Covid-19 (Coronavirus)

[Deleted member 619]

The problem I have is I dont know of anyone who has died from covid19.

No, the problem is that you have no idea of how statistical distribution works. You're lucky to live in a country that has a scientifically literate head of state, and one that has developed a reputation for efficiency and attention to detail. Given that I know German very, very well (lived there as a child and toured it extensively as an adult), I know that this reputation is not unearned.

As a result, you've managed one of the lowest CFRs of any developed nation, which is pretty impressive for a populous, landlocked country.

As of today, Germany has experienced an infection rate of 4.4% (my own BOTE calculations extrapolated from the Worldometers figures) and a CFR of 2.42%, which is pretty impressive when compared to most nations.

Why does this matter? Because the result is that there have been fewer than 90K deaths in a population of ~84 million. If we distribute those deaths naïvely, we get an average distance of slightly less than 4 kilometres between deaths. Now, that is naïve, because infection doesn't distribute in the same way. In particular, infection clusters around nodes (basic epidemiology, this), and deaths will always tend to be concentrated in those nodes so, unless you live very close to one of the nodes, you're not incredibly likely to know anybody personally who's died from it. That's just the nature of statistics.

Not only that but I don't know anyone who is friend or relative of someone who has died from corona. Of course if I knew 6 people who died from it, I would feel differently. How can I be arrogant if my choices are influenced by my environment?

You're arrogant because your choices are solely driven by your own experience and,. as we've noted, data is not the plural of anecdote.

 

[Deleted member 619]

He is not completly wrong though hack.

He is, I'm afraid.

That you and me are alife, is good evidence that there have been no highly contagious, deadly, airborne diseases yet, since that would have wiped humanity off the face of the earth.

Except that there have been many highly contagious, deadly, airborne diseases (once again going to point out that, thus far, SARS-CoV-2 has not yet been discovered to be airborne under traditional definitions of the term). If you think that this should have wiped us out, then we still have far to go.


Measles, for example, is a highly contagious, deadly, airborne virus. It's been around for centuries, and it hasn't yet wiped us out.

 

[Deleted member 619]

I would say yes this counts. I guess hackenslash and Ness would say it counts for nothing because its anecdotal. I think that is truely assholish behavoir on web forum. They are cowards.

Fuck you, and the equine quadruped that propelled thee hence. What an utterly cuntish thing to put in somebody else's mouth, you measly, dishonest little cunt.

You want to talk about fucking cowardice to me?

 

[Deleted member 619]

Can we say that I count? My mother's best friend, and my girlfriend's aunt both died due to complications resulting from covid-19. My girlfriend also worked in an ICU, and I've had to watch her collapse emotionally from the stress of having to work in garbage bag clothes and explain to families that she can't get them a final moment with a dying loved one because she has two other dying patients she has to deal with.

But this all comes back to everyone's criticisms concerning your habit of extrapolating about the nature of the world based on your own narrow perception of it.

Dude.

 

[Deleted member 619]

Any historian can cite dozens over dozens of outbreaks over the course of history and the responses to them, especially if he is specialized in medievil times. And most importantly, can tell you what worked and what did not. We have been dealing with Cholera, Small Pox, Measles etc. for thousands of years now and taken many different approaches to deal with it.

And none of them are the approach we'd take today, nor could we learn anything of significant value in dealing with future epidemics, because this world is not that world. We're in a totally different KIND of landscape now when it comes to aetiology and epidemiology, because we have the confluence of worldwide rapid mass transit and a mobile population, and we have modern medicine.

If we model our responses on any of those in the past, it will not go well for us.

 

[Deleted member 619]

What else are you expecting from a bad faith actor?

I'm beginning to see the light.

 

[Deleted member 42253]

And none of them are the approach we'd take today, nor could we learn anything of significant value in dealing with future epidemics, because this world is not that world. We're in a totally different KIND of landscape now when it comes to aetiology and epidemiology, because we have the confluence of worldwide rapid mass transit and a mobile population, and we have modern medicine.

Thats actually exactly what we are doing, shut down travel, close down borders, quarantine the infected, shut down public life.
Thats basically the medievil winning strategy. Should just have been a bit quicker and more brutal about it.
Not suggesting not to adjust it a bit .. I mean, shutting down air travel in the whole world, is a no brainer. Well, maybe they ll do it next time.
Now that we got the vaccine and at least somewhat effective treatment methods, we can start to transition to a, more modern approach. At least in the countries that can.

You see, one of the big problems with the pandemic, was, that lots of countries tried to reinvent the wheel. Pinning their hopes on cell phone apps(that failed miserably), trying new approaches like Sweden and the UK did with their herd immunity nonsense(which failed spectacular) and even test and trace did not really work out in most countries.

We already have time tested, robust measures to deal with pandemics and are using them year after year with Ebola outbreaks for example. And honestly? There is nothing modern about them.

 

[Deleted member 619]

trying new approaches like Sweden and the UK did with their herd immunity nonsense

Not sure what you mean by this. I can't tell whether you mean that herd immunity is nonsense or that the UK officially did something as an attempt to achieve it.

Neither of these is true. Herd immunity can only be achieved in two ways; with vaccines or with a fuckton of dead people. If anybody was doing that stupid infection party bullshit, it was never any part of an official response and it was never going to work, because the morons who suggested it don't understand herd immunity.

Not sure what you're talking about with ebola, as it's never reached beyond local epidemic status. There's a reason for that, and it's exactly nothing to do with how we respond to it. The reasons we've never had a broader outbreak of ebola are that a) the region from which ebola stems is not one that very many people travel to and from, b) transmission is by direct contact with bodily fluids, and c) it has a short incubation period and high mortality rate (varying between 25% and 90%, dependent on the particular strain plus environmental conditions). This makes ebola unlikely to travel very far, easy to isolate once identified, and easy to quarantine against.

That's why we don't see an ebola pandemic. It's has very little to do with good management, and more to do with the aetiology and epidemiology of that specific disease.

 

[Deleted member 42253]

Yeah, the UK and Sweden tried the "fuckton of dead people" approach.
Sweden officially .. the UK most likely accidental thanks to complete incompetence. And yes, at least the UK definitely did not understand what herd immunity normally means(You only achieve that by vaccination, as far as humans are concerned, since everything else would be completly amoral and vile).

Sweden wised up quickly though, after comparing their numbers of dead with the neighboring countries(They beat them by factor 5-10), that did not go with the "hands off" approach.

You really missed when that was raging in the media? At least for the UK, its in the news all over again, thanks to the "Cummings revelations" from a couple of days ago. But they were actually talking about herd immunity live on air in the early days of the pandemic over on old blighty.


On the topic of the lab leak bs ....

WHO asks for re-checks of research on when coronavirus first surfaced in Italy

Samples from a study suggesting the coronavirus was circulating outside China by October 2019 have been re-tested at the World Health Organization's (WTO) request, two scientists who led the Italian research said.

www.reuters.com

Looks like Corona surfaced much earlier in Italy. Which completly throws the lab leak idea out of the window.

 

[Deleted member 619]

I just checked, and it appears you're right. I was pretty much out of the world during the early days of the outbreak.

What a bunch of absolute fucking muppets. I do note that they were vociferously warned against this asininity by scientists and medical professionals.

I spotted a piece that says that herd immunity will be achieved within days from a couple of weeks ago. That's exactly the sort of shoddy bullshit that manifests in more deaths than we should have. herd immunity is itself a variable per disease. The estimate for herd immunity for COVID19 is around 90%, and we aren't even close to that.

 

[Deleted member 42253]

Yeah, made me lose faith in humanity .. well, not that there was much left.

You get how frustrating it is, seeing something like that unfolding live in the media without being able to scream some sense into the gobshytes?

Btw. you can trust me, I am no one suspicous and usually right 70% of the time. 30% chance I am wrong about that though.

 

[Dragan Glas]

Greetings,

I can understand you. The problem I have is I dont know of anyone who has died from covid19. Not only that but I don't know anyone who is friend or relative of someone who has died from corona. Of course if I knew 6 people who died from it, I would feel differently. How can I be arrogant if my choices are influenced by my environment?

If I remember correctly, Led, you said that your partner works in a hospital?!

Hasn't she told you of anyone dying from the virus?

Kindest regards

James

 

[Sparhafoc]

Herd immunity can only be achieved in two ways; with vaccines or with a fuckton of dead people.

Yeah, this shit annoyed the fuck out of me - coming from all the typical sources, both famous and infamous.

Jamest, for example, thought this was a swell idea. As long as he's alright, Jack. Not sure whether anyone would be alright once the bodies started piling up.

 

[Deleted member 619]

Oh, and incidentally, news now that the Indian 'delta' strain of the vaccine has a transmissibility coefficient somewhere between 30 and 100% greater than that of the original strain, is more severe and at least partially vaccine-resistant.


Christina Pagel is the director of the clinical operation research unit at UCL.

THIS, all else aside, is why we still need to wear masks. Every new transmission increases the likelihood of new strains, and each new strain increases the probability of an entirely vaccine-resistant and even more virulent strain.

This is far from over.,

 

[Deleted member 619]

Yeah, this shit annoyed the fuck out of me - coming from all the typical sources, both famous and infamous.

Jamest, for example, thought this was a swell idea. As long as he's alright, Jack. Not sure whether anyone would be alright once the bodies started piling up.

A part of me is glad I was incommunicado at the time.

 

[Deleted member 619]

 

[Led Zeppelin]

I think it's even more fucking stupid that you think I did that.

 

[Deleted member 619]

If you have an objection, be brave and voice it.

Do you think I actually said the preposterous thing you attribute to me?

Go on, it won't hurt you. I'm a coward, remember.


Edited to add: I'm going to withdraw this. I did say something that could be construed as having said that. You'd have to be treating it pretty dishonestly, which is not a surprise, but I withdraw anyway. I'll leave the comment as it is for posterity's sake. There are plenty of other issues to deal with.

 

[Led Zeppelin]

No, the problem is that you have no idea of how statistical distribution works. You're lucky to live in a country that has a scientifically literate head of state, and one that has developed a reputation for efficiency and attention to detail. Given that I know German very, very well (lived there as a child and toured it extensively as an adult), I know that this reputation is not unearned.

I guess you are probably right.

You're arrogant because your choices are solely driven by your own experience and,. as we've noted, data is not the plural of anecdote.

This is right also. I am sure that if I was in charge of controlling a pandemic, it would end in catastrophe.

 

[Led Zeppelin]

More assertions. Got anything to back it up?

It would be against the law. What are the hell are you thinking? You can decide for yourself if I am telling you the truth or if I am a psychopath who is telling you lies because I want everyone to die.