General > General Technical Chat
Covid 19 virus
Mr. Scram:
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on March 25, 2020, 12:48:50 pm ---This is called "appeal to authority", and is utterly stupid here, because everyone here has looked at what WHO and other expert groups have to say. The fact that some others have reached a different conclusion than you, in a really complex matter, does not mean that you are now officially representing WHO and have understood everything they say 100% correctly. You can agree to disagree, but laughing at others like you are some magical God of the True Information sent by WHO not only makes you look stupid, it's detrimental to the quality of discussion. Maybe just drop it? No need to run in circles for pages after pages.
--- End quote ---
Posts here show that people very blatantly haven't looked at or understand what the WHO is saying or why. Pointing at what they say in conjunction with other evidence and sources isn't an appeal to authority, it's corroborating the story. If you're going to make claims which differ from the leading institution you not only better make bloody sure you know what you're talking about, but also prove it beyond doubt. You do understand that risky behaviour gets people killed in a very literal sense? Good intentions kill people all the same. Dropping it because people can't accept their gut feeling doesn't jive with the best evidence we have isn't an option. This isn't an inclusivity club.
engrguy42:
paulca, I like your idea of a "when this is over" register. Probably want to include all the self proclaimed experts who sit on their butts commenting on stuff they know nothing about, solely to boost their own egos, rather than getting off their arses and taking a lesson from the UK. I'm hoping the US follows suit. Then people like me can get off their arses and do something useful.
Thanks for the breath of fresh air.
Siwastaja:
Pieces of status from Finland:
The government "seems" to take this corona thing quite seriously, but acting still slowly.
Media has focused on the fact that Sweden seems to lag behind on the actions even worse than Finland. While this seems to be true, the race to see who's the worst and who's the second worst isn't what we should be doing right now. Both Finland and Sweden are repeating the footsteps of Italy. Let's back this up by looking at three example countries which have approximately the same number of infections per capita,
Finland 154 cases / 1M people:
schools still partially open (all 1st to 3rd graders); restaurants, bars, etc. still allowed to fully operate; police still stands behind their statement that they have no means (by law) or will to enforce the limitations of people gathering. So we are basically still relying on "suggestions", and people doing "the right things" on their own. Which, of course, works to some extent.
USA 166 cases / 1M people
or, Germany 406 cases / 1M people (known to test more easily, hence showing higher number of verified infections, compared to Finland for example):
large scale curfews, travel restrictions, schools actually closed wherever necessary, restaurants, bars completely closed or heavily limited (for example, by how many customers can go in at once).
The response in Finland is clearly lacking behind compared to our peers. Though, it seems, we are quite content with the fact Sweden is lacking even more. (Just to make sure no one misunderstands, I don't share this joy.)
Now, the government has decided to close the restaurant and bars, actually they have already talked about it for over a week. On Monday came the preliminary information that the restaurants would be finally closed on Tuesday (yesterday). Yesterday, we were informed that "if everything goes perfectly well", the restaurants "may be closed as soon as Saturday", and all this delay is because of doing everything "by the book", including the multi-step legal process (which can be only accelerated to certain extent). Note, there is 100% agreement about having to implement these limitations, shared by the government, and the opposition. Opposition is supporting the government and demanding them to work faster.
Last weekend, Finland brought 2500 Finnish tourists home from Spain. To the surprise of everyone, no quarantine, no medical control. People were given a piece of paper with a suggestion of staying home "if possible". Instead, the reporters witnessed these high-risk people from the worst hit areas get into crowded buses, and head to restaurants to have some coffee. This is seen as alarming because many of these people live outside the most hit Helsinki Uusimaa region; outside this region, the number of cases are still fairly low.
The government is actually "planning" on isolating the Helsinki Uusimaa region, so for the first time, activating some real travel restrictions inside Finland. Sadly, it seems this is coming a bit too late, as well; the numbers outside the Helsinki region are rising already (and there is the 2-week delay between infection, and detection). Bringing in the tourists from Spain just before the isolation of the Helsinki area naturally does not help. Legal experts have (correctly, AFAIK) stated that the current state of emergency law does allow the government to isolate the Helsinki area any minute with no legal issues. Yet, planning to do exactly this has continued for almost a week now. It may happen today or tomorrow, we are hopeful.
We are clearly acting very poorly here, but it must be noted we are likely not the very worst offenders. Indeed, it seems Sweden is doing even worse. This argument is used to suppress critique; people are still quite happy how the government is doing. Many actually think that the actions are stronger than elsewhere, and "too" strong. We do see news from Italy and Spain, but not very much; I guess people still won't understand how serious this disease actually is, and how strong the actions in most other countries actually are.
nctnico:
--- Quote from: dunkemhigh on March 25, 2020, 12:51:18 pm ---In general it's not a case of knowing better (or not). If one's intuition suggests one thing and expert advice suggests another, shouldn't one try to find out why there is that difference?
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This is exactly what the WHO does! They look at the research and information from all the experts from different countries and base the information they supply on that. As usual truth is what the majority thinks is right but I rather follow advice resulting from balancing many different opinions than that of a limited group of people (government advisors included).
Mr. Scram:
--- Quote from: engrguy42 on March 25, 2020, 01:30:56 pm ---paulca, I like your idea of a "when this is over" register. Probably want to include all the self proclaimed experts who sit on their butts commenting on stuff they know nothing about, solely to boost their own egos, rather than getting off their arses and taking a lesson from the UK. I'm hoping the US follows suit. Then people like me can get off their arses and do something useful.
Thanks for the breath of fresh air.
--- End quote ---
Careful now, you don't want to keep tripping over those passive aggressive assumptions.
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