Which is why we have a, you know, society, to make sure we soften the blow when someone draws a short straw. But the answer will be what it always is - corporate tax cuts and trickle down voodoo.
Call your representative and Senators. There's a bill being discussed in DC right now. You might want to see how it relates to you and make your voice heard.
> If your employer has reduced your hours or shut down operations due to COVID-19, you can file an Unemployment Insurance (UI) claim. UI provides partial wage replacement benefit payments to workers who lose their job or have their hours reduced, through no fault of their own. Workers who are temporarily unemployed due to COVID-19 and expected to return to work with their employer within a few weeks are not required to actively seek work each week. However, they must remain able and available and ready to work during their unemployment for each week of benefits claimed and meet all other eligibility criteria. Eligible individuals can receive benefits that range from $40-$450 per week.
> The Governor’s Executive Order waives the one-week unpaid waiting period, so you can collect UI benefits for the first week you are out of work. If you are eligible, the EDD processes and issues payments within a few weeks of receiving a claim.
No. That's one of the key ways to differentiate between employees and contractors. Keep this in mind the next time you or anyone else cries bloody murder that the state was overreaching in requiring "gig economy" workers to be classified as employees.
One of the most common arguments against treating "gig economy" workers as employees that I see is that none of these "gigs" are not supposed to be primary sources of income. Unemployment insurance (in California at least) is funded by (and total payout is determined by) paycheck deductions on W-2 employees.
While I certainly support providing financial support for everyone, everyone should be paying into the system. Just like with health insurance.
Gig workers in California are hurting for other reasons: A lot of them can't adequately support themselves because of recent legislation impacting gig workers in California. This was true before we had a pandemic on our hands.
If you are a service worker and your hours have been cut you need to file for unemployment immediately. You should be able to receive partial unemployment for the missed hours.
Nothing. A lot of experts have been saying for years that millions of Americans lack a safety net, and politicians didn't care even the slightest bit. Now we're seeing real time millions of Americans becoming homeless.
ASAP? Nothing, really. The American government operates at a glacial speed for various reasons and local governments are strapped for resources.
What we needed to do was improve our safety nets approximately 10-15 years ago. Now we're seeing the end result when an actual crisis hits. The best we'll be able to get is some bandaids that'll mostly just be a way of appeasing businesses rather than helping individuals.
The only way to combat this is to get checks into the hands of individuals.
The government will most likely be providing a subsidy to the airline industry, they are already requesting $50B.
Will the government step in to get 2 months pay to every individual, that is the big question.
Given that the democratic debate yesterday was primarily focused on paying for the tests and care of coronavirus rather than the larger societal economic impact it will have, it's seems like a stretch.
However, the one thing that Trump has proven is that he has definitely not done things like the establishment and given the poor handling of the crisis as well as it being an election year, a President sponsored bill to provide 2 months salary to every tax payer who is affected by this and under a certain level of income would certainly be one way to reclaim victory over this debacle.
If you have to go outside please keep your distance and wear a shirt like this one (https://socialdistanceshirt.com/products/social-distance-shi...) or a sign or something, there's zero need to spread this thing (accidentally or not) any more than absolutely necessary.
> What can the government do to get aid to these individuals ASAP?
Here is something the government could do: basically suspend for 60 days, everything having to do with owing money to people who don't produce anything.
That means: for 60 days, no interest is charged on any loans, and no rent can be collected, and no taxes of any kind can be collected on anything.
Edit: Not sure why adding information to the discussion is being downvoted - I didn't even convey an opinion. Maybe this is a sign that HN is now Reddit 2.
This is my last post here. Heading to Wikipedia, where at least facts are appreciated. Hope the like-minded ones join me.
I wouldn’t necessarily think that Best Buy or Office Max were essential, but they seem to be exempted as essential because they sell equipment to enable working from home
They have no idea. A grocery store worker is essential, until the freezer craps out, at which time a HVAC repairman is essential, who needs a part delivered via FedEX, who needs a functioning airport, etc. There are too many micro-essentials to count.
This is untrue. They have an idea and all of those cases (grocery worker, HVAC repairmen, FedEx, and airports as necessary to support essential work) are accounted for in the actual order.
“Essential Businesses” may stay open and their employees may leave home to go to work. Examples of Essential Businesses include:
Healthcare organizations, such as hospitals, medical and mental health clinics, doctor offices, pharmacies, health care supply stores, and other health care facilities.
Grocery stores, certified farmers’ markets, farm and produce stands, supermarkets, food banks, convenience stores, and other store groceries.
Food cultivation
Gas stations and auto-supply, auto-repair, and related facilities.
Banks and related financial institutions.
Garbage and sanitation services and collection.
Hardware stores, and plumbers, electricians, exterminators, and other service providers who provide services that are necessary to maintaining the safety and sanitation.
Schools, for distance learning and providing meals.
Laundromats and laundry service providers.
Restaurants and other prepared food facilities, but only for delivery or carry out.
Businesses that supply products needed for people to work from home;
Businesses that supply other essential businesses with the support or supplies necessary to operate;
Businesses that ship or deliver groceries, food, goods or services directly to residences;
Airlines, taxis, and other private transportation providers providing transportation services necessary for Essential Activities and other purposes expressly authorized in this Order;
Home-based care for seniors, adults, or children;
Residential facilities and shelters for seniors, adults, and children;
Professional services, such as legal or accounting services, when necessary to assist in compliance with legally mandated activities;
Childcare facilities providing services that enable employees exempted in this Order to work as permitted, subject to certain conditions discussed below.
The definition is pretty complicated but thorough. Healthcare counts, and there are other categories of "Essential Businesses" (grocery stores, gas stations, banks, hardware stores, plumbers, delivery services, etc. etc.), and you're also explicitly allowed to go to work if it's needed to keep the company alive (inventory, security, pyaroll) or needed to keep the rest of your company able to WFH.
Supply chains needs every occupation short of (although maybe even including) telemarketers. The constant escalation without any escalation of cases should terrify everyone. We're now so far "all in" on "prevention" that we're likely to see life remain fucked for months.
The government has likely overstepped its legal authority here. It is likely a violation of Constitutional rights for the government to declare that you may not visit other people in person, and it takes a damn high bar to clear the necessary scrutiny to render it legal — high enough that courts have declared some Ebola quarantines in the US to be a violation of civil liberties (see: Kaci Hickox).
I am curious to see how long this lasts, and whether there will be lawsuits to that effect.
(Also. I am being modded down for this for no apparent good reason. This is not a violation of my civil liberties, though there may be ways to make HN a better place that are more consistent with site guidelines.)
What advantage does waiting provide? It’s not like the disease is less deadly because 100 million people have it vs 100 thousand.
Theoretically the most efficient approach might be to quarantine only the sick or elderly, but that’s unlikely to work well. Doing absolutely nothing would cost millions of lives. So, I really don’t see any good options only some hard choices ahead.
PS: The only state without known infections is not testing people. Exponential growth is a bitch at this point.
No, that's what "exponential growth" means. By the time the body count is in three digits, you're way, way too late. Frankly this should've happened at least a week ago as it is.
Given what we've already seen worldwide, it's irresponsible to say that. Especially since this has proven to be statistically much less fatal to younger ages, youthful hubris is dangerous. It might not kill you, but transmission is just as dangerous to older populations.
Is it even right to say "older populations?" I don't have a better word, but maybe we should say, "very old" or enumerate the ages specifically.
Median COVID-19 death age in Italy is 81.
Average life span for an Italian male is 80.
Chance of dying every year for an 85 year old American male is 10% for any and all causes. Because... well our bodies get old and frail at that age. And even then, the vast majority of them survive COVID-19.
Can we not infer from other nations, or is the US exceptional, precisely because of the kinds of people who want to bury their heads in the sand and not take action to make us exceptional, until it's too late?
Only problem is that exponential growth factor. The line between "nothing happened so why did we do all this" and "everything happened, why didnt you prevent it?" is thin.
> Can we at least wait til the US body count reaches 3 digits before saying stuff like this?
Looks like your comment was posted around 3 pm Pacific on Monday. https://www.worldometers.info/ says we are at 85 deaths. Unfortunately we'll probably be at triple digits within 24 hours.
Excuse me. This is a rather dispassionate note that the government has likely done something it is not authorized to do, and that its orders are at risk of being overturned. It does not assign value to the order, nor declare it worthless. It does not decry the violation of civil liberties, nor does it declare the violation meaningless.
If merely raising the issue in such a note is sufficient to count as "freedom at all costs libertarian fetishism" these days, then by all means, sign me up for freedom at all costs libertarian fetishism. In the meantime, I am confident that our government is strong enough to withstand mild observations of this nature.
I know we're all willing to die for each others freedoms, but seniors eating it to respiratory illness and other injureds dying because the ICUs were full doesn't really have the glory factor.
What in God's good name are you talking about, sir?
I think you are replying to the wrong part of the thread. The post you want was written by someone with the username `strawman` who was posting patriotic poems about dying for freedom. This thread is entirely unrelated and much, much more boring.
> If merely raising the issue in such a note is sufficient to count as "freedom at all costs libertarian fetishism" these days, then by all means, sign me up for freedom at all costs libertarian fetishism.
The fetishism I refer to is one that is distinctly anti-social, since the premise is entirely "others are telling me I shouldn't do this thing, and obviously I know what's best for me, so I will do it to exercise my freedom". You are falling into the same trap.
Sir, the person who is fetishizing all these things, and exercising his freedom, is not a part of this conversation, and you offer no meaningful link to this conversation.
I find the statement "the rest of the world makes fun of Americans for" to be a bit disingenuous. For one thing, the world is a very big place, and the alleged people making fun of the U.S. are no doubt a part of a certain demographic, who's views align with a certain demographic within the United States. That demographic is one of many demographics in both the US and elsewhere, and thus, it feels very intellectually dishonest to generalize that an entire world population of 8Billion+ "makes fun" of any one thing.
A better statement would be: "... that the rest of the [insert demographic] of the World make fun of Americans for"
Reducing it to "nitpicking" is fundamentally misunderstanding the content of the comment, and goes to show the truth of the criticism regarding the myopic nature of the perspective you are peddling.
The entirety of the point that was made is "people are different and have different opinions" which is a retort to a clumsily-framed statement serving primarily as rhetoric and not fact. Shooting semantic fish in the rhetorical barrel is what makes people "no fun at parties" and something that has become a stereotype -- no, a meme -- on HN.
> The entirety of the point that was made is "people are different and have different opinions"
That is only a superficial understanding. What you left out is the manipulative hubris of your clumsy rhetoric pretending to command some kind of hegemony of opinion. It is no surprise to see a continuation of that in the further comments.
Unsure why this is downvoted - the government restricting citizens' right en masse isn't something that happens often and definitely runs up against our Constitutional Rights. Even if in this case, it is for the greater good.
History shows that whenever you ask "what kind of jackass would do this?", a number of such jackasses tend to present themselves.
Don't underestimate contrarianism and people's willingness to fight tooth and nail for what they believe in, no matter how ridiculous it may seem to you.
Not sure about the legal validity here, but you can be sure somebody would find time and energy to take this to court. I don't think however, that any court would rule to swifty declare this illegal and then be deemed somewhat responsible for the consequences.
That is related to people coming off cruise ships being quarantined, where they are actually confined. This order is different, because you are still allowed to leave your house for essentials, exercise, etc. Not saying whether it's legal/illegal/good/bad/whatever. Just noting that it's a different scenario.
Keep in mind that, if it comes to it, California can declare martial law to maintain order. This is certainly an emergency of enough severity to warrant exceptional measures like this.
> Keep in mind that, if it comes to it, California can declare martial law to maintain order.
Isn't that the right thing to do? You can't have martial law forever. On the other hand, this set a precedent for government to reduce liberties when they see fit.
"American constitutional jurisprudence has long recognized a vast authority on the part of the states to regulate private social and economic activity in the name of the public welfare. Dramatic measures to address the spread of disease has long been a part of those police powers..."
That's coming from a libertarian writer in a libertarian magazine that both likely wish the truth were otherwise.
If you're going to drop links to Reason at me, you should also take a look at https://reason.com/2020/03/11/would-italian-style-lockdowns-... which is less recently published but addresses the question of a "China-like lockdown" more directly, rather than simply looking at questions of "can the government close my favorite bar?" It almost certainly can close the bar, but personal liberties — the freedom to not be under some sort of house arrest — tend to get a lot more scrutiny than commercial activity, for good or for ill. Where specific quarantine powers exist, the language authorizing these quarantines often hinges on whether the persons quarantine are actually a substantial risk to public health; here, we are talking about the freedom of movement of ~7000000 people, due to the (known) infections of approximately 200. Just by these numbers, this is an exercise of quarantine power that is without precedent.
The government can compel you to take up arms and risk death on a battle field. I think you'll find the constitution is entirely up to the whims of the courts which makes it far less absolute than one imagines.
Notwithstanding the presidency of Andrew Jackson, and more recently of Donald Trump, the United States remain a nation of laws, and not of raw power.
Because of this, it is utterly uninteresting to observe the peak of government power, like compelling the draft. The draft is specifically legally authorized in the Constitution, in which the Government is lawfully granted the power to raise and support Armies. It can do so while obeying the law. This is not "the whims of the courts," and the courts are barely involved, because the law is so very clear.
Quarantine powers are also subject to the power of law, including both general police powers and Constitutionally protected rights. When these conflict, there are a variety of legal tests to determine which wins, and there is legal precedent for interpreting the laws. When the courts interpret this conflict, it will almost certainly not be on a whim.
True, the draft is not an ideal example. None the less, the court is hardly infallible: for example, it is odd that congress can not constitutionally require medical insurance but can institute taxes and even prohibit the consumption of anything deemed to be an intoxicant.
Or for more specific examples, given, Gore v Bush, when exactly does the court have standing to intervene in a presidential election? Given DC v. Heller in 2008, what does the word "militia" mean now? Why, to everyone's surprise, did maritime law suddenly limit punitive damages with Exxon vs Baker (2008)? Why did the court narrowly reverse 200 years of convention and the near universal understating of speech with Citizens United?
Please. Citizen's United was not a reversal of the understanding of speech. Efforts to convince you of that were propaganda. The Courts detailed the corporate personhood doctrine in Trustees of Dartmouth College v. Woodward in 1819, discussing how corporations have rights because their owners have rights and the corporation is a way for these owners to get together and exercise these rights as a group. These rights include freedom of speech and of the press.
Moreover, allow me to remind you that Citizens United is actually a nonprofit group+ and the thing this case was actually about was making an anti-Hilary movie, and being barred from distributing it. Anyone who has glanced at the Bill of Rights, and the history of this nation and its jurisprudence in the area of free speech, could have seen this result coming. (Somehow there are many people not aware of this fact.)
(+ not a charity, contributions aren't tax deductible; just a standard 504 not-for-profit.)
This may or may not be good policy. It's eminently open to debate. But hewing to precedent like this is supposed to be your evidence of the Court acting on a whim?!?
I agree, this is an over-reaction, but good luck saying that on HN without inciting an angry mob. People are at peak panic mode right now, and it shows.
I just want to remind everyone that H1N1 in 2009 killed between 150-600k people worldwide. Between 10 and 20% of the world population caught it at some point. The fatality rate was greater than Covid-19.
And yet, we got through it without panicking. People don't even give it a second thought today, and it was just 10 years ago.
H1N1 was contagious 1 day before symptoms appeared. COVID-19 is contagious mean 5-6 days before symptoms appear. And it's not about the CFR, it's about healthcare system capacity.
SARS-Cov-2 is more infectious than H1N1. This larger pool of patients means a greater number of people will die. A small percentage of a very large number is still a lot of people.
> The fatality rate was greater than Covid-19.
No, it wasn't. The fatality rate for H1N1 was about 0.2%. The fatality rate for covid-19 is tricky to work out at the moment, but 2% is a reasonable low estimate.
> At first sight, the data seem to imply that this new virus is relatively mild, with case fatality ratios around 0.5%, similar to the upper range of that seen for seasonal influenza2 and relatively low hospitalisation ratios. However, the case fatality ratio seems to vary substantially between countries, and deaths have occurred in much younger people than is the case for seasonal influenza.3 4
> There are many reasons why simple interpretations of these crude figures at the beginning of a pandemic may be misleading both in terms of assessing severity and in making comparisons between countries. Here, we discuss some of the important mechanisms resulting in biases, propose study designs and associated statistical methods to estimate the case fatality ratio given these limitations, and show their strengths using simulated data. The two main sources of bias in estimates of the case fatality ratio we consider stem from shifts in case ascertainment (over time, efforts may become more focused on the most severe cases, leading to an overestimation of the case fatality ratio) and from the inevitable delay between symptom onset and death, which in the early phase of the epidemic can lead to underestimation of the case fatality ratio if it is not adjusted for.
> A natural definition for the case fatality ratio is the ratio of the total number of deaths from a disease divided by the total number of cases. In a fully ascertained (and complete) epidemic, this simple method works perfectly. However, in most infectious diseases there is underascertainment of cases as people who are asymptomatic or have mild infection will be less likely to present to health care, and if they do present they will be less likely to be tested and confirmed. It is therefore likely that there will be a bias towards diagnosis of more severe cases (fig 1⇓), with the result that the case fatality ratio and other measures of severity are overestimated. Furthermore, this underascertainment will change as an epidemic matures. Initially increased awareness by patients and doctors may lead to high ascertainment, but as cases increase and systems are overwhelmed, only a proportion will be tested (potentially those with links to other confirmed cases), making it difficult to understand the scale of under-reporting.
> I just want to remind everyone that H1N1 in 2009 killed between 150-600k people worldwide. Between 10 and 20% of the world population caught it at some point. The fatality rate was greater than Covid-19.
This is categorically false.
According to estimates from the CDC, in the United States, H1N1 infected ~61M people and killed ~12,649 for a CFR of around 0.02%.
You should stop claiming that the CFR of H1N1 is larger than COVID-19, when all current data and epidemiological estimates show that it absolutely is not.
Yeah what a read. The first few paragraphs I thought, hey, good for you SF. Then it became increasingly dystopian as it went on. I certainly agree with all the "advice" they're giving, but it's quite a shocking thing to read as an American. If they were simply advising people to stay inside rather than enforcing it would be fine, and personally I believe that people would listen. I could be wrong though.
You're right, it would require martial law to express this kind of authority. However most people won't be opposing this and the main battle is against uncertainty and lack of information.
Government power is relatively fragile anyway, and in times like these, this kind of notice can settle fears and give people some direction. They'll follow it given the alternative of chaos, and that's all the city needs.
I doubt they are actually going to lock anyone up for violating this order. If they did, probably that person would have standing for a lawsuit. Everyone else is going to go along because it makes good sense to do this.
Armchair civil libertarians pontificating about whether or not it is technically legal are doing nothing other than distracting. I want and need the full force of the government in a time like this to see us through this, as do a lot of people. Right now we are seeing a severe under-reaction. At this moment to argue about whether or not the government can do something it should do for the greater good doesn’t help us.
We should all be very happy this is finally happening, even if it is a huge inconvenience.
The important thing to remember is that society definitely will return to normal. It's just a matter of time.
The math tells us that ~95% people will get through this with a week or two of downtime, rendering them immunized against this virus, and then they'll be right back to work.
These extreme measures are to ensure as many people as possible survive hospitalization. We're all saving lives by staying home.
From what I've heard & read, we don't actually know that people are rendered immune — and even if they are, we don't know how long the immunity would last.
This seems iffy; I don't think the reports from last week that people in China and Japan who were sent home and then tested positive again have been really confirmed. Do we have new info on that? We should be seeing more instances in Europe if it's a real phenomenon.
Even if it turns out that immunity doesn't happen, I don't think it changes the reaction that we need at this moment. It will change our decisions going forward, of course.
Don’t know for China but there are couple sources and cases for Japan.
What I think a most plausible explanation is it takes time after symptoms disappear for our immune system to finish wiping out virus. Influenza also has that stretch, though only days long, not weeks.
There's also that little problem we get new versions of the flu virus every year, why isn't that going to happen with covid-19 now? It's got billions of hosts.
> The math tells us that ~95% people will get through this with a week or two of downtime, rendering them immunized against this virus, and then they'll be right back to work.
I don't think this is right. 80% of people should get through this fine if they contract it, given numbers I read recently. The other 20% will have some level of big problems, and if too many of these happen in a given area, hospitals will be overwhelmed and more would die than otherwise.
Furthermore, from what I have read, there is no known long-term immunity to CoV, but maybe a 4-month window of some level of immunity.
Not exactly. Up to 20% of those tested thus far required hospitalization of some kind of another. This in no way means 20% of all infections will require hospitalization. But right now, we don't have great data, other than estimations, of how many people currently have been, or are, infected without being able to test everyone.
That is not what the math says. Even if people do become immune, it takes much much longer for the disease to spread through the population at a rate that won't overwhelm healthcare capacity. There was some uncertainty about this until now, but a paper just came out from the team at Imperial, whose advice was informing the UK govt.
You have to keep severe social distancing in place until there's a vaccine, or there are too many people to care for. Better just hope it's a worst-case scenario when they estimate 12-18 months for a vaccine.
Unfortunately SF has failed in civic responsibility already. The crime, homeless, waste and other issues will hit it hard, on top of the high cost of living that affects everyone without a high-paying remote-capable job. SF (and other cities) need to focus on speedy testing and recovery at this point, not more quarantine.
People are forgetting that any preventative action in a pandemic will seem like an overreaction because it is a PREVENTATIVE action. We're not reacting to a few people having COVID-19, we're reacting to the millions we know will have COVID-19.
~320,000 citizens of Filipino decent in the Bay according to the 2000 census, so yes it's a big population, though I know that number doesn't reflect Filipino as a person's primary language, but still it's a good indicator.
Good chance that there's more sex, not less, throughout all this. Could be a bunch of babies coming! Fewer hookups, sure... but lots of people have sex with steady partners that they'll be stuck in place with.
"It is mandatory. This Order is a legal Order issued under the authority of California law. You are required to comply, and it is a misdemeanor crime not to follow the order (although the intent is not for anyone to get into trouble)."
What does this mean regarding enforcement? Are people going to get ticketed / jailed? Will the police be out in force to check papers?
158 comments
[ 4.0 ms ] story [ 207 ms ] threadThis current emergency only strengthens the argument for universal healthcare imo.
Laid off service workers don't need job training or resume assistance.
> If your employer has reduced your hours or shut down operations due to COVID-19, you can file an Unemployment Insurance (UI) claim. UI provides partial wage replacement benefit payments to workers who lose their job or have their hours reduced, through no fault of their own. Workers who are temporarily unemployed due to COVID-19 and expected to return to work with their employer within a few weeks are not required to actively seek work each week. However, they must remain able and available and ready to work during their unemployment for each week of benefits claimed and meet all other eligibility criteria. Eligible individuals can receive benefits that range from $40-$450 per week.
> The Governor’s Executive Order waives the one-week unpaid waiting period, so you can collect UI benefits for the first week you are out of work. If you are eligible, the EDD processes and issues payments within a few weeks of receiving a claim.
While I certainly support providing financial support for everyone, everyone should be paying into the system. Just like with health insurance.
What we needed to do was improve our safety nets approximately 10-15 years ago. Now we're seeing the end result when an actual crisis hits. The best we'll be able to get is some bandaids that'll mostly just be a way of appeasing businesses rather than helping individuals.
The government will most likely be providing a subsidy to the airline industry, they are already requesting $50B.
Will the government step in to get 2 months pay to every individual, that is the big question.
Given that the democratic debate yesterday was primarily focused on paying for the tests and care of coronavirus rather than the larger societal economic impact it will have, it's seems like a stretch.
However, the one thing that Trump has proven is that he has definitely not done things like the establishment and given the poor handling of the crisis as well as it being an election year, a President sponsored bill to provide 2 months salary to every tax payer who is affected by this and under a certain level of income would certainly be one way to reclaim victory over this debacle.
Here is something the government could do: basically suspend for 60 days, everything having to do with owing money to people who don't produce anything.
That means: for 60 days, no interest is charged on any loans, and no rent can be collected, and no taxes of any kind can be collected on anything.
Edit: https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article241216061.html
https://streetlifesolutions.blogspot.com/
https://q13fox.com/2020/03/13/king-county-changes-policy-for...
Edit: Not sure why adding information to the discussion is being downvoted - I didn't even convey an opinion. Maybe this is a sign that HN is now Reddit 2.
This is my last post here. Heading to Wikipedia, where at least facts are appreciated. Hope the like-minded ones join me.
“Essential Businesses” may stay open and their employees may leave home to go to work. Examples of Essential Businesses include:
https://www.sfdph.org/dph/alerts/files/HealthOrderC19-07-%20...
The definition is pretty complicated but thorough. Healthcare counts, and there are other categories of "Essential Businesses" (grocery stores, gas stations, banks, hardware stores, plumbers, delivery services, etc. etc.), and you're also explicitly allowed to go to work if it's needed to keep the company alive (inventory, security, pyaroll) or needed to keep the rest of your company able to WFH.
Supply chains needs every occupation short of (although maybe even including) telemarketers. The constant escalation without any escalation of cases should terrify everyone. We're now so far "all in" on "prevention" that we're likely to see life remain fucked for months.
I am curious to see how long this lasts, and whether there will be lawsuits to that effect.
(Also. I am being modded down for this for no apparent good reason. This is not a violation of my civil liberties, though there may be ways to make HN a better place that are more consistent with site guidelines.)
"The Constitution is not a Suicide Pact". Lincoln got away with throwing out Habeas corpus during the Civil War.
California will get away with this on the grounds of an unprecedented national emergency.
Can we at least wait til the US body count reaches 3 digits before saying stuff like this?
Theoretically the most efficient approach might be to quarantine only the sick or elderly, but that’s unlikely to work well. Doing absolutely nothing would cost millions of lives. So, I really don’t see any good options only some hard choices ahead.
PS: The only state without known infections is not testing people. Exponential growth is a bitch at this point.
Median COVID-19 death age in Italy is 81.
Average life span for an Italian male is 80.
Chance of dying every year for an 85 year old American male is 10% for any and all causes. Because... well our bodies get old and frail at that age. And even then, the vast majority of them survive COVID-19.
I'm very impressed that some countries think they're above others.
Looks like your comment was posted around 3 pm Pacific on Monday. https://www.worldometers.info/ says we are at 85 deaths. Unfortunately we'll probably be at triple digits within 24 hours.
If merely raising the issue in such a note is sufficient to count as "freedom at all costs libertarian fetishism" these days, then by all means, sign me up for freedom at all costs libertarian fetishism. In the meantime, I am confident that our government is strong enough to withstand mild observations of this nature.
I think you are replying to the wrong part of the thread. The post you want was written by someone with the username `strawman` who was posting patriotic poems about dying for freedom. This thread is entirely unrelated and much, much more boring.
The fetishism I refer to is one that is distinctly anti-social, since the premise is entirely "others are telling me I shouldn't do this thing, and obviously I know what's best for me, so I will do it to exercise my freedom". You are falling into the same trap.
A better statement would be: "... that the rest of the [insert demographic] of the World make fun of Americans for"
That is only a superficial understanding. What you left out is the manipulative hubris of your clumsy rhetoric pretending to command some kind of hegemony of opinion. It is no surprise to see a continuation of that in the further comments.
This is a completely reasonable order given the emergency situation. No reasonable person should object to it.
(I did not downvote you)
Don't underestimate contrarianism and people's willingness to fight tooth and nail for what they believe in, no matter how ridiculous it may seem to you.
https://twitter.com/ACLU_NorCal/status/1236722627000975361
Look at how long it took the Japanese internment from WWII to be ruled upon - and that was by modern standards not remotely beneficial to society.
Isn't that the right thing to do? You can't have martial law forever. On the other hand, this set a precedent for government to reduce liberties when they see fit.
I'd much rather see a martial law.
"American constitutional jurisprudence has long recognized a vast authority on the part of the states to regulate private social and economic activity in the name of the public welfare. Dramatic measures to address the spread of disease has long been a part of those police powers..."
That's coming from a libertarian writer in a libertarian magazine that both likely wish the truth were otherwise.
Because of this, it is utterly uninteresting to observe the peak of government power, like compelling the draft. The draft is specifically legally authorized in the Constitution, in which the Government is lawfully granted the power to raise and support Armies. It can do so while obeying the law. This is not "the whims of the courts," and the courts are barely involved, because the law is so very clear.
Quarantine powers are also subject to the power of law, including both general police powers and Constitutionally protected rights. When these conflict, there are a variety of legal tests to determine which wins, and there is legal precedent for interpreting the laws. When the courts interpret this conflict, it will almost certainly not be on a whim.
Or for more specific examples, given, Gore v Bush, when exactly does the court have standing to intervene in a presidential election? Given DC v. Heller in 2008, what does the word "militia" mean now? Why, to everyone's surprise, did maritime law suddenly limit punitive damages with Exxon vs Baker (2008)? Why did the court narrowly reverse 200 years of convention and the near universal understating of speech with Citizens United?
Moreover, allow me to remind you that Citizens United is actually a nonprofit group+ and the thing this case was actually about was making an anti-Hilary movie, and being barred from distributing it. Anyone who has glanced at the Bill of Rights, and the history of this nation and its jurisprudence in the area of free speech, could have seen this result coming. (Somehow there are many people not aware of this fact.)
(+ not a charity, contributions aren't tax deductible; just a standard 504 not-for-profit.)
This may or may not be good policy. It's eminently open to debate. But hewing to precedent like this is supposed to be your evidence of the Court acting on a whim?!?
I just want to remind everyone that H1N1 in 2009 killed between 150-600k people worldwide. Between 10 and 20% of the world population caught it at some point. The fatality rate was greater than Covid-19.
And yet, we got through it without panicking. People don't even give it a second thought today, and it was just 10 years ago.
COVID-19: 0.6% CFR in South Korea (likely similar in other locations when we stop undercounting infections)
These aren't so dramatically different, are they?
But they are: H1N1 had a median death in the US of 37 years old, rather than 80+.
https://www.who.int/immunization/sage/1.Briand_epi_7th_July_...
The best data sets so far are South Korea and the Princess Cruise ship, because they did widespread testing. Both show a CFR of about 0.6%.
This seems categorically false.
CDC estimates that ~61M Americans were infected with ~12,469 deaths. That would be a CFR in the US of 0.02%.
https://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/estimates_2009_h1n1.htm
[1] https://nssac.bii.virginia.edu/covid-19/dashboard/
> The fatality rate was greater than Covid-19.
No, it wasn't. The fatality rate for H1N1 was about 0.2%. The fatality rate for covid-19 is tricky to work out at the moment, but 2% is a reasonable low estimate.
https://www.who.int/immunization/sage/1.Briand_epi_7th_July_...
https://www.bmj.com/content/339/bmj.b2840
> At first sight, the data seem to imply that this new virus is relatively mild, with case fatality ratios around 0.5%, similar to the upper range of that seen for seasonal influenza2 and relatively low hospitalisation ratios. However, the case fatality ratio seems to vary substantially between countries, and deaths have occurred in much younger people than is the case for seasonal influenza.3 4
> There are many reasons why simple interpretations of these crude figures at the beginning of a pandemic may be misleading both in terms of assessing severity and in making comparisons between countries. Here, we discuss some of the important mechanisms resulting in biases, propose study designs and associated statistical methods to estimate the case fatality ratio given these limitations, and show their strengths using simulated data. The two main sources of bias in estimates of the case fatality ratio we consider stem from shifts in case ascertainment (over time, efforts may become more focused on the most severe cases, leading to an overestimation of the case fatality ratio) and from the inevitable delay between symptom onset and death, which in the early phase of the epidemic can lead to underestimation of the case fatality ratio if it is not adjusted for.
> A natural definition for the case fatality ratio is the ratio of the total number of deaths from a disease divided by the total number of cases. In a fully ascertained (and complete) epidemic, this simple method works perfectly. However, in most infectious diseases there is underascertainment of cases as people who are asymptomatic or have mild infection will be less likely to present to health care, and if they do present they will be less likely to be tested and confirmed. It is therefore likely that there will be a bias towards diagnosis of more severe cases (fig 1⇓), with the result that the case fatality ratio and other measures of severity are overestimated. Furthermore, this underascertainment will change as an epidemic matures. Initially increased awareness by patients and doctors may lead to high ascertainment, but as cases increase and systems are overwhelmed, only a proportion will be tested (potentially those with links to other confirmed cases), making it difficult to understand the scale of under-reporting.
This is categorically false.
According to estimates from the CDC, in the United States, H1N1 infected ~61M people and killed ~12,649 for a CFR of around 0.02%.
https://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/estimates_2009_h1n1.htm
Stats for the global H1N1 pandemic estimates estimate ~1B people infected with 500,000 deaths. That's a CFR of 0.05% worldwide.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic
You should stop claiming that the CFR of H1N1 is larger than COVID-19, when all current data and epidemiological estimates show that it absolutely is not.
Government power is relatively fragile anyway, and in times like these, this kind of notice can settle fears and give people some direction. They'll follow it given the alternative of chaos, and that's all the city needs.
Which particular constitutional right do you think this violates, precisely?
I went to pick up my kid's medication and iPad at school today.
They opened their library and were letting kids checkout extra books to take home. I thought that was a nice gesture.
The important thing to remember is that society definitely will return to normal. It's just a matter of time.
The math tells us that ~95% people will get through this with a week or two of downtime, rendering them immunized against this virus, and then they'll be right back to work.
These extreme measures are to ensure as many people as possible survive hospitalization. We're all saving lives by staying home.
Even if it turns out that immunity doesn't happen, I don't think it changes the reaction that we need at this moment. It will change our decisions going forward, of course.
What I think a most plausible explanation is it takes time after symptoms disappear for our immune system to finish wiping out virus. Influenza also has that stretch, though only days long, not weeks.
I don't think this is right. 80% of people should get through this fine if they contract it, given numbers I read recently. The other 20% will have some level of big problems, and if too many of these happen in a given area, hospitals will be overwhelmed and more would die than otherwise.
Furthermore, from what I have read, there is no known long-term immunity to CoV, but maybe a 4-month window of some level of immunity.
Going to need a cite on that one ...
Many seniors will never leave their homes again.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/mrc-global-infectious-disease-ana...
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/s...
You have to keep severe social distancing in place until there's a vaccine, or there are too many people to care for. Better just hope it's a worst-case scenario when they estimate 12-18 months for a vaccine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Filipino_Ameri...
It will be interesting to see what happens to a society when sex is effectively prohibited for months.
What does this mean regarding enforcement? Are people going to get ticketed / jailed? Will the police be out in force to check papers?