COVID-19 - READ THE RULES BEFORE REPLYING

[Sauron]

16 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

Add pretty much open borders to that

Nope, "open borders" have nothing to do with this. In the EU we only have open borders internally and travel has now been temporarily restricted for obvious reasons. It's no different from, say, state borders within the US - which by the way has had way more victims in less time. From what I've read this is a lot more correlated to population density, which is particularly high in northern Italy and Spain.

[StDragon]

5 hours ago, SpaceGhostC2C said:

LOL. This XXI century Howard Hughes would be so sad to watch if it wasn't so entertaining

 

 

This is so true; couldn't agree more.

 

Elon is truly a visionary. I'm frankly amazed he's gotten this far. If anything, he will be noted more for SpaceX as I believe that will be his long lasting legacy whereas Tesla will retain pop-culture. Companies like Toyota, Honda, Porche, and Tata Motors are playing the long game. In fact, the Porche Taycan is the first to truly give a Tesla a run for its money. It's not like it couldn't have been done before, rather Elon was the first to expand new market share through innovation. But once he did that, all the others will follow and IMHO exceed his R&D and manufacturing capability. He's on borrowed time in the automotive industry.

 

A few days ago Joe Rogan interviewed Elon for about 2 hours (he's something of a regular guest on his program). I was dismayed at the overselling and over promising of what his Neuralink can do. He waxes on how it can cure this and that along with providing a Matrix type interface for advanced AI integration . Please, not going to happen. A few probes sitting on brain isn't going to do all that much and I hope he's not being blinded by some cyberpunk fantasy. The brain is a hardwired computer that's very plastic (changing). No two are identical, not even in identical twins. And, recalling memory isn't like a computer. It's a biologically destructive process. When you recall a memory, the molecular chain gets broken down and rebuilt. It's completely alien in structure and ability to anything we can put on a silicon chip.

 

Anyways, yeah, he definitely fits the mold of Howard Hughes. Hopefully he doesn't snap into pure insanity.

 

 

[Morgan MLGman]

18 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Nope, "open borders" have nothing to do with this. In the EU we only have open borders internally and travel has now been temporarily restricted for obvious reasons. It's no different from, say, state borders within the US - which by the way has had way more victims in less time. From what I've read this is a lot more correlated to population density, which is particularly high in northern Italy and Spain.

Yeah, this was a bad phrase to use. I meant that inside-EU travel was permitted without any verification/restrictions for so long, that any later restrictions were pretty much futile, as the virus already spread where it wanted to. Not to mention no real restrictions of travel between China and EU as soon as the first confirmed human-to-human case was confirmed (which was at the end of January). The response to Covid in my country was terrible, incoherent and often contradictory to itself.

To represent what I mean - US banned travel to and from China on January 31st when there weren't any deaths reported yet. - imagine that usually there's more than 200 000 people traveling there back and forth on a daily basis. Of course Trump was called a racist and a xenophobe because of that travel ban, and yet later on the rest of the world followed that. You can't know the amount of infections this move prevented, but you can be pretty much sure that it helped...
 

I have no data about travel to EU, but I suppose it's something similar when you add up all of the different countries.

[Sauron]

1 minute ago, Morgan MLGman said:

I meant that inside-EU travel was permitted without any verification/restrictions for so long, that any later restrictions were pretty much futile, as the virus already spread where it wanted to. Not to mention no real restrictions of travel between China and EU as soon as the first confirmed human-to-human case was confirmed (which was at the end of January).

Sure (though the gravity of the situation wasn't quite understood then) but that's not open borders, that's just how normal borders work. There are no special controls for viruses at external borders that are absent within the EU. You roll up with a passport and they let you in. Most of the transit outside of holiday season is for business and that does not strictly depend on Schengen (the company will just take care of what is needed).

6 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

US banned travel to and from China on January 31st when there was one case confirmed there.

And yet here we are with the US leading in both infections and deaths.

7 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

Of course Trump was called a racist and a xenophobe because of that travel ban, and yet later on the rest of the world followed that.

The difference being that he specifically went after China despite reports that the virus had already spread outside it. Also there's no need for a full border blockade, you just need viral controls and/or a period of quarantine upon entering, as well as requiring specific reasons to travel (not just leisure). The only reason for a full block against a specific country is a lack of understanding of the problem and xenophobia.

[WkdPaul]

Sadly, there's a LOT of misinformation going around, even some medical doctors are spreading misinformation around.

 

Here's an interesting video correcting some of that (BTW, pretty interesting to see who's behind that COVID conspiracy documentary) ;

 

 

 

The documentary is called Plandemic, and here's a few articles going in details about some of the misinformation ;

 

https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/verify/verify-the-plandemic-documentary-is-full-of-misinformation/507-95caed4e-7a95-4452-ba7f-98cd0442c9e9

 

https://amp.usatoday.com/amp/3095471001

 

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/fact-checking-judy-mikovits-controversial-virologist-attacking-anthony-fauci-viral#

[Morgan MLGman]

18 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Also there's no need for a full border blockade, you just need viral controls and/or a period of quarantine upon entering

Yeah, the problem is we didn't know the nature of the virus back then, so we couldn't exactly know how it spreads and thus it wasn't a viable solution.

Chinese government carefully concealed as much bad PR it could get as possible, and with that vital information about the disease, with which they had contact first. Based on that flawed data, WHO gave flawed information to the rest of the world and it caused a lot of other issues.
We still don't actually even know if the shelter-in-place orders (aka mass quarantines) given in most countries around the world at some point were an effective countermeasure, because we've never studied something like that before on such a scale...
 

18 minutes ago, Sauron said:

The difference being that he specifically went after China despite reports that the virus had already spread outside it.

I still think it was the only reasonable, temporary measure to prevent mass spread of an unkown pathogen.

US was the first to do that, and yet it still has the most cases (there's many reasons for it), so I'd go out on a limb and say there'd be a lot more if that travel wasn't restricted. China was logically just the first country to be banned, because it was the epicenter of the outbreak. The fact that people couldn't travel from the two most affected provinces to the rest of mainland China, but could fly around the world raised suspicions as well.
If that measure didn't help, traveling all around the world wouldn't be eventually banned in one way or another.

[StDragon]

20 minutes ago, Sauron said:

The only reason for a full block against a specific country is a lack of understanding of the problem and xenophobia.

There was definitely a lack of understanding by frankly everyone. This virus was new, as in never before seen; hence the term "novel". Blocking China wasn't xenophobic when clearly they lied. They knew well in advanced what happened and didn't share it with the rest of the world. Even German intelligence confirmed they manipulated WHO. In the end, it didn't matter as most US infections originated out of NY which ostensibly came from Europe. Modern air travel spread it in about 14 hours half-way around the world.

 

Don't buy into the media hype. It's inherently political. The Press Sec Kayleigh lit up into them a few days ago and called them out on their on BS. It was rather awesome! So armchair quarterback all you want, the POTUS acted on the best intelligence we had, which was very little. You only know what you know at the time and take the best precaution. But sure, in hindsight it was futile. 

 

[Sauron]

4 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

US was the first to do that, and yet it still has the most cases (there's many reasons for it), so I'd go on a limb and say there'd be a lot more if that travel wasn't restricted.

That's one interpretation... the other one is that it made no tangible difference because the virus had already spread. Maybe a complete lockdown, while unnecessary, would have helped - but only blocking one country was clearly ineffective.

7 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

We still don't actually even know if the shelter-in-place orders (aka mass quarantines) given in most countries around the world at some point were an effective countermeasure, because we've never studied something like that before on such a scale...

Infection rates and deaths have drastically dropped here so yes, it was obviously effective.

[Guest willies leg]

9 hours ago, leadeater said:

*Just not at the expense of human life and health

 

Spoken as a true follower, not a leader. To each his own.

[leadeater]

4 minutes ago, willies leg said:

Spoken as a true follower, not a leader. To each his own.

No, spoken as someone who doesn't want to be the one causing or promoting the spread of a heath crises. Fair is fair you want to be a leader like you are saying then you have to stand in front of a line of the families of the dead and they all get to kick you once.

 

If you are prepared to withstand that then lead all you like.

 

Edit:

True leadership is leading by example, moving people forward, improving the lives of others, advancing civilization and societies not leading them to ruin for profit. Leadership means making those tough decisions, not having a whine about it.

[Morgan MLGman]

Just now, Sauron said:

Infection rates and deaths have drastically dropped here so yes, it was obviously effective.

True, the million dollar question is - Would wearing masks outside, disinfecting stuff, trying to socially distance yourself at work as much as possible and just being generally careful and informed instead of being forced to stay inside actually cause any more infections/deaths in the long-run?
I've seen some research from Germany that says it would be about the same. But that's just one study, so nothing huge yet.
 

7 minutes ago, Sauron said:

That's one interpretation... the other one is that it made no tangible difference because the virus had already spread. Maybe a complete lockdown, while unnecessary, would have helped - but only blocking one country was clearly ineffective.

Yeah, it's hard to balance casualties in both public health and economy with so little information.

[Sauron]

4 minutes ago, StDragon said:

Blocking China wasn't xenophobic when clearly they lied.

"They lied" (even though Trump definitely couldn't know that at the time) is not a reason to block travel. But again, travel restrictions are sensible - it's focusing exclusively on China which is stupid and probably motivated by xenophobia. Besides you don't even need to point at the travel ban to know Trump is being xenophobic when he insists on calling it the "Chinese virus". The man clearly has no clue what he's doing, he just knows what will rile up his supporters and what will get more money in his pockets.

7 minutes ago, StDragon said:

Don't buy into the media hype. It's inherently political.

Yes, that tends to happen when you cover politics.

12 minutes ago, StDragon said:

So armchair quarterback all you want, the POTUS acted on the best intelligence we had, which was very little. You only know what you know at the time and take the best precaution.

Nah, everyone who knows what they're talking about has repeatedly warned Trump and others like him and they weren't listened to. Everyone keeps telling then what they should do and they just ignore them. They're not taking the "best precaution", not even close. Even a child could have told you a travel ban with China specifically at the end of January, when we already had cases in Europe, was a stupid idea. They don't care about saving lives, the lockdown only came after immense pressure and overwhelming evidence that ignoring it wasn't making it go away.

[Bombastinator]

4 minutes ago, wkdpaul said:

Sadly, there's a LOT of misinformation going around, even some medical doctors are spreading misinformation around.

 

Here's an interesting video correcting some of that (BTW, pretty interesting to see who's behind that COVID conspiracy documentary) ;

 

 

Correcting this conspiracy theory video the presenter in the linked video got ahold of?  “That” is a bit unclear.  The video is quite long.  It starts out not talking about covid but about HIV.  Getting through the whole thing is something of a slog and it’s quite convoluted.
I failed.  I got to the point where it was revealed that the original piece was produced by the anti-vax movement and was done.
 

It shows that there is a lot of crap out there though.

The virus is a fast moving thing compared to research and a slow moving frog boiler compared to human attention.
 

Finding out what it does and untangling the motivations of the people demanding action requires a lot more time than there is available.  

 

 

[Sauron]

1 minute ago, Morgan MLGman said:

True, the million dollar question is - Would wearing masks outside, disinfecting stuff, trying to socially distance yourself at work as much as possible and just being generally careful and informed instead of being forced to stay inside actually cause any more infections/deaths in the long-run?
I've seen some research from Germany that says it would be about the same. But that's just one study, so nothing huge yet.

Going out with precautions is fine but it only works if you've sufficiently prepared for it and if the infection rate has slowed down enough. The lockdown is crucial in order to get there.

 

Italy has reopened with precautions (I'm at work right now), we'll have to see the situation stabilizes. I'm not too optimistic because I see people ignoring precautions all over the place... but we'll see.

4 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

Yeah, it's hard to balance casualties in both public health and economy with so little information.

Every virologist is saying health should have the utmost priority right now. If the economy can't take a month or two of slowdown then the economy is shit and should be drastically reorganized.

[Commodus]

1 hour ago, Bombastinator said:

Ran into another article discussing the way covid attacks the body.  A lot of these people who aren’t killed may be badly damaged in other ways.  apparently it attacks a lot more than just the lungs.  

I’m getting more and more worried about this restriction lifting that is going on

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/05/10/coronavirus-attacks-body-symptoms/?arc404=true

I remember reading a story (from the BBC, I believe) about a NYC paramedic's experience at the height of the pandemic and how many of the 911 calls for COVID-19 were billed as "cardiac arrest."  It was clear by then that it could affect the heart, but I can't help but wonder how many deaths were incorrectly attributed to some other heart condition.

[StDragon]

5 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Besides you don't even need to point at the travel ban to know Trump is being xenophobic when he insists on calling it the "Chinese virus".

I get it, you don't like the current POTUS in office. That's ok, I acknowledge your opinion of the matter. But the fact is, China is on record for saying it originated out of the US. IMHO, that is why he was emphatic about labeling the origin of where this thing came from.

 

There's no doubt in my mind that this was the Chinese equivalent of a biological "Chernobyl event". They covered up, lied, and lied some more. It's a Communist regime where 1984 wasn't a warning but a user manual. Just because a nation-state can repeat a lie doesn't make it true. The West is onto their propaganda BS. 

[Morgan MLGman]

10 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Italy has reopened with precautions (I'm at work right now), we'll have to see the situation stabilizes. I'm not too optimistic because I see people ignoring precautions all over the place... but we'll see.

Same here. Just went to the store today to get some groceries, in theory covering your face outside is mandatory here, and I've seen only about 60% of the people in masks. Implementation of those precautions wouldn't be easy, I admit.

10 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Every virologist is saying health should have the utmost priority right now. If the economy can't take a month or two of slowdown then the economy is shit and should be drastically reorganized.

You see, that's the point - virologists aren't politicians for a reason. They weren't democratically elected to lead our countries and they aren't fit for it. We need to take their advice with a great deal of consideration, but they can't make countrywide policy.

EDIT: We went off-topic quite a bit here, I apologize.

[Sauron]

Just now, StDragon said:

I get it, you don't like the current POTUS in office.

My personal like or dislike for him is irrelevant. He's objectively incompetent and incapable of handling this crisis.

1 minute ago, StDragon said:

But the fact is, China is on record for saying it originated out of the US.

Even if that's true (I've never heard of this though) that's completely irrelevant. "They do it too" is something I expect a kinderartener to say, not the POTUS.

2 minutes ago, StDragon said:

There's no doubt in my mind that this was the Chinese equivalent of a biological "Chernobyl event".

Except Chernobyl was a technological failure whereas a virus is beyond their control.

2 minutes ago, StDragon said:

It's a Communist regime where 1984 wasn't a warning but a user manual.

There is literally nothing remotely communist about modern day China. Literally nothing. No offence but you seem to be getting your geopolitical knowledge from red scare propaganda from the '60s.

4 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

You see, that's the point - virologists aren't politicians for a reason.

Being elected doesn't make you an omniscientist who knows everything. A good politician should listen to their advisors on topics they have insufficient understanding of - that's normal. Nobody is expecting Trump to know everything - we expect him to know something about how the world works and to listen when people who know more than him try to advise him.

[Bombastinator]

7 minutes ago, Commodus said:

I remember reading a story (from the BBC, I believe) about a NYC paramedic's experience at the height of the pandemic and how many of the 911 calls for COVID-19 were billed as "cardiac arrest."  It was clear by then that it could affect the heart, but I can't help but wonder how many deaths were incorrectly attributed to some other heart condition.

My worry is long term affects.  There is evidence that it rarely kills and young people are safe.  that’s within a given time frame of a few months though.
It may just be that it rarely kills fast enough to easily see and young people aren’t safe at all, they just die slower.
 

 If this thing is attacking nerves and kidneys it could still cause death.  Just years later, even if the disease is destroyed.  

a weird extreme example:
back when I was three I was in a horseback riding accident and hit my head on a rock.  I lived thanks to heroic medical effort but it affected some social stuff brain wise.  One result of this is I have never been attractive to women thus never been married, thus never had any kids.  It effectively rendered me sterile.  As far as Mother Nature is concerned I died when I was 3.

[leadeater]

20 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

True, the million dollar question is - Would wearing masks outside, disinfecting stuff, trying to socially distance yourself at work as much as possible and just being generally careful and informed instead of being forced to stay inside actually cause any more infections/deaths in the long-run?
I've seen some research from Germany that says it would be about the same. But that's just one study, so nothing huge yet.

Main problem with face masks is ensuring proper usage of them because they can be worse not better used incorrectly. Surgical type masks aren't actually supposed to be worn for hours or reused and need to stay dry. You also need put it on and off carefully without touching your eye, nose or mouth and that applies while wearing it too.

 

From what my health ministry has advised is that social distancing and good hygiene is 90% effective as proper mask usage so in my view it makes them pointless accept for those in high risk situations or the sick who need to go out.

 

For workplaces it's also very important that there is good air circulation and extraction, stagnant air is a risk factor if someone is sick/contagious and nobody knows yet.

[StDragon]

1 minute ago, Sauron said:

Even if that's true (I've never heard of this though) that's completely irrelevant. "They do it too" is something I expect a kinderartener to say, not the POTUS.

 Then here, let me help you out.

Quote

Except Chernobyl was a technological failure whereas a virus is beyond their control.

Yes, having proper public policies against wet markets was totally beyond their control. Which BTW makes it all the more worrisome. It wasn't like they were trying to split atoms or anything complicated. Go to China and then tell me how clean it is (it's not).

 

There's a reason we have a CDC and FDA in America...

Quote

There is literally nothing remotely communist about modern day China. Literally nothing. No offence but you seem to be getting your geopolitical knowledge from red scare propaganda from the '60s.

 

Yeah, and there was nothing remotely socialist about the German Nazi National Socialism either.

 

You stepped in it. Let me teach you something. Communism is fascism, and Fascism is fascism. The difference is one side hides their true intention whereas the other doesn't. Essentially, they're all sides of the same coin, totalitarianism. 

 

You got schooled!

[Morgan MLGman]

18 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Being elected doesn't make you an omniscientist who knows everything. A good politician should listen to their advisors on topics they have insufficient understanding of - that's normal. Nobody is expecting Trump to know everything - we expect him to know something about how the world works and to listen when people who know more than him try to advise him.

Still, we have people elected in our countries to be able to soundly decide what's best, based on information provided by people like virologists. Unelected people making nationwide policies undermine fundamentals of democracy, so we should just be careful about what we do.

In my opinion decisions like that should be made based on a multivariate analysis of many different effects (whether short-term or long-term) of shutting down economies and mass quarantines as they're not viable long-term solutions.

9 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Main problem with face masks is ensuring proper usage of them because they can be worse not better used incorrectly. Surgical type masks aren't actually supposed to be worn for hours or reused and need to stay dry. You also need put it on and off carefully without touching your eye, nose or mouth and that applies while wearing it too.

Yeah, no solution is perfect. Quarantines aren't a perfect solution either, as I've heard that 60% of cases in New York came from people who were socially distancing themselves at homes

9 minutes ago, leadeater said:

From what my health ministry has advised is that social distancing and good hygiene is 90% effective as proper mask usage so in my view it makes them pointless accept for those in high risk situations or the sick who need to go out.

The recommendation to wear masks outside was made largely based on data coming from Asian countries like South Korea, where wearing a mask outside is a common thing and apparently the number of cases is relatively low despite very high population density in some regions of Asia. They decided masks must help in some way.
I don't think it was possible to say that publicly right away because people massively buying masks could impact the amount of protective equipment available for the medical staff around the world.

[leadeater]

5 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

The recommendation to wear masks outside was made largely based on data coming from Asian countries like South Korea, where wearing a mask outside is a common thing and apparently the number of cases is relatively low despite very high population density in some regions of Asia. They decided masks must help in some way.

They also have a long standing history of using them so the problems around comfort and touching your face too much isn't as big of a problem. It's largely an education and training issue which is already done there.

 

Here the effectiveness or rather not needing them comes from the very low density, so as long as there is space and people can distance you're all good, if not then not so much.

[leadeater]

6 minutes ago, Morgan MLGman said:

Still, we have people elected in our countries to be able to soundly decide what's best, based on information provided by people like virologists. Unelected people making nationwide policies undermine fundamentals of democracy, so we should just be careful about what we do.

In my opinion decisions like that should be made based on a multivariate analysis of many different effects (whether short-term or long-term) of shutting down economies and mass quarantines as they're not viable long-term solutions.

The only thing about this is the actual people doing the work and tasked to make the decisions or make policies aren't elected, often the best you get is sign-off from someone elected but they didn't actually make the decision or even were part of the discussion only agreed to implement it. The ratio of elected people in government to appointed/un-elected is very much weighted to one side, the un-elected.

 

Not that I think in this situation policies and decision recommendations are being made without the elected officials.

 

If there is one thing all governments are good at is being massive employers with a policy, procedure and process for everything down to ordering coffee.

[Morgan MLGman]

6 minutes ago, leadeater said:

The only thing about this is the actual people doing the work and tasked to make the decisions or make policies aren't elected, often the best you get is sign-off from someone elected but they didn't actually make the decision or even were part of the discussion only agreed to implement it. The ratio of elected people in government to appointed/un-elected is very much weighted to one side, the un-elected.

 

Not that I think in this situation policies and decision recommendations are being made without the elected officials.

 

If there is one thing all governments are good at is being massive employers with a policy, procedure and process for everything down to ordering coffee.

This is why the bigger the government, the worse it works...

Pretty much this