General > General Technical Chat
Working From Home - Impacts of Coronavirus
<< < (266/447) > >>
Nusa:

--- Quote from: jeffheath on May 13, 2020, 04:13:08 am ---I think Dave had a good point when he said "there's no control group." It's impossible for me to think of how the U.S. should have handled this, when there's nothing to compare it to. The U.S. has never actually tackled a disease this dangerous before. I guess it's better to have a bunch of poor people than a bunch of dead people.

--- End quote ---

Plenty to compare it to. CV19 isn't over yet, but so far we haven't even come close to the death toll from the 1918 pandemic (675,000 US, 50 million worldwide). Remember the US population at the time was a bit over 100 million, so that's a pretty significant death ratio....at least 6000 per million.

If you want more recent, at least within my lifetime, the 1957 and 1968 pandemics each killed at least 100,000 in the US. CV19 has the potential to beat that, but isn't there yet.

And the 2009 one on Obama's watch, which turned out to be wimpy (only 13K died) compared to Covid19, but one doesn't know that beforehand. Which is why Obama left pandemic playbooks and human resources for the Trump administration. Which were then eliminated, shelved, ignored, and the still-working warning systems were attributed to political action rather than actual danger.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/basics/past-pandemics.html

Those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. While not always true, there's a lot of truth in that saying.
paulca:

--- Quote from: jeffheath on May 13, 2020, 04:13:08 am ---I think Dave had a good point when he said "there's no control group."

--- End quote ---

There are many small "control groups".  Places like care homes, ships, island communities.  There was the aircraft carrier parked in Japan.  You can't do lock down on a navy ship.
SilverSolder:

--- Quote from: thinkfat on May 12, 2020, 03:40:10 pm ---
--- Quote from: cdev on May 12, 2020, 02:56:34 pm ---It just seems to me like we may be ignoring a substance with great potential to help people.

--- End quote ---

It is of no consequence on the grand scale if the few us here ignore it. I do wonder, very much so, what drives your insistence in this being the right forum for shilling grape seed and red wine.

--- End quote ---

Personally, I don't need much convincing that red wine is good for you!  :D
cdev:
Apart from the epidemiology, the financial issue is what is the most problematic for people.

They can't evict everybody.  I think they should freeze all bills relating to housing (mortgages and rents and similar) At least for small landlords and low income tenants. (Because it's an unprecedented situation)

in a freeze for both tenants and landlords. Because in many areas, people just dont have the money. Many small landlords may be in a similar situation too, financially. The rent is the big one for many people, and landlords often have substantial ongoing bills too. Small landlords are the people who rent to most "small" tenants and more often than not they are not evil people they are just small businesspeoople. Some are bad landlords, but there are not so many of them, unfortunately, the ones that exist,, cause a lot of problems.

They should just freeze those bills for the duration, not eliminate them, not have a balloon payment either. That is the most fair to everybody and doesn't put the taxpayers on the line for the money either. That way a few months is tacked on at the end of the mortgage or similar. And they cannot evict people for nonpayment, nor is a big lump sum due as soon as the emergency ends. Similar with healthcare bills. (health insurance co pays and deductibles, which can be huge). People should also remember that once foreign corporations are involved in anything, (foreign banks, which may have invested here anticipating lots of foreclosures, really! Or foreign health insurers. The government is only allowed to pay these bills in a bona-fide emergency because of trade policy! A very very dumb trade policy. All that talk about Medicare for all, could only happen after we pulled out of that agreement. Otherwise, healthcare policy can only go one way. towards privatization and less govt involvement and more globalization.)


--- Quote from: Nusa on May 13, 2020, 05:35:25 am ---
--- Quote from: jeffheath on May 13, 2020, 04:13:08 am ---I think Dave had a good point when he said "there's no control group." It's impossible for me to think of how the U.S. should have handled this, when there's nothing to compare it to. The U.S. has never actually tackled a disease this dangerous before. I guess it's better to have a bunch of poor people than a bunch of dead people.

--- End quote ---

Plenty to compare it to. CV19 isn't over yet, but so far we haven't even come close to the death toll from the 1918 pandemic (675,000 US, 50 million worldwide). Remember the US population at the time was a bit over 100 million, so that's a pretty significant death ratio....at least 6000 per million.

If you want more recent, at least within my lifetime, the 1957 and 1968 pandemics each killed at least 100,000 in the US. CV19 has the potential to beat that, but isn't there yet.

And the 2009 one on Obama's watch, which turned out to be wimpy (only 13K died) compared to Covid19, but one doesn't know that beforehand. Which is why Obama left pandemic playbooks and human resources for the Trump administration. Which were then eliminated, shelved, ignored, and the still-working warning systems were attributed to political action rather than actual danger.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/basics/past-pandemics.html

Those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. While not always true, there's a lot of truth in that saying.

--- End quote ---

Amen. Lets not forget, this right now is likely only the "Herald wave" with the big epidemic coming next year, next flu season, at least thats how it worked with influenza.
cdev:
There is no guide to how to minimize death and injury. We're figuring it out as we go along. So we should try to keep people on track. And realize that contact tracing and improving hygeine is where we need to get better. I personally think that if we want large workplaces to reopen, we have to wait until we have a means of preventing large scale illness. Because here in the US, in low wage industries, large numbers of poor people will die if we send them back to work in those kinds of businesses. Because they are too close to one another. Also ventilation needs to be examined in a lot of settings. Heating and cooling systems that recycle stale air will need to be replaced by fresh air ventilation. They should also freeze LNG export because its the only affordable energy source for that. We were lucky because the winter was abnormally warm and of course, COVID-19 basically eliinated the biggest consumers needs for the late winter and spring this year and probably reduced needs for the next as well, but that is not going to last forever, but the lack of business this year might mean that the winters will get colder. Nobody knows where energy prices will end up but we have to be aware, exporting LNG means substantially higher energy prices if everything else remained the same. And natural gas is the way most Americans heat and cook, electricity is much more expensive and likely to get more if the price of gas rises a lot. (The EIA projections say it will track natural gas prices) Millions of buildings are not insulated well enough for a permanent spike in gas prices. Especially not if there is a requirement for more, powered ventilation. They will need energy retrofits and landlords are going to be keen to raise rents and replace tenants -eliminating rent control. That adds up to a major housing problem for the US, especially large cities with lots of postwar multiunit housing. We cant handle that all right now, it would be a sucker punch to the poor to force them to find new housing in the midst of all this.



--- Quote from: paulca on May 13, 2020, 07:33:41 am ---
--- Quote from: jeffheath on May 13, 2020, 04:13:08 am ---I think Dave had a good point when he said "there's no control group."

--- End quote ---

There are many small "control groups".  Places like care homes, ships, island communities.  There was the aircraft carrier parked in Japan.  You can't do lock down on a navy ship.

--- End quote ---
Navigation
Message Index
Next page
Previous page
There was an error while thanking
Thanking...

Go to full version
Powered by SMFPacks Advanced Attachments Uploader Mod