covid politics

[JohnRoberts]

Wouldn't this be downplaying the severity of the situation WHILE sowing division amongst our society? Seems twice as bad to me when put in context.

OK almost on topic, there has been a lot of criticism about underestimating the severity of the COVID19 outbreak.  I am probably starting to sound like a broken record but.....

China neglected to share with the outside world that their health workers were getting sick from patients, but it is even worse than that. China also understated the severity of the infection and extent of the infection spread.

Even after learning about the human to human transmission the models for projecting future spread were built on faulty (understated) data coming from China that led many western nations to underestimate the potential severity of this viral outbreak.

Now after seeing accurate data from several western countries, in perfect hindsight, we appreciate that we could have responded more strongly.  In an exponential growth equation the variables matter, a bunch. Bad data causes bad projections.

JR

PS: I appreciate that this looks like me blaming China for this, but IMO they really are responsible for a lot of the bad news.

 

[kambo]

OK almost on topic, there has been a lot of criticism about underestimating the severity of the COVID19 outbreak.  I am probably starting to sound like a broken record but.....

China neglected to share with the outside world that their health workers were getting sick from patients, but it is even worse than that. China also understated the severity of the infection and extent of the infection spread.

Even after learning about the human to human transmission the models for projecting future spread were built on faulty (understated) data coming from China that led many western nations to underestimate the potential severity of this viral outbreak.

Now after seeing accurate data from several western countries, in perfect hindsight, we appreciate that we could have responded more strongly.  In an exponential growth equation the variables matter, a bunch. Bad data causes bad projections.

JR

PS: I appreciate that this looks like me blaming China for this, but IMO they really are responsible for a lot of the bad news.

anyone who is not able to understand this and still arguing, must be an...  :-X

 

[cyrano]

McCarthy is on the loose again...

https://news.yahoo.com/suspected-sars-virus-and-flu-found-in-luggage-fbi-report-describes-chinas-biosecurity-risk-144526820.html

 

[fallout]

anyone who is not able to understand this and still arguing, must be an...  :-X

Besides the obligatory "you're a racist/xenophobe" there really is no argument.

 

[living sounds]

China also understated the severity of the infection and extent of the infection spread.

According to this news article they did:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says

 

[kambo]

Besides the obligatory "you're a racist/xenophobe" there really is no argument.

;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D u r more than funny  ;D ;D ;D ;D

 

[JohnRoberts]

Besides the obligatory "you're a racist/xenophobe" there really is no argument.

you talking to me?

JR

 

[JohnRoberts]

For something new to chew on... what do we think about contact tracing... South Korea (about the size of Indiana)  that is held up as model of how to handle COVID19, they use extensive contact tracing to track and control exposure from infected individuals.

This is very useful to slow and/or prevent spread, but is not consistent with our expected privacy protections. 

I think there is a fair argument that infected individual create a risk to public health so tracking them could save lives.

Any thoughts?

JR

 

[fallout]

you talking to me?

JR

I'm agreeing with you (re: China)

 

[JohnRoberts]

I'm agreeing with you (re: China)

Hard to tell...  Thanx

I am getting so thin skinned from all this daily political drama that I felt a lady bug bite my arm the other day while working out in the yard. I didn't even know that they could bite... Since they eat aphids, they must be able to bite...  :

JR

 

[crazydoc]

For something new to chew on... what do we think about contact tracing... South Korea (about the size of Indiana)  that is held up as model of how to handle COVID19, they use extensive contact tracing to track and control exposure from infected individuals.

This is very useful to slow and/or prevent spread, but is not consistent with our expected privacy protections. 

I think there is a fair argument that infected individual create a risk to public health so tracking them could save lives.

Any thoughts?

JR

I have no problem with the privacy aspect, but that horse is way out of the barn in locations where there are already more than a few cases. There aren't enough personnel to do the job. It would be helpful to do when the first new positive cases in a given political area (town, county) are encountered, but with the current several day lag in test results even that would be difficult. Maybe when the new 15 minute PCR test is widely available this would make sense, but in general I think it's way too late to attempt.

 

[iturnknobs]

China neglected to share with the outside world that their health workers were getting sick from patients, but it is even worse than that. China also understated the severity of the infection and extent of the infection spread.

Even after learning about the human to human transmission the models for projecting future spread were built on faulty (understated) data coming from China that led many western nations to underestimate the potential severity of this viral outbreak.

So does this imply/assume that the death/instance count is falsified from China? Please cite documents.

 

[JohnRoberts]

So does this imply/assume that the death/instance count is falsified from China? Please cite documents.

Nice try...

If they do not release accurate data, where would I come up with documents?

How about the fact they denied letting western health inspectors into Wuhan, and whistle blower health workers from there tend to disappear.

The fact that the virus behaves much more virulently than their early data suggests is a strong hint.

But no I do not have proof, that they withheld proof (can't prove that negative), other than the disappearing whistle blowers which imo is suggestive of shenanigans.

JR

 

[iturnknobs]

For something new to chew on... what do we think about contact tracing... 


I think there is a fair argument that infected individual create a risk to public health so tracking them could save lives.

Any thoughts?

JR

Sorry to chop up your comment. Our countries had case #1 within 24 hours of each other, and they're "done" with it if news reports are accurate. Sounds like a privacy issue we're not willing to deal with, albeit effective.

 

[iturnknobs]

*they're(being South Korea)

 

[living sounds]

So does this imply/assume that the death/instance count is falsified from China? Please cite documents.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says

 

[JohnRoberts]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says

Thank you... this is why the WHO and numerous western countries underestimated the severity of this.

JR

 

[hodad]

Thank you... this is why the WHO and numerous western countries underestimated the severity of this.

JR

There's a certain edge of scapegoating to this "blame China" approach.  There is no doubt that very preventable errors were made  by the US and others in their approach to COVID--and that's without the issues with China's virus reporting. 
Yeah, China almost certainly understated the severity of the situation--weren't people saying that as far back as January?  It's what you expect from China.  Somehow, in spite of the bad information from China, there were plenty of smart and talented scientists and doctors who had a very good idea of how to approach all this, and they were roundly ignored by the Trump administration. 

There's plenty of blame to go around, but for the US govt.  to try to whitewash its own very grave & obvious shortcomings by demonizing China is pretty weak stuff.

 

[crazydoc]

... Somehow, in spite of the bad information from China, there were plenty of smart and talented scientists and doctors who had a very good idea of how to approach all this, and they were roundly ignored by the Trump administration. 

There's plenty of blame to go around, but for the US govt.  to try to whitewash its own very grave & obvious shortcomings by demonizing China is pretty weak stuff.

"We were warned in 2015, when Ezra Klein of Vox, after speaking with Bill Gates about his algorithmic model for how a new strain of flu could spread rapidly in today’s globalized world, wrote that “a pandemic disease is the most predictable catastrophe in the history of the human race, if only because it has happened to the human race so many, many times before.” If there was anything humanity could be certain that it needed to prepare for to prevent the deaths of a lot of people in little time, it was this...

The systemic failure stems in part from the fact that in recent decades successive administrations have not treated pandemic preparedness with the degree of seriousness they reserved for addressing other top security threats...

When the National Commission on the COVID-19 response materializes, it will differ from the 9/11 Commission in that it will conclude that “the system was blinking red” not just in the inner sanctum of the U.S. intelligence community but out in the open, as well. For years. Within government and outside government. And that, despite all that, the U.S. government was not sufficiently prepared when the boogeyman, in this case the virus SARS-CoV-2, finally came calling."


https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/03/pandemic-coronavirus-united-states-trump-cdc/608215/

 

[Script]

Scape-goating is the flip-side of fear.

Fear of something, anything -- and since this is a politics thread, probably also the fear of loosing an election.

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Underestimated at first, I guess so. Then the thought it might be overestimated by WHO, since they did a less than stellar job on the previous one.

Underestimated probably also by China. I don't believe the Chinese are that different as people from anybody else. Also, we cannot really expect that they should have known much more back then, than many more almost worldwide still don't know even by now.
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Yes, I also recalled Bill Gate's words the other day who has warned of something like this for a long time.