continue to be in control of the senate and congress (or the equivalent in other countries)
Even supposing politicians all act 100% selfishly, they'd still want to do everything possible to mitigate the effects of the pandemic: for themselves and their own families, even if for nobody else.
So, they want to hole up, then let the pandemic burn to completion as quickly as possible, so they can then emerge. They want everyone else to be exposed so they are no longer dangerous (either dead or immune).
> So, politicians choose (1), no action, as the most likely winning scenario.
I'm from Belgium myself, so I can chime in.
Our minister of health is a docter herself, and is advised by a panel of experts including a professor of virology. They know very well what they are doing with the current 400 known infections.
Closing schools makes no sense currently because of following factors:
- kids are not the main factor in spreading the virus, as seen in other countries.
- Putting kids with their grandparents is probaly worse for death toll compared to keeping them in schools.
Your comment is fine except for that attack. Please don't stoop to that here, regardless of how strongly emotions are running. It helps no one and only makes this place worse.
What have Belgium and Denmark done differently, up to ~10 March?
I don't see much (if any) difference in their responses, so there must be some other factor for Denmark -- e.g. increased travel to Italy, more tourism from China, poorer personal hygiene, ... I don't really know, but
Maybe, but this is not linear growth. It's still exponential, albeit not as steep as ours (Slovenia), but you are still on course to double number of cases every 5 days.
Linear growth would have a declining rate for daily percentage change (adding 10 cases when you have 100 is 10% change, adding 10 when you have 400 is 2.5%).
Closing schools makes senses in democratic nations for two reasons.
First, it puts societal pressure on businesses to close or modify their operations by allowing people to work from home. Many families are simply not setup to have kids at home, but parents at work, so factoring that in will cause businesses to change.
Most importantly, all this happens without government directly intervening in business decisions.
Secondly, it lays the groundwork for politicians to take more drastic actions. If schools remain open, even if it makes sense by “the numbers”, it’s still going to be politically difficult to cancel events, restrict general travel, and eventually close businesses. The public sees school closures as step 1 in any disaster situation. You can’t discount the importance of emotional signaling.
> Italy, which did act in time, but still failed because their neighboring countries (e.g. Germany - not technically a neighbor but within Schengen Zone) failed to act
This is incorrect. Italy closed borders on Jan 31st. The Chinese visitor to the Webasto company meeting came to Germany on Jan 19th.
It is easily evident that Germany closing its borders at the same time as Italy would not have prevented this transmission. You should probably increase your skepticism about the media where you read this.
This analysis could just as well be applied to "war on terror" -- The response to which was opposite, and a lot of people profited by it (careers, contracts, etc). What makes them different?
Just a little thought experiment:
If the current wisdom is actually that almost everyone will be infected eventually, wouldn't it (ignoring any ethical issues) be wiser to deliberately infect medical personnel as soon as possible, so the 5-10% of infected that need IC treatment can actually get it, before the medical system is overrun by the infected general population. In a few weeks, all doctors are immune (or deceased) so that they are much better prepared when the number of cases in the general public explodes
Probably little evidence for Covid-19, but for SARS, studies in animals have found limited immunity after both infections and vaccination attempts. https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/706717_1
> Why aren’t we going for green though, that seems even better?
Because we want to avoid Covid-19 becoming a recurrent winter illness like other coughs and colds and flu. Those already cause considerable pressure on healthcare systems, and adding annual covid-19 season on top would be pretty rough.
Yes! We don't want to flatted the curve so much that it extends into winter, because then we compound other seasonal illnesses like the flu, and the pressure on the health service is back above the red line.
TLDR: It's cheapest to let old people die, so that the young can continue working.
A very cruel view on humanity, but I would be surprised if these thoughts hadn't crossed our politicians minds.
Also, many initiatives by young people (e.g. limiting climate change, re-structuring society to be more equal-opportunity) are being blocked by old people who wish to preserve the status quo. So there is a general dislike by young people - those mostly unaffected by Covid - against the elderly - those most likely to die from Covid.
And for many years, there have been heated discussions about whether it is fair to force an ever smaller number of young people to pay for an ever growing number of old people, even if those old people directly undermine the young people's livelihood, for example by driving up rental prices or by voting to stop free education (which they themselves benefited from, when young).
So you could probably even win some young votes with a platform of "let's sacrifice the unneeded grumpy grandmas for the greater good".
Of course, everyone will hope that it's not their own parents, but only that one grumpy old person in the neighborhood that everyone dislikes anyway.
As for the reasons of why there is a divide between young and old, I guess a big part is jealousy, because the older generations had more stable job opportunities available to them.
While it's true our federal government hasn't issued orders but only advice the local and provincial authorities have the power to prevent some things from happening. And they are using it: some classes or schools are getting shut down, some away trips are being cancelled.
But I agree, everything's fine in Belgium :D. The virus is likely to have taken a detour to avoid Belgium, like the Chernobyl cloud did.
I think this theory gives way too much credit to governmental competence. I think Yes Minister's Four Stage Strategy is a much more accurate assessment:
Standard Foreign Office response in a time of crisis:
In stage one we say nothing is going to happen.
Stage two, we say something may be about to happen, but we should do nothing about it.
In stage three, we say that maybe we should do something about it, but there's nothing we can do.
Stage four, we say maybe there was something we could have done, but it's too late now.
How long is the pandemic expected to last? What are the furthest out conferences that have been (or should be) canceled? How is the end of a pandemic even defined?
It’s almost tautologically true that the cost of closures are considered in the decision-making process. This “article” tries to portrait this entirely obvious fact as some sort of sinister conspiracy, with cargo-cult charts to appeal all scientify.
At this point, the writing for the USA is on the wall: either institute a national quarantine policy, or face a mass die off of hundreds of thousands of the elderly in the next couple months.
We need to start the national quarantine before things blow up to Italy and Wuhan level proportions. Yes, it will be extremely costly. But riding on imaginary hopes that the virus will just disappear for no real reason is extraordinarily irresponsible.
The details of what it looks like will take time to figure out--it will be a complicated collaboration between the federal, state, and local authorities, with the justice system and health sectors being deeply involved. That's reason to start figuring those details out now, and not two weeks from now.
Donald Trump was elected because he said he was a risk taker willing to do what needs to be done despite criticism from everyone. A national quarantine is needed now, and we need bold action to get it started. This is his moment to make a difference.
Hospitals will only allow visitors if they are over 16 and a primary caregiver (ie spouse), and even they are screened before being allowed in. Nursing homes are limiting visitors, both who can come, and where they can go. Companies are halting non-essential travel.
It isn't as drastic as you might think it should be, but it is significant at limiting risk for the most vulnerable.
Most of the above is running plans that have been in place for a long time (far longer than Trump), walking the line between overreacting and things getting out of control.
Amazing how brainwashed the HN community is... Kobe-911 is an obvious scam. Just go test old blood samples, they will test positive too. Seasonal flu you sheep!
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[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 179 ms ] threadThis might actually hold given the groups that are the most at risk are probably least productive: the old and the infirm.
I for one am working towards my old age, I'd hate to be left to just die.
That word doesn't work when describing people who are no longer part of the reproducing population.
Of course I'm not saying that anyone has done those tradeoffs optimally, especially considering that those relations probably are non-linear in practice.
Self perpetuation is fundamentally based only on the implications of the strategy. If keeping elders alive past nominal utility helps spread well then it is effectively favored. Which may or may not be known ahead of time.
That said by being smarter than it we have both the ability and responsibility for the consequences for decisions to follow or defy its nudges as we can and see fit.
Caring well is always better than not caring. Unless we won't care in the green scenario either. But then, who think we won't care if we have time and resources?
And yes, I am prepared to take a hit in my earnings, paying higher taxes if needed after this if that is what it takes for at least one person more to live.
Because grandparent said they would sacrifice a realistic tax increase to save lives in the COVID-19 outbreak, the parent asked about a confiscatory 99% tax rate and asset seizure, which would be wholly unnecessary for paying for the current crisis.
I don't see how the original comment was unreasonable in asking what is the threshold where economic losses are too high. Halting all economic activity to completely stop the spread of the disease and prevent deaths amounts to a 100% taxation since you are forced to not work and generate revenue. Whether that is acceptable or not isn't my point, but asking the question isn't a fallacy
These calculations have to be made because economic impacts also have a death toll. It all comes back to saving lives in the end.
>I am prepared to take a hit in my earnings, paying higher taxes if needed after this if that is what it takes for at least one person more to live.
As a side note, you can do this any time, and unrelated to the pandemic. There are charities you can donate to to save lives if you are so inclined.
From an ethical point of view, governments owe seniors the money and care, because they had worked for state prosperity. Also, if young people had more foresight, they would realize the way seniors are treated today will be more less the way they themselves will be treated. But old age and death is a depressing topic and no one likes to dwell on it.
At least in my country, we spend radically more per-capita on healthcare for the old than we do for the young [1] simply because the old need more of it.
For men age 5-45 we spend less than £1000, for men age 80-85 we spend more than £4500. It's a similar story for women, but with a bump for women of childbearing age.
I don't see any evidence of a bias in favour of the working-age population.
[1] http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/135407/
This seems implausible to me. Given that the rich tend to be of rather old age themselves, I'd wager that they'd invest in preventing their own deaths
This is self-evident, both due to first-order and second-order effects. How the author manages to stand it on its head is amazing. It's worth noting that approaching, or exceeding, the capacity of the medical system (or any other) drives the costs sky high by and of itself - not to mention other, unrelated cases that also need treatment. With a few weeks worth of disruption to healthcare, even mild cases of other illnesses can spiral out of control and become costly (or even deadly) on their own.
I wouldn't read too much into a country having a muted or slow response to the pandemic; it's the expected outcome of political and economical systems differing across the globe. There is always a slow country to act, and its citizens might feel entitled to the kind of far-fetched speculation the author posted.
Sounds about right. Belgium and the Netherlands aren't doing very much yet.
One interesting fact I discovered when discussing with my wife last night that I think does shape the discussion here: In the Netherlands, seasonal influenza has ~1% mortality rate -- in the U.S. it's more like 0.1%. This leads to different framings of the comparative severity of Coronavirus in the Netherlands.
(I'm not a healthcare professional nor actuarian; the following is freehand speculation)
There are two key factors. Firstly, USA is much less densely populated, with various additional compounding aspects: social stratification, with many segments of society living mostly in their own areas, and lesser dependence on mass transport. Modern technology and abundance of land allows maintaining a degree of isolation when needed.
Secondly, the healthcare system in USA vs Netherlands is tale of semi-private vs nationalized system. The former has more incentives to be proactive and minimize costs, vs the later having incentives to make a good showing, with payments being assured anyway.
On an individual basis perhaps in theory, but not on a population basis. See underinsured people afraid to go to a doctor until their condition is so bad it warrants an ER visit.
The actual numbers of the cost-effectiveness of US healthcare also shows the complete opposite of "minimizing costs" where it's twice as expensive as any other system
Yikes! If true, do you know why that is?
Three days ago the government held a special meeting about the coronavirus, in which they deliberated that people should stop shaking hands. That's all. They tell people who have come back from a high risk area and have flu symptoms NOT to call their gp and just stay home.
It's more that the Dutch seem to be extremely... relaxed, maybe a bit fatalistic, about illness. It's a "suck it up" attitude. The fact that they're so slow in taking action now doesn't surprise me.
https://www.rivm.nl/sites/default/files/2019-09/TG_123539_01...
The reality is probably closer to the fact that there isn't anything governments can do about it. They can try to shut down the borders of the country, but that is going to a lot worse and probably won't stop it anyways.
Just because governments can do something and do do something doesn't mean that that something is meaningful or will have a positive impact.
Many things are just outside of their control.
Many decisions can be taken, but are not (for various reasons). Most experts recommend to limit contacts rather than closing down borders, and no one is pretending to stop the virus but they all should try to flatten the curve. You don't seem to pay attention to the current situation.
Afaik in Germany the country's government can't force schools to close or public events to be cancelled. These decisions have to be taken locally (at state/city or even district level). All the health ministry can do is tell people "you shouldn't do A B C and you should do X Y Z"
In the places where they have shut down schools, they can't really do it either. But when government says "do X" and has good reasons, the institutions comply. I'm in the board of a private institution in a country with a shutdown order, and there was really no discussion between the board members that this institution would shut down too, despite there being no legal backing at all.
In other places there are no real consequences for you, even if people die. But there are legal and economic consequences if you shut down without top cover. That is why the government and legislative paralysis is so damaging -- with no safety net, people will prefer the unknown loss over the certain loss.
Not saying it's good or bad, but it's definitely a different system.
Denmark population: 5.6 million.
Doesn't seem like an accurate comparison.
Is there a generic term for this sort of fallacy, where someone brings up a random difference between [cities/states/countries] as an excuse for why one can't do what the other has already done, without ever bothering to explain why the difference matters?
This is almost common sense in the business world. No one thinks BigCo and LittleStartup are capable of the same things or that one's ability or inability to do something is equivalent.
> small states turn out to be better for humans
Source/examples of this? In Europe, the larger countries like the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain don't seem obviously worse off to me than their smaller counterparts. Like if you compare the UK to Ireland, Germany to Austria, Spain to Portugal, etc.
Most of the actions taken are those most likely not affecting those in the target older or immuno-compromised demographic likely to have the serious consequences.
https://omny.fm/shows/inside-the-huddle/03-dr-laura-power-on...
It's a balancing act between lowering infections/death and economic impact.
If it has, there's no point in banning incoming people (maybe you can stop people from leaving so other regions don't get infected, but that's a less strong incentive). If you already have the virus in your country, the best thing you can do is slow its spreading, by banning large groups of people from congregating.
At this point we can trust authorities to have a reasonable approach to this and that they monitor the situation closely. Or we can assume they don't.
In the first case, we follow the action plan. In the latter we do what we can, best based on actions that worked elsewhere. Just complaining about how insufficient actions are in our eyes doesn't help.
Anyway, there plans for stuff like this government drawers everywhere. Ranging from school closures to plan keeping critical infrastructure up. Heritage from the cold war.
And even if the US federal government seems to screw up, states like New York and Washington seem to react rather decisively. And we shouldn't forget that things in China are calming down to an extent ad-hoc hospitals are closed down and medical supplies can be shipped to Italy.
a) There's a time-lag of probably 1-2 weeks between someone becoming infected, until their case hits the official statistics.
b) There will be different rates of testing between different areas, healthcare systems, and countries, which will be hard to quantify.
c) There will be fundamental differences between countries (e.g. patterns of population density, quality/availability of healthcare, etc.) which mean that direct per capita comparisons (as you made) are of little value.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-12/france-cl...
States struggle to get enough masks for medical staff, diverting any for the general public doesn't seem smart. And self made masks will have so little effect that they could be detrimental if people decide to be less careful because they wear a masks.
To the other points, education about hand washing and behavior in public is the one thing governments have all done for weeks now. It just seems that this isn't nearly enough.
Now I understand the logic behind there being shortages. But saying that the general populous shouldn't wear masks because it doesn't do anything doesn't sound accurate.
Most people don't get a good fit of the mask either. Respirators are a bit easier but nowhere near enough of them.
Practically speaking all it does is burn through a small supply of masks.
Thing is, it appears that there's little overlap between actions that seem reasonable and actions that are effective. If you wait until drastic actions seem justifiable, then by that time it's too late to be effective (i.e. the Italy lockdown which would have helped Italy if it was done 2-3 weeks earlier); and if you take effective actions, then most people and media will wonder why you're so authorative and unreasonable (e.g. the reaction to early Wuhan containment measure enforcement).
So the overall cost picture is strongly in favor of early action.
The Moscow Times is currently reporting that there are 28 cases so far. We'll see how that turns out, regardless of whether they're currently telling the truth about it.
Coronavirus in Russia: The Latest News | March 12
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/03/12/coronavirus-in-rus...
>— A religious procession in central Russia aimed at fighting the coronavirus has been canceled due to the threat of the virus itself.
Apparently they believe the gay isn't the only thing you can pray away.
Trump seeks a 'miracle' as virus fears mount
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/28/politics/donald-trump-cor...
>"It's going to disappear. One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear," Trump said at the White House Thursday as the virus marched across Asia and Europe after US officials said the US should brace for severe disruption to everyday life.
>The President also warned that things could "get worse before it gets better," but he added it could "maybe go away. We'll see what happens. Nobody really knows."
Doctors in Russia are accusing the government of covering up its coronavirus outbreak and denying them protective equipment
https://www.businessinsider.nl/coronavirus-russia-doctors-sa...
>“While the whole world is facing an outbreak of a new coronavirus, Russia is facing an outbreak of a community-acquired pneumonia,” Vasilyeva said. “And as usual, we’re facing the lie of the authorities.”
>She said Russian authorities were referring to coronavirus cases as ordinary pneumonia, implying that they’re distinct from the coronavirus pandemic.
>Russian authorities strongly denied her claims. A statement from the Moscow Department of Health accused her of seeking “to discredit Russian medicine and relevant government agencies” and called for authorities to investigate her.
Coronavirus: Reported spike in pneumonia cases in Moscow as Russia accuses critics of fake news
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-...
>“I have a feeling they (the authorities) are lying to us,” said Anastasia Vasilyeva, head of Russia's Doctor's Alliance trade union.
>“I don't believe the coronavirus numbers,” said Ekaterina, a Moscow accountant. “I remember what they told us about Chernobyl at the time. It's only now that we're finding out what really happened.”
https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/30/russia-closes-2700-mile-borde...
They can proactively close schools, government jobs. They can roll out bailout programs to encourage business closings that would otherwise cause the businesses to go bankrupt. They can aggressively close borders, and enforce quarantines with military force. They can mandate the production of respirators, testing kits and other medical necessities.
Government can do A LOT that no other actor can, so I don't quite get where you're coming from with this statement.
And there most certainly are many things the government can do about it. How about Medicare for all people, and for all diseases?
Republicans Want Medicare for All, but Just for This One Disease. Everyone’s a socialist in a pandemic.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/11/opinion/coronavirus-socia...
Closing borders, certainly at this point, seems largely futile.
I've read (true, who knows?) that in the USA this isn't legally possible. Federal government doesn't have that power.
This may be behind Trump's move to stop flights only to Europe, and not domestic flights. He has the power to do the former but not the latter, apparently.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_America...
I'm not sating that it is a good idea, just that judicial review doesn't seem particularly effective.
> there isn't anything governments can do about it.
Banning public events, locking down geographical areas, closing schools, pulling in retired medical workforce etc.
> doesn't mean that that something is meaningful or will have a positive impact
You can see the impact of measures such as enforcing lockdowns (e.g. Wuhan cases) and you can compare the spread of the virus in countries which take measures vs those that do not.
The deaths from Coronavirus are mostly not people of working age. The death rate for 50-59 is around 1%, below that it drops to 0.2%. For seniors it's as high as 20%.
If you want to be cold-blooded about it, there is certainly a case to be made for shrugging and plowing on, as that will minimize the duration of the impact (quarantines, etc) and the people who will die are mostly not economically productive.
To be even more crass - before long we will probably be in a triage situation where there are more cases than resources available to treat. There are only about 20 full-service respirators per 100k people, around 62k nationwide, and many of those are already in use (people will still get in car accidents, have strokes, get meningitis, whatever). We can't treat everybody. So who gets it? Little Timmy who has a long and productive life ahead of him, or great-aunt Susan who's 75 and barely gets around anymore?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21149215
At a first approximation there will be around 100 times as many seniors who need treatment as youngs. From a social perspective it's pretty obvious that treatment should be prioritized for those younger patients.
(reminder that not making a choice is still making a choice, whether that means treatment ends up being first-come first-serve or a financial/insurance basis. Triage sucks, but you have to prioritize your resources somehow or other, the whole problem is there is not enough treatment to go around.)
That's because Belgium has no government to put sanctions into place.
And the federal government has said that indoor meetings with more than 1000 persons are "not recommended". The Brussels government has cancelled those, the Walloon cities don't have events of more than 1000 persons planned in the near future, and the Antwerp government seems to be using the whole thing as an opportunity to criticize and reject any responsibility on the federal government without taking any decision (as far as I know, the Simple Minds concert hasn't been cancelled yet, and is supposed to have a lot more than 1000 people).
There are actually a lot of governments which each have the power to do things. I personally think that the only reason they don't do anything useful is pure incompetence, irresponsibility and political calculations.
Really? Because I seem to have read that budget deficit is getting out of hand because there is no federal government to fix it.
Also, yeah, fair enough. There are a handful of other governments that technically could take a decision, but as you said: it's easy to say: "well, this is a federal decision, so we won't do anything".
But the coronavirus crisis is definitely a current affair, and the current government has free reign to do anything it deems necessary about it.
Belgium has a pretty divided population (Wallonia/Flanders) and no winner-takes-all election system, and so there's often a stalemate where no majorities can be reached for any votes, including for electing the government officials).
(Then again, my government isn't the Belgian government.)
In the US, a lot of the action is at the state level, and WA, for example, seems to be doing fine.
The federal response, and especially the testing situation, is complete amateur-hour bordering on negligence-in-the-criminal-sense, yes.
Even the graph in the article is weird, why is there a sharp limit at max capacity in the T2 curve? the virus doesn't care about max capacity....
The intuitive impulse is there (trade off hospitals getting "creamed" vs. shutting down economy), but the implementation isn't realistic, so with the incubation period and lag in testing, all governments act too late. It's an impossible control problem.
On the other hand, maybe the right time to act is to watch your stock market. It's a forward predictor. When it starts to tank, go all out.
https://www.onvista.de/etf/VANGUARD-FTSE-ALL-WORLD-UCITS-ETF...
Surely, cost is the area under the curve of the original graph. Massive strain on our systems doesn’t come for free.
In other words, the government probably realizes that despite the grim reality, their POV may be that the virus will have a net positive effect on the economy and also accommodation affordability for the younger generation.
Stressing systems like that is far more damaging/costly than managing the situation with care. Even if the death toll for the elderly explodes, there will be far more more old people requiring intensive care over time. Don't look at the death tool only, the coronavirus does not "kill clean".
Sources:
https://www.bpb.de/nachschlagen/zahlen-und-fakten/bundestags... (Zweitstimmenergebnis)
https://www.bpb.de/politik/grundfragen/parteien-in-deutschla...
Which would be how a company think, I'm pretty sure governments don't think like that
Most presidents want to be elected at the next election and this is probably the main thing they are trying to optimize right now
Honestly, I am really surprised that this post is being upvoted at all. Empty speculation for no reason at all.
It's also very wrong, as it depends on what measures are required for each curve, and as it seems clear, this guy does not seem to know the possible measures at hand, their feasibility and effectiveness.
By inventing a completely unsupported rationalization/conspiracy theory?
"Ruling elites" are not omnipotent, and paradoxically most are in the most vulnerable demographic. And as others said, it is a situation where one can be damned regardless of which way they act.
In the case of strong containment/quarantines, unless you're willing to completely close the borders indefinitely at this point it is futile doing maximum containment: it's past the point where you can stop it, as the world managed to do with SARS and MERS.
At this point every government is vulnerable to every other government, and further vulnerable to the possibility that there are super-carriers spreading it. And FWIW, a number of countries have a done a very good job of managing it, but again it isn't a closed-loop.
He just relabelled the curves for no apparent reason!
To make it clear: The vertical axis should not be number of deaths. While the number infected remains below the health system capacity the number of deaths should remain relatively low. But once it hits capacity there is a step function that ratchets it up.
And the horizontal axis isn't cost at all. The green line shows something that is within the normal capacity of the health system. There aren't additional costs and so should be relatively cheap.
And the green curve is great - everyone would like that - that's the normal Flu. The Blue curve is the maximum we can sustain without overwhelming the health system.
You can't just change the axis labels because the death ratio depends non-linearly on infection ratio above the threshold.
Are we willing to take the risk when we don't know the consequences?
1) no pandemic, no action -> government was "right", avoided wasting money -> reelected
2) no pandemic, action -> government was "wrong", wasted a lot of money, damaged the economy, inconvenienced the lives of the population -> voted out
3) pandemic, no action -> government was "wrong", caused loss of lives and damaged the economy -> voted out
4) pandemic, action - this is the trickiest scenario, so let's consider two options:
4a) pandemic, action, it works -> government was "right", saved lives, spared the economy -> reelected
4b) pandemic, action, doesn't work -> government was "wrong", their actions failed, they're incompetent -> voted out
There's two winning scenarios, (1) and (4a), but the problem is that (4a) has vanishingly small probability of success... with little information available about the virus, and rampant globalization, it's hard to know what action makes sense, is correct and viable... Case in point is Italy, which did act in time (they banned flights from China 2 weeks before the outbreak), but still failed (i.e. their action was "correct" but not "correct enough") because their neighboring countries (e.g. Germany - not technically a neighbor but within Schengen Zone) failed to act.
So, politicians choose (1), no action, as the most likely winning scenario.
Another explanation is that government don't realize how much their words and actions have an effect on people's behavior, or they only focus on the worst possible effects ("what if people don't understand or react badly?"). In which case, they downplay the danger only to delay their decision. Because they're afraid of themselves (and can't have trust in the population).
No, the experts are subject to the same game-theoretic play... e.g. WHO declared it a pandemic only yesterday. The only ones who suggested the correct action (ban all flights from China already during Chinese New Year) are the ones with no skin in the game / no decision-making power / no relevance, who are therefore not subject to the game.
Instead governments are weighing the probabilities (think a probability tree, according to your scenarios) you kind of point to this in your conclusion.
The 2 players here are the government, and the voters. The socially optimal scenario is action REGARDLESS of whether it's a pandemic or not (in a hyper-globalized world it would hurt a bit, but only the first time, after that the tourists, supply chains, etc. would adapt) but the voters penalize that outcome (they see action with no pandemic as overreaction not as successful prevention) so governments avoid it.
The question here is which actions of what severity, not simple act or not.
There are many ways to handle this, from maximum quarantine and cancellation of medical appointments, through closing mass gatherings (e.g. schools), rationing, enforced testing, closing public transportation, controlling private transportation, closing airports, sea and river ports, mandatory sampling for tests etc.
Each choice comes with a value for disruption and voter groups it will affect, and value for monetary cost.
Game theory is not too helpful here, as disruption does not directly affect discontent and definitely not your chances of getting elected. These are much more complex decisions with many more actions between here and then.
It is simply up to the government to estimate probability and expected payoff. Optimal action for government is to take the least amount of action to prevent the voters from thinking its a pandemic. It isn't a game theory scenario, there are no nash equilibria.
Because it's hard to know to what degree any actions taken mitigated the severity of the pandemic.
Just compare countries with similar properties that took measures at different points in time.
Japan and Germany might not be the best to compare here, but consider:
Japan, schools closed etc. at 200 cases. 8 days later: 400 cases.
Germany, no action whatsoever at 200 cases, 8 days later: 1600 cases.
But yeah, European countries should make for better comparisons soon.
(And it wasn't closed to travel until recently either.)
https://medium.com/@donhopkins/cobol-forever-1a49f7d28a39
The ones recommending a complete, (aka non-discrimnatory open border practice), are the WHO which is basically a discredited ccp mouthpiece by now.
They even pressured the Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases Graph from Johns Hopkins University (JHU) to rename Taiwan into Taipe & Chinese Environment. Live on twitter.
The very party who caused this epidemic with mismanagement from the start, gets now barely vailed praise from its WHO for not beeing weak and democratic like the west. Including racistic harassment of all non-chinese wanting to travel to china at this point.
Besides, it's a lose/lose proposition for the gov anyway.
If they do act, people will blame them for the cost of the action.
If they don't, people will blame then for the cost of not acting.
Nobody will pat them on the back, except a few intellectuals, for acting.
In fact, economically, the virus spreading is an opportunity to fire people you couldn't fire before, get rid of an old population costing money and have an excuse for a lot of things like passing certain types of law. People will not focus on that, their attention is elsewhere, and you can always invoke the circumstances if they do.
We have created a system in which it's not in the interest of the gov to solve the problem. And in which the population lives in a way that makes it hard to do the right thing by themselves.
Are personal costs of the pandemic encouraging people to support subsidised healthcare, and therefore a left-wing party?
Or is the xenophobic rhetoric of "blame China/Europe/travellers/etc" causing people to support a right-wing party?
I also haven't seen a full discussion of the chain of cause and effect. There was a shift from the primary sector to tertiary services, which led to urbanisation to find demand for services. Young people living in cities can make more friends than before, and this is good! It also means that there are more people living in close quarters, who can spread disease more effectively. I'm willing to face the risks of urban life instead of subsistence farming, but I wonder if other generations resent that.
I see a lot of what you mention on online mediums.
But it's usually quite different than what's really happening IRL.
People love to play the panic game online, but I've seen only quiet order around me.
Yesterday, my entire neighborhood has been evacuated because of a bomb, we were all grouped in an hospital, where we were questioned about possible fever.
In airports, I see people wearing masks, facing cancelled flights. I see stores with huge queues to buy stock of food.
It all happens in a calm and civil manner.
Maybe I'm optimistic, but I'm nicely surprised by the way people act right now, despite all the blame we want to place.
Similar for the right wing.
honestly, this situation is becoming increasingly politicized. bernie supporters/left wing are trying to use it as an excuse/example for pushing their healthcare agenda but the truth is it's not working because not enough people have had to go to the emergency room and received the bill in the mail. More of the criticism seems to focus on trying to make the president appear incompetent. Either way, I don't think it's very effective because the president has destroyed the reputation of most media against him.
the right wing is looking to blame anyone and everyone except themselves and the administration and trump, of course, is trashing democrats and the media saying nothing would have ever been enough.
In short, both sides are just shoring up their existing support. Trump has more to lose right now, and he knows it, due to one of his major selling points being the economic recovery/stock market gains. These are looking very very grim at present. However, he's an excellent salesman and I expect he may find a way through it. He may have to apply a lot of pressure on the democrats for economic stimulus, though, and we will see how that goes. Democrats may hold the line and allow the economy to tank to ensure a Biden victory in November.
The entire free-world except the US has subsidized healthcare far in excess of the the American system.
Which is to say: no one in Australia is looking at $1000 COVID-19 tests.
(I don't mean to imply that right-wing = authoritarian; I pair them together because my recollection is that the research in question was specifically about right-wing authoritarianism and not about rightism generally or authoritarianism generally.)
So (1) to whatever extent the GOP is authoritarian as well as right-wing, or at least pushes the same psychological buttons that authoritarian rightists do, it might benefit from having a population that feels afraid, and (2) maybe Mr Trump would have done better politically with something along the lines of "This is a deadly epidemic, sweeping in from scary foreign countries, and only your strong President can protect you and keep you safe". I guess the restriction on air travel from Europe may be intended as a bit of a pivot in that direction.
There’s been some yelling at trump over his poor handling but it’s mostly just virtue signaling at this point. When the elections come around for real we will probably see something of this if/when it has evolved into something more serious here.
I say this in Boston, just a few degrees of separation from some of the COVID confirmed individuals.
This is likely the same segment of the population who have a strong incentive to go to work ignoring risks of community spread. They live pay check to pay check and can't afford to be sick and take time off.
As an emergency measure, the federal government should carry all costs associated with virus testing. Any individual who is quarantined or must stay home to care for those quarantined should receive direct cash transfers to off-set the immediate economic dislocations this causes.
The current federal administration's argument for suspending payroll taxes does nothing for those who are unemployed or work in the informal, cash economy.
Luckily, at the state and local level officials appear more competent placing the health related impacts above politics. As an example, the governor of New York took the unprecedented step of quarantining New Rochelle just outside New York city.
If there is any possibility of a silver lining from all of this, it would be how the U.S. electorate might see the true economic cost of allowing roughly 10% of the population to be uninsured. To me, it is immoral that the richest nation on earth permits those who are most vulnerable not having equal access to adequate healthcare.
Finally, as an indication of how the federal government continues to politicize the pandemic, the Secretary of State continues to call the Covid-19 pandemic, Wuhan virus, as an insult to China.
As a US citizen lucky enough to not be significantly impacted by all of this, I'm deeply embarrassed by such an outrageous insult from a federal official.
If the coronavirus starts impacting the lives of Americans in a widespread manner (shuddered schools, closed offices, loss of jobs), the same instinct will kick in.
Don't act, and you'll get a messup economy because of the panic and the sick people.
Act, and you'll get a messup economy because of the panic and the sick people, and the cost of tests+quarantines+curfew. Less people dead is the ethic thing to do, but power is not about morality.
We have become very cynical people.
History books tell me we have done that for centuries: slavery, wars, ecology...
old people are the base voters for many populist ruling party in Europe
It's not like they don't have the same incentives in the other countries, the main difference is that we do not trust the government. Might be selection bias, but I do think we have been hammered with a stereotype on modern culture about the incompetent/evil bureaucrat getting in the way of the hero's solution.
This is too optimistic. If it works then people see a tiny death rate and a shutdown forced by the government. The greatest success will look like an overreaction.
So it's a complicated problem, with many dynamics at play.
That said, a lot of governments are taking serious measures and apparently not counting the electoral cost.
That and giving smallpox-infested blankets to Native Americans was 100% genocidal malice, not a lack of having their shit together. The problem is that they DO have their shit together, and it's racist xenophobic mendacious destructive shit.
The Trump DOJ’s Crazy Back-and-Forth on Coronavirus Prevention Posters
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/03/what-was-trump-dojs-...
CDC director breaks with Trump on claim that border wall will help stop coronavirus
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/10/cdc-director-border...
I have serious doubts about this model, but will play along.
What explains:
(a) The exceptions - some countries are acting and doing well. Others are doing better after a delay.
(b) Past, more aggressive actions - many countries, the US included, have responded much more quickly and competently to acute disease crises.
I wouldn't like to be the one to meet the decision, so. Because the cost of closing down a country for a couple of weeks is enormous. So when do put these actions in place? I have no idea, but it seems to be pretty difficult to get the timing right.
There is no point in crying wolf over these actions online, or even worse about what should have been done in hindsight. There are whole staffs doing nothing else right now, experts in their respective fields. So the best we, as a public, can do right now is to get out of these people's way. We follow guidelines like washing hands and reducing contact. We go self quarantine. We take steps we can in our social and professional environment. We send our employees into WFH or close certain cites if that's not possible. We work with authorities to come up with plans and contingencies if our companies are relevant in that regard.
First, there's no "no pandemic" case. Not anymore.
Second, your conclusion says that "politicians choose (1)" but that is not the case at all - almost every country in Europe, Asia, middle east had taken measures, with varying severity, and significant economic cost.
Last but not least, the whole framing is extremely simplistic and follows the "politicians are evil" reddit-like logic.
I am not saying that the analysis is correct, but information that is disclosed now has no bearing on an explanation of the actions of actors in the past.
> Last but not least, the whole framing is extremely simplistic and follows the "politicians are evil" reddit-like logic.
Politicians are people who happen to really care about being reelected. If you have any contact with them, you will realize that this is the ulterior motive of all of their actions. In a sense, as it should be. Being our democratic-elected representatives, it seems reasonable to me that they behave as slaves to the preferences of those who elected them. Like everything else, this creates a bunch of perverse incentives. You would have to be very naive to overlook these things, and imagine that powerful politicians will no put reelection above all things. The ones that didn't did not get reelected, and are not powerful politicians.
The Italian cluster most likely stems from an initial infection in Germany which occurred 10 days before the first flight bans anywhere. Italy probably failed, because it reduced testing to only include symptomatic cases at a critical time ( https://www.adnkronos.com/fatti/cronaca/2020/02/27/coronavir... ), not because Germany did not disallow flights at a time where it was already community spreading in Europe.
That distinction makes for a world of difference in voting behavior.
Shocking.
In times of crisis our system needs leaders who do the right thing over the popular thing, even when it means risking losing office. This is called statesmanship.
Voters would do well to remember this when choosing leaders, it’s an increasingly rare quality we select for.
I'm from Belgium myself, so I can chime in.
Our minister of health is a docter herself, and is advised by a panel of experts including a professor of virology. They know very well what they are doing with the current 400 known infections.
Closing schools makes no sense currently because of following factors:
- kids are not the main factor in spreading the virus, as seen in other countries.
- Putting kids with their grandparents is probaly worse for death toll compared to keeping them in schools.
Look at the exponential growth curve of for example Denmark https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in...
And compare that to the pretty linear growth curve of Belgium https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in...
So please stop treating this as game theory. Our country is doing the best thing in this situation.
Edit: denmark link and rude language
Your comment is fine except for that attack. Please don't stoop to that here, regardless of how strongly emotions are running. It helps no one and only makes this place worse.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
I don't see much (if any) difference in their responses, so there must be some other factor for Denmark -- e.g. increased travel to Italy, more tourism from China, poorer personal hygiene, ... I don't really know, but
Linear growth would have a declining rate for daily percentage change (adding 10 cases when you have 100 is 10% change, adding 10 when you have 400 is 2.5%).
But if you look at the curve before that, it gave indication that the growth rate was slowing down.
Let's see what tomorrow brings.
Why did Japan close down schools, do they know something which Belgium does not or did Japan make a mistake by closing down schools.
All said I agree with GP that existing evidence suggests kids aren't a driver of the pandemic.
In Belgium, almost everybody works, so kids will go to their grandparents, which is arguable a worse situation.
First, it puts societal pressure on businesses to close or modify their operations by allowing people to work from home. Many families are simply not setup to have kids at home, but parents at work, so factoring that in will cause businesses to change.
Most importantly, all this happens without government directly intervening in business decisions.
Secondly, it lays the groundwork for politicians to take more drastic actions. If schools remain open, even if it makes sense by “the numbers”, it’s still going to be politically difficult to cancel events, restrict general travel, and eventually close businesses. The public sees school closures as step 1 in any disaster situation. You can’t discount the importance of emotional signaling.
And medical staff needs to stay home and take care of the kids too?
This is incorrect. Italy closed borders on Jan 31st. The Chinese visitor to the Webasto company meeting came to Germany on Jan 19th.
It is easily evident that Germany closing its borders at the same time as Italy would not have prevented this transmission. You should probably increase your skepticism about the media where you read this.
Because we want to avoid Covid-19 becoming a recurrent winter illness like other coughs and colds and flu. Those already cause considerable pressure on healthcare systems, and adding annual covid-19 season on top would be pretty rough.
A very cruel view on humanity, but I would be surprised if these thoughts hadn't crossed our politicians minds.
Also, many initiatives by young people (e.g. limiting climate change, re-structuring society to be more equal-opportunity) are being blocked by old people who wish to preserve the status quo. So there is a general dislike by young people - those mostly unaffected by Covid - against the elderly - those most likely to die from Covid.
And for many years, there have been heated discussions about whether it is fair to force an ever smaller number of young people to pay for an ever growing number of old people, even if those old people directly undermine the young people's livelihood, for example by driving up rental prices or by voting to stop free education (which they themselves benefited from, when young).
So you could probably even win some young votes with a platform of "let's sacrifice the unneeded grumpy grandmas for the greater good".
As for the reasons of why there is a divide between young and old, I guess a big part is jealousy, because the older generations had more stable job opportunities available to them.
https://qz.com/940686/millennials-and-baby-boomers-have-been...
But I agree, everything's fine in Belgium :D. The virus is likely to have taken a detour to avoid Belgium, like the Chernobyl cloud did.
Standard Foreign Office response in a time of crisis:
In stage one we say nothing is going to happen.
Stage two, we say something may be about to happen, but we should do nothing about it.
In stage three, we say that maybe we should do something about it, but there's nothing we can do.
Stage four, we say maybe there was something we could have done, but it's too late now.
https://youtu.be/nSXIetP5iak
Would it though?
We need to start the national quarantine before things blow up to Italy and Wuhan level proportions. Yes, it will be extremely costly. But riding on imaginary hopes that the virus will just disappear for no real reason is extraordinarily irresponsible.
The details of what it looks like will take time to figure out--it will be a complicated collaboration between the federal, state, and local authorities, with the justice system and health sectors being deeply involved. That's reason to start figuring those details out now, and not two weeks from now.
Donald Trump was elected because he said he was a risk taker willing to do what needs to be done despite criticism from everyone. A national quarantine is needed now, and we need bold action to get it started. This is his moment to make a difference.
Hospitals will only allow visitors if they are over 16 and a primary caregiver (ie spouse), and even they are screened before being allowed in. Nursing homes are limiting visitors, both who can come, and where they can go. Companies are halting non-essential travel.
It isn't as drastic as you might think it should be, but it is significant at limiting risk for the most vulnerable.
Most of the above is running plans that have been in place for a long time (far longer than Trump), walking the line between overreacting and things getting out of control.