Ask HN: What's the Best Way for a Layperson to Be Informed about Covid-19?
I'm personally very unsophisticated as concerns biology, I have what amounts to undergraduate-requirement bio (and my own career to focus on): so I don't aspire to be an expert or even to be equipped to give advice to others.
Nonetheless I, like most others, have to make day-to-day decisions about a great many things regarding COVID-19: do I have my Moderna boosted, when should I wear a mask, is travel a good idea, is dining out a good idea this month? I would like to do so in as scientific and apolitical a way as is possible for a non-expert.
It seems like such a polarizing topic that I'm personally having trouble sifting the signal out of the noise about it, and I doubt that I'm alone.
Is there a resource or set of resources available to the layperson willing to read a lot for becoming at least somewhat conversant in the key science, developments, legitimate controversies, spurious controversies, and generally the lay of the land that is balanced, apolitical, globally-minded, and actionable?
Thanks in advance!
P.S. I hope I don't start a flamewar by asking. I'm looking for how to hear even-handed, civil debate that doesn't involve a flamewar and my Google-fu is inadequate to find it.
26 comments
[ 4.4 ms ] story [ 77.2 ms ] threadhttps://youtu.be/GklHGYY8vN8
Thank you!
As for the day-to-day:
- Masks don't protect you from others. They protect others from you. So if nobody around you is wearing a mask, your mask will make no difference. If everyone is wearing one, your mask DOES make a difference. This becomes a "when in Rome" kind of thing when you're traveling (i.e. do what others do, and don't be a dick about it).
- Get vaccinated and boosted. This is proven, and you'll feel pretty dumb sitting in an ICU unit when a simple injection could have prevented it. Even with the latest Omicron variant, you can still get extremely sick and possibly even die (90% of ICU patients and almost all deaths are unvaccinated).
- Airline travel is one of the most common ways people get infected. Even switching to non-recycled air in the airplane is not enough, apparently. You takes your chances...
- Dining is generally safe as long as there's a decent distance between tables. Although Omicron is a LOT more virulent, so who knows how safe it actually is now...
Bottom line: Vaccination protects you from the worst parts of an infection, and then it comes down to your risk profile.
I understand that government and private industry are not two clearly distinguishable Lego bricks, I understand that regulators need some industry people to know what they're regulating even at the risk of some revolving-door stuff, and I understand that some profit motive is necessary to get smart people to work on something in large numbers.
But the waters seem very muddy (and there seem to be a lot of axes to grind all around) as to who is acting in good faith and who is seeking to push some agenda or to guard some rice bowel even among people with excellent credentials.
Historically I've kind of leaned on credentials in deciding who to listen to on topics outside my field (which may or may not have been a good idea), but on this one there seem to be people with multiple advanced degrees from prestigious universities ranging from "being in charge of the CDC" to "banned from Twitter for promoting vaccine hesitancy".
How do you personally go about figuring out what the closest thing to a dispassionate group of experts is? I somehow doubt that either A) Fauci is a crook putting a microchip in my arm or B) all the signatures on the Barrington Declaration are all from nutjobs: I imagine there is some balanced debate in the middle but I'm not sure how to find it.
Very few people are actually intentionally attempting to mislead. More often than not they are deluded themselves. But this is not helped by the other human tendency to demonize wrongdoers and assume the worst of motives.
Fauci is an interesting case because he's been in charge of a largely bureaucratic and invisible organization for so long, and was unprepared for being thrust into the spotlight. He wants to do good, but it's getting harder and harder to do that because every mistake he makes is amplified and used against him in the public sphere, and he's not used to reputation management like someone in a more public-facing organization would be (nor do I think he's up to the task - he's too nerdy and will probably be replaced eventually).
The waters are muddy because the topic has been politicized. The ebola vaccine was not controversial in the Americans eyes, but it WAS controversial in some African countries, where conspiracy theories ran rampant and hampered the vaccination drive (the biggest one being that it was an American plot to sterilize African women and render them barren).
Once counter-campaigns start, it gets progressively harder and harder to push a policy, because everyone will say "there's no smoke without a fire somewhere".
At the end of the day, you only have psychology to use as a heuristic, because the people lying and the people telling the truth are almost ALL convinced that they're honest and truthful.
The exceptions are the propagandists who actively want to damage another society to influence their politics, gain an objective, or diminish their world reputation - or local propagandists who cynically want to bring in a new policy or enforce an existing one (example: Reefer Madness or the tobacco lobby). And these people work with intention, so they're generally pretty good at covering themselves against blowback. But they usually work via the mainstream media, so you can often (but not always) see the telltale signs of a hard shift in reporting. Iraqi WMDs would be a good example since it was so clumsily done.
Last point: The truth is rarely in the middle. The middle is just what lazy people go for because then they don't have to think. We humans like quick and easy rules that yield simple answers, but the world just doesn't work that way.
In a weirdly meta way I think vaccination itself is a useful metaphor: personally the pro-vaccination/anti-vaxx dichotomy is itself extreme to me. Vaccination is some combination of pharmaceutical and medical procedure. It’s almost certainly the right thing at some times for some people, and almost certainly the wrong thing for other people at other times. It’s not a 1-bit problem (there are few 1-bit problems). But it seems to be something that we can’t collectively approach with as much nuance as e.g. prescription medications, which especially recently is not a decision-making process known for its demonstrable subtlety.
I personally get skittish around all-or-nothing anything.
It makes no sense. Of course they do. They don't protect that much but they are certainly better than nothing. It is about surgical masks. N95 masks are designed to protect yourself. Masks also protect others, and if both you and others have masks, you are doubly protected.
> Get vaccinated and boosted.
Yes
> Airline travel is one of the most common ways people get infected.
Are you sure about that? Do you have sources? From what I've seen Airline travel is surprisingly not that bad. From a late 2020 study, bars and clubs are the worst, followed by restaurants, followed by gyms and churches, I don't know if it is still the case.
> Even switching to non-recycled air...
Recycled air goes through HEPA filters, which are much more efficient than even N95 masks. Intuitively I'd say that we should have more recycled air, to trap as many virus particles as possible in these filters instead of having them linger around the cabin.
> Dining is generally safe as long as there's a decent distance between tables
It is more complicated than that and it depends a lot on air currents. I wouldn't consider dining indoors as "safe". Not something worth panicking about, and in general, I don't think it is worth going beyond the official recommendations, but if you are high risk, I would avoid it.
I think a lot of the debate comes from the fact that in many countries we have freedom of choice in how we want to live our lives.
So, what’s your goal? To not get COVID? To not die from COVID? To not transmit COVID? To follow government / health organization guidance? To enjoy your life as you see fit? To find a balance between these goals?
Depending on your goal, different information will be relevant to your decision making process.
Personal ethics and the tradeoffs they imply aren't very fungible :)
I would like to become informed by balanced debate as to roughly "this choice is better for X but worse for Y" so that I can decide for myself if I care more about X or Y and in what ratio.
- Governments are very bad at what they're supposed to do. Pandemic diseases are close to certain, but no government was adequately prepared. We got mixed messages and panicked response. On the other hand we got a vaccine in about a year, which is a record short time.
- People have different sets of values and interpret information differently. That's always the case, we just have to live with that and try to respect each other.
- Vaccines are the best protection. Sometimes they have side-effects. They are never 100%. Covering the mouth and nose and avoiding other people can work too -- ancient people figured that out.
Almost everyone I know, vaccinated or not, masking and distancing or not, has got infected, myself included. Short of avoiding all human contact we can't reduce the risk of infection to zero.
Figure out how much risk you can tolerate and act accordingly.
I'm less equipped to understand the following question: to what extent can people more vulnerable than myself protect themselves by their own choices (and should therefore have the burden on them to make those choices as they see fit), and to what extent do my choices deprive others of being able to protect themselves and now I'm morally on the hook for someone else's outcome?
A lot of people make the argument that extreme low-vulnerability people like e.g. myself have a lot of influence on life or death stakes outcomes for the more vulnerable and are therefore morally responsible for doing some set of things. I’d like to understand how clear the science is on that argument because I neither want to endanger people because I can’t be bothered to make some sacrifices, nor do I want to live in infinite crisis mode if it makes no difference anyways. I’d like to use numbers to guide that decision.
All evidence tells us that COVID is highly contagious. If we want to avoid catching it, and to avoid spreading it to others, we need to take steps to prevent infection (vaccination) and staying out of range of everyone. We can't tell at a glance if someone in a store or restaurant is more vulnerable or not (well, maybe based on their apparent age), or if they're "smart", or if they've been vaccinated. I hear debates about how effective masks are, but I choose to wear a mask because it's a minor inconvenience and probably protects me and other people more than not wearing a mask. Knowing the exact percentage of effectiveness (science: inconclusive) doesn't really matter, I assume it's non-zero.
COVID is not likely going away, so the only way to eliminate your own risk and the risk of infecting others is to completely isolate, forever. If that's not an option then you take whatever active precautions you can to avoid getting infected and to avoid possibly spreading the infection. I'm not sure what you could do beyond that or what "set of things" you might feel morally obligated to do. Lecturing and hectoring people to get vaccinations and wear masks hasn't really worked.
When the COVID outbreak started I took smart person Nassim Taleb's advice. When you see an avalanche coming you don't wait for the science to measure the speed, mass, and direction of the snow -- you run. Assume the virus is highly contagious, anyone can spread it, everyone is vulnerable, and act accordingly.
As one struggling with Long Covid, I think it is important to be aware of its existence as a small, but non-zero outcome of catching Covid, no matter the variant. I've been effectively disabled from any physical activity more than going to the grocery store since March 2020. Some people have it far, far worse.
Being stuck at home, not being able to focus, or do things has been really hard on my self esteem, and I'm worried about our long term financial future as a family.
Many of the symptoms of long flu -- bacterial infections, pneumonia, ear infections -- are things we have treatments for, but don't make easily available to people who can't afford insurance or medical care. I think Americans are mostly aware that our health care system fails a large portion of the population, so focusing on individual conditions seems somewhat futile.
For me it was a revelation to realize that I don't have to care. Just follow the main regulations and get vaccinated, but don't spend brain cycles on something that you have no impact over.
I don't always agree with TWiV on their personal views which they make clear are their own opinions on public policy and own choices about day to day activities (and the hosts don't always agree with each other either), but they are a terrific weekly updated resource coming directly from virologists.
Thank you!
I cut my hand a few years back with metal and they said I needed a tetanus shot, I took it. I have no idea what was in that or what potential disease I would get if I didn't take it. Granted that is not something that I could spread to others (I assume, again 0 research). I just trusted medical professionals.
Look at your local covid-19 metrics for number of cases, number of ICU beds, number of deaths and if there is a surge happening make decisions based on that. Surges appear to take 2-3 weeks to pass in an area and are commonly linked to holidays.
Other than that, ask your physician about boosters. There isn't much more to be informed about that is practical/actionable to everyday life.
Example links:
https://www.cebm.net/oxford-covid-19-evidence-service/
https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/commentisfree/2021/n...
Not saying they should be all of your reading, just that they are worth adding to your list.
Thank you!
- Don't take advice from the comment section, ever. This includes this very sentence. It also includes HN, reddit, discord, gab, tiktok, prodigy, random podcasters, random math blogs... basically don't listen to anyone who doesn't have direct, meaningful accountability from thou.
- Any smooth-talking non-practicing dumbass Ph.D. in some tangential field can get a decent-enough steaming setup to spread their uninformed opinions as they please. The best of them with the smoothest voices can probably even get a decent number of patrons and other funders for their chicanery, get on podcasts and programs, whatever. They make content where such a person claims that some undefined, proverbial "They" are lying to "us" and that "we" need to do exactly x to thwart "Them". Anyone using this sort of language without clearly defining the perpetrators and victims are not serious, and can be ignored with prejudice. [1^]
- On reading scientific papers and education: You'll likely need a Master's[2^] level of understanding to meaningfully interpret published papers (much less pre-prints). Dr. Dumbass probably doesn't actually know much more about this subject than you, but if they're a few chapters ahead of you they can probably sound pretty convincing to a student.
- Conjecture: in any sufficiently large community of people, a Dr. Dumbass can be found. If true, say community X hates community Y. A member of X can like find Dr. Dumbasses in group Y and compile these statements into a shitty meme in an attempt to convince members of X that members of Y are less rational than they actually are. Such a member can make a big wallpaper image of Dr. Dumbass's crankery, but then mix in a few contextless posts from the hypothetical actually legitimate Dr. Goodfaith to pretend that Dr. Dumbass and Dr. Goodfaith are similarly fraudulent. I've casually called this the "adjacency fallacy" but there's probably a better term for it.
- Members in community Y can in-turn repost the shitty and fallacious memes created by some rando in community X, and claim without merit that it evidence that all members of community X are delusional. This leads to a tumult of angry comments, upon which some members of X repost in their communities and claim their sense of victimhood. Some members of Y do the same, creating a feedback loop where the two communities cease to discuss the primary topic any more, and instead spend more time complaining about other people complaining as a form of anger-pornography. Similar principles can be derived for political pundits, podcasters, streamers, who spend hours of their day practically screaming into their microphones about the horrors of "something". Stay away from the karma farmers who sow this sort of nonsense far and wide.
- For overall reasoning skills, I greatly enjoyed Douglas Walton's "Informal Logic: A Pragmatic Approach". My big takeaway from the book was that "logical fallacies" are not inherent argumentative traps which must be avoided at all cost. Rather, these sorts of arguments become fallacies when there is an unwarranted dialectic shift in the type of argument. For example, if you were debating a topic and your opponent brandishes a gun to compel you to agree with them, that is clearly not a valid argument. If instead this were a hostage negotiation, their threats of violence can be considered valid. The fallacy wasn't the threat to violence, rather the fallacy was the shift from a "debate" to a "negotiation". Some of the most frustrating arguments I've read online are those where one or both users are more intent on shifting the dialectic to suit their existing arguments rather than to truly learn from others and seek consensus. Identifying dialectic shifts IMO is...