At what point did you / will you take the coronavirus epidemic seriously?

[Omaha 680]

Sweden's Relaxed Approach to the Coronavirus Could Already Be Backfiring

https://time.com/5817412/sweden-coronavirus/

"Sweden has a relatively high case fatality rate: as of April 8, 7.68% of the Swedes who have tested positive for COVID-19 have died of the virus. Neighboring countries, like Norway and Denmark, have case fatality rates of 1.46% and 3.85% respectively. (The U.S. case fatality rate is 3.21%.) While Sweden’s elevated case fatality rate could be a result of its low testing rates compared to its neighbors, experts say Sweden’s laissez-faire approach could also be to blame."

Could be a result of low testing? It almost surely is. Sweden is middle of the pack in Europe for deaths per capita so far. If not performing strict lockdowns is sure to lead to mass death and overwhelming of the system, surely they would be spiking by now. It's almost as if every population is unique and there is not a one size fits all solution.

Maybe Sweden will still be a disaster. But it will provide a very interesting counterfactual argument if they turn out ok.

[CardiacCoug]

Would be cool if we continue a counter of deaths from heart disease every day on CNN. Every day in big numbers you could have 1700 DEATHS, 1800 DEATHS every day and then slowly climb to 700,000 over the course of the year.

I totally agree with closing schools and especially closing church but people are crazy if they don’t think losing your job, losing health insurance, etc doesn’t ultimately also lead to tens of thousands of early deaths. I think at this point my vote would be to not resume schools until the fall but to resume most other normal life activities sometime in mid-May.

[Pelado]

Would be cool if we continue a counter of deaths from heart disease every day on CNN. Every day in big numbers you could have 1700 DEATHS, 1800 DEATHS every day and then slowly climb to 700,000 over the course of the year.

I totally agree with closing schools and especially closing church but people are crazy if they don’t think losing your job, losing health insurance, etc doesn’t ultimately also lead to tens of thousands of early deaths. I think at this point my vote would be to not resume schools until the fall but to resume most other normal life activities sometime in mid-May.

Not reopening the schools will cause more fatalities than COVID-19. Kids and parents were never intended to spend this much time together.

[Uncle Ted]

How do you tell how many people are infected in a community with out testing everyone? Easy, just take a look at their crap:

Coronavirus traces found in Massachusetts wastewater at levels far higher than expected

Coronavirus was detected in Massachusetts sewage at higher levels than expected, suggesting there are many more undiagnosed patients than previously known, according to a new study.
[...]
The researchers, along with a team from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, analyzed the samples and found the number of coronavirus particles was on par with if there were 2,300 people infected with the virus.

But at the time of tests, there were only 446 confirmed cases in the region, according to the study.
[...]

https://nypost.com/2020/04/09/corona...ts-wastewater/

[Jeff Lebowski]

Would be cool if we continue a counter of deaths from heart disease every day on CNN. Every day in big numbers you could have 1700 DEATHS, 1800 DEATHS every day and then slowly climb to 700,000 over the course of the year.

I totally agree with closing schools and especially closing church but people are crazy if they don’t think losing your job, losing health insurance, etc doesn’t ultimately also lead to tens of thousands of early deaths. I think at this point my vote would be to not resume schools until the fall but to resume most other normal life activities sometime in mid-May.

Yes, some kinds of death rates go up, but others go down. It is weird.

This is one of the best articles on it I have found.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00210-0

In 1922, a pair of sociologists at New York’s Columbia University were poring over 50 years of US economic and mortality data, when they noticed a surprising result. Lean times in the country’s history didn’t correspond with more deaths, as they expected. In fact, the opposite was true. More people — babies included — died when the economy prospered1.

William Ogburn and Dorothy Thomas were sceptical enough to delve further. Would accounting for a possible lag in time between the downturn and the rise in deaths change the outcome? Or perhaps deaths had simply been recorded more rigorously during boom times? No, and no. Their peculiar finding seemed to hold.

Even numbers from the global financial crisis of the late 2000s follow suit. José Tapia Granados, a health economist at Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has calculated that death rates in Europe dropped faster during this downturn, known as the Great Recession, than before the crisis hit. The trend held even in his birth country of Spain, where unemployment topped 20%.

“Everyone was expecting a strong increase in mortality. Again, it was the opposite,” he says. Now he calls the link between recessions and lowered death rates, “almost as strong as the evidence that cigarette smoking is bad for health”.

Disclaimer for SU: I AM NOT SAYING RECESSIONS ARE GOOD!

EDIT: This phenomenon seems to hold for wealthy countries, not poor countries.

[SeattleUte]

Could be a result of low testing? It almost surely is. Sweden is middle of the pack in Europe for deaths per capita so far. If not performing strict lockdowns is sure to lead to mass death and overwhelming of the system, surely they would be spiking by now. It's almost as if every population is unique and there is not a one size fits all solution.

Maybe Sweden will still be a disaster. But it will provide a very interesting counterfactual argument if they turn out ok.

There was going to be a spike anywhere, because China was lying about it and it was circulating for months before people started being careful. Denmark residents are taking precautions. They’re just not locked down.

It’s dismaying to see the transparent glee evinced by some as Denmark’s deaths (predictably) increase.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I found out from a client today that some dickhead at his wife's place of employment was coming into work all of last week with a fever. Sure enough he had the Corona, they found out last Thursday. Yesterday or today a second employee tested positive.

When I think about this lockdown, I've tended to think about the virus as some hidden thing lurking with asymptomatic people. But an equally large problem are the assholes like this employee who showed up for days spreading this around in an enclosed environment that has about 50 people around at any given time.

[tooblue]

Could be a result of low testing? It almost surely is. Sweden is middle of the pack in Europe for deaths per capita so far. If not performing strict lockdowns is sure to lead to mass death and overwhelming of the system, surely they would be spiking by now. It's almost as if every population is unique and there is not a one size fits all solution.

Maybe Sweden will still be a disaster. But it will provide a very interesting counterfactual argument if they turn out ok.

What happens if this virus is similar to the flu in that it returns year after year and the whole notion of herd immunity is pointless?

Frankly, Sweden isn't turning out OK. Their death rate is 7.68% and the economy is being controlled more and more by the government and not capitalism. The Swedish government is offering the same types of stimulus packages as other countries:

https://www.government.se/government...-for-covid-19/

Why, because the epidemic will have a terrible effect on an economy regardless.

[Omaha 680]

What happens if this virus is similar to the flu in that it returns year after year and the whole notion of herd immunity is pointless?

Frankly, Sweden isn't turning out OK. Their death rate is 7.68% and the economy is being controlled more and more by the government and not capitalism. The Swedish government is offering the same types of stimulus packages as other countries:

https://www.government.se/government...-for-covid-19/

Why, because the epidemic will have a terrible effect on an economy regardless.

Their death rate is not 7.68% and it's weird to insist that. Their system is currently not being overwhelmed (I'm not insisting it won't be), so what would be the reason for them to have a higher death rate rate then their neighbors at this point? Because they aren't locked down? Does the virus know that and get offended so it attacks swedes more aggressively? I don't know if this will backfire on them or not but proponents of long term lockdowns seem to insist they know it will even though there is no firm evidence of that yet.

I looked up their stimulus because I was curious. Without getting bogged down by details, it is not on the same planet as what we are doing...especially since there are many in congress who want double or triple what we have already spent.

[SeattleUte]

Their death rate is not 7.68% and it's weird to insist that. Their system is currently not being overwhelmed (I'm not insisting it won't be), so what would be the reason for them to have a higher death rate rate then their neighbors at this point? Because they aren't locked down? Does the virus know that and get offended so it attacks swedes more aggressively? I don't know if this will backfire on them or not but proponents of long term lockdowns seem to insist they know it will even though there is no firm evidence of that yet.

I looked up their stimulus because I was curious. Without getting bogged down by details, it is not on the same planet as what we are doing...especially since there are many in congress who want double or triple what we have already spent.

Their death per confirmed case rate is 6.56 percent. That’s not the death rate, you are correct.

[tooblue]

Their death rate is not 7.68% and it's weird to insist that. Their system is currently not being overwhelmed (I'm not insisting it won't be), so what would be the reason for them to have a higher death rate rate then their neighbors at this point? Because they aren't locked down? Does the virus know that and get offended so it attacks swedes more aggressively? I don't know if this will backfire on them or not but proponents of long term lockdowns seem to insist they know it will even though there is no firm evidence of that yet.

I looked up their stimulus because I was curious. Without getting bogged down by details, it is not on the same planet as what we are doing...especially since there are many in congress who want double or triple what we have already spent.

Per the linked article in Time magazine: "Sweden has a relatively high case fatality rate: as of April 8, 7.68% of the Swedes who have tested positive for COVID-19 have died of the virus." There is not ambiguity there. Again, per the linked article that is 4 points higher than the US.

You are splitting hairs with regards to stimulus. Of course the Swedish government package isn't the same. Sweden has a population of 10.23 million versus a US population of over 300 million. Regardless, that does not change the fact the Swedish government's motives are the same: to stimulate their economy. Bluntly, that is not allowing capitalism to do its thing. You have to ask yourself why ... because economies will struggle regardless, meaning Sweden isn't OK by virtue of the fact they are making the same policy decisions as other countries.

[tooblue]

Their death per confirmed case rate is 6.56 percent. That’s not the death rate, you are correct.

Per the linked article in Time magazine: "Sweden has a relatively high case fatality rate: as of April 8, 7.68% of the Swedes who have tested positive for COVID-19 have died of the virus."

[SeattleUte]

Look at New York’s case load, and it’s still not overwhelmed and there’s no prospect of that happening, and you realize how far California and Texas and Michigan are from being overwhelmed.

[SeattleUte]

Per the linked article in Time magazine: "Sweden has a relatively high case fatality rate: as of April 8, 7.68% of the Swedes who have tested positive for COVID-19 have died of the virus."

I got my figures from the Coronavirus meter at this time. I don’t know Time’s source, and I don’t read Time.The point is it’s the case fatality rate and not the overall death rate.

[tooblue]

I got my figures from the Coronavirus meter at this time. I don’t know Time’s source, and I don’t read Time.The point is it’s the case fatality rate and not the overall death rate.

You misspoke and now you are moving the goal posts