COVID-19 - READ THE RULES BEFORE REPLYING

[Andreas Lilja]

7 minutes ago, Rakanoth said:

Saving 'lives' isn't the only reason people support lockdowns. Many have grown comfortable with the idea of lockdowns and are suffering from 'Lockdown Syndrome'.

Burn the introverted heretics.

[Zodiark1593]

3 minutes ago, Andreas Lilja said:

Burn the introverted heretics.

Easy to do when all it takes is some sunlight.

 

[PhantomJaguarr]

We caught a customer stealing our complementary masks they we are giving out to other customers. I’ll just say I hope karma exists. /end rant.

 

Also I was informed that essential workers in our county have priority to get tested like in LA. ‘Bout time.

[Guest]

17 hours ago, mr moose said:

My guess is something to do with symptoms not being present so not tested for, but the chances of falling ill are the same for all age groups.  Probably something to do with how fast the cells split and the body heals, old people take so long to heal the flu gets bored and moves on.   Waiting now to hear the actual answer.

This is a good answer. There is a large amount of younger individuals being underrepresented in the data. Most cases are recorded upon hospital administration, therefore a higher chance of being symptomatic and requiring hospital assistance. This is called symptom-based surveillance. 

 

Older people do also have a weaker innate immune system, and hence a weaker ability to heal and recover. They are also more susceptible to newer diseases due to a depleted naive T cell population. Unfortunately coronaviruses lack the ability to get bored, and so they tend to persist. This does not explain however why they are over represented in COVID statistics than a younger population, but underrepresented in the Spanish Flu. 

 

17 hours ago, Zodiark1593 said:

In the case of the Spanish Flu, during the second wave, the virus had mutated and caused Cytokine Release Syndromes in many victims, leading to the immune system attacking the respiratory system. To tl,dr it, it pretty much meant a strong immune system actually becomes a pretty lethal liability. This particular mutation is theorized to have proliferated due to the travels of soldiers during World War 1. 

That is a great answer, and I didn’t know that. Very interesting and would definitely be an answer. But would this account for a large discrepancy in mortality - older people are more susceptible anyway and much more likely to die?

 

17 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

Because many of the elderly nowadays also take ACE inhibitors (e.g. Lisinopril, Captopril) and Angiotensin 2 Receptor Blocking drugs (e.g. Losartan, Irbesartan) to manage their hypertension especially those with Diabetes and protect their kidneys from CKD due to increased RAAS feedback brought by increased blood pressure. The downside of these drugs is that it makes them more susceptible to the SARS-Cov-2. Add to that elderly people's immune systems are not as efficient as younger people. Also, it has been demonstrated recently that the virus can induce hypoxia due to ARDS. The inflammation can also cause small blood clots in the lungs especially in the alveolar capillaries, and that is why many of them report patients with below 95% O₂ saturation. Much is to be unveiled about the virus especially its systemic pathophysiology on both cellular and molecular level.

This is an excellent answer. However, would an increase in ACE2 provide a greater susceptibility for transmission given how unknown the disease is to humans? I.e. you already have many receptors, would an upregulation of ACE2 make a substantial difference?

17 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

Excess inflammation does more harm than good, it maybe able to destroy the virus but it leaves so much tissue damage. Can you imagine what an increase in TNF-α, IL-2, IL-6, IL-1, and increased complement activation especially the Classical pathway would do?

That’s a good point. This type of inflammation is common, especially in protozoan infections. Even so, the body is pretty fine at regulating the immune system - would older individuals have higher or lower cytokine levels, and what would influence that?

 

An interesting answer comes from Giuseppe Ietto. When we have a vaccine, not only does it convey immunisation against a specific pathogen, but also stimulates the immune system to generate a scattered immunity against non-self antigens - this includes other coronaviruses. Remember viruses are very basic - coronaviruses all usually have the same proteins. In fact they majority of younger individuals with covid present with mild-like seasonal Coronavirus symptoms. The immune response is seen as quick and fast. However in older individuals the immune response is slow - the immune system is very much a balance of an all or nothing approach. 

 

The only way to have a quicker immune response is to have immunological memory to a similar antigen. Stimulation can occur via vaccination - but we don’t have any CoV vaccines in a vaccine schedule. One solution could be the tetanus vaccine, this covers diptheria, tetanus and pertussis. Children have been routinely vaccinated with this vaccine for some time, and it also allows for some non-specific immunisation against pathogens that are in transit - as the immune system is activated by the vaccine. The young individual now has non-specific immunity to coronaviruses.

 

What this means is more immediate recognition of SARS-CoV-2 and upregulation of the immune system before viral pneumonia in young individuals due to non-specific immunity - most likely to nucleocapsid protein, which is not highly immunogenic. 

 

In older individuals, immune memory cells have started to die off, as well as a decay of the innate immune system, lymphatic and an exhausted naive lymphocyte population. There is no non-specific immunity. 

 

Thus we can see a discrepancy between Spanish Flu and COVID pandemics due to vaccinations becoming prominent in the 1930s-40s, so younger individuals have gained that non-specific immunity since. 

 

18 hours ago, NZgamer said:

A country that smoothly went into lockdown vs a country with idiots that protest their freedom during a worldwide pandemic

(Snip)

New Zealand has several key things on its side

- a highly dispersed population, one of the most so in the world

- a high quality of hospital care and public health model

- a good education system - policies such as lockdown and social distancing have been easy to enforce, apart from notable exceptions such as the iwi-run checkpoints, people risking social distancing to get takeaways, certain politicians. However it has been quite obvious that many people have not quite followed this. 

 

Realistically, given the public health model we have and how dispersed we really are compared to the rest of the world, it was inevitable. In the US you have widespread poverty, high density populations, ignorance, conflicting information from politicians, media and word of mouth. Not to mention people already avoid hospitals and have a huge amount of mistrust. 

 

We’re very lucky in New Zealand, it is now our job to keep the spread to a minimum and reopen businesses at the same time, and help other countries with their recovery process. 

[captain_to_fire]

1 hour ago, Andreas Lilja said:

Burn the introverted heretics.

I'm gonna be just fine, as long as there's internet, electricity, air conditioning and my quarantine pass for groceries

 

[Bombastinator]

2 hours ago, Rakanoth said:

Saving 'lives' isn't the only reason people support lockdowns. Many have grown comfortable with the idea of lockdowns and are suffering from 'Lockdown Syndrome'.

 

Many people, especially those unhappy with their jobs, are quite happy with the new normal of getting paid for doing nothing and more time for hobbies, family bonding, etc.

 

"Why you might be dreading the end of lockdown": https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/why-you-might-be-dreading-the-end-of-lockdown/2020/04/28/8b5aa2f6-865e-11ea-a3eb-e9fc93160703_story.html

 

"I don't want lockdown to end": https://www.reddit.com/r/CasualUK/comments/g9icoa/i_dont_want_lockdown_to_end/

 

"The lockdown paradox": why some people's anxiety is improving during the crisis https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/29/coronavirus-lockdown-anxiety-mental-health

 

"People are dreading post lockdown life and we asked a psychologist to explain why": https://thetab.com/uk/2020/05/01/people-are-dreading-post-lockdown-life-and-we-asked-a-psychologist-to-explain-why-154725

That’s hilarious.  Define “many” in this case. out of millions?  What you describe is one of the most severe phobias that exists.  Acrophobia.  It’s a pretty severe and debilitating thing.  You’re saying the vast number of people who are looking at the math and saying “this is stupid” are doing so because they’ve all become acrophobic?  That’s asinine.  

 

These cripplingly mentally ill folks you speak of..  Were they acrophobic  before too?  Acrophobia does happen.  It’s incredibly rare.  

[captain_to_fire]

1 hour ago, RorzNZ said:

This is an excellent answer. However, would an increase in ACE2 provide a greater susceptibility for transmission given how unknown the disease is to humans? I.e. you already have many receptors, would an upregulation of ACE2 make a substantial difference?

As I've said, there's more to be discovered about Covid-19 and the entire Coronaviridae but considering that increased ACE2 expression allows the virus to enter, it's possible that transmission might be higher with increase ACE2. Although I'm not aware of any thorough studies confirming this. But since it has been observed that intake of ARBs and ACEi's increases susceptibility to the virus, attending physicians of these hypertensive individuals are advised to either switch their medications (not easy) or force these at-risk people to just stay home.

1 hour ago, RorzNZ said:

The only way to have a quicker immune response is to have immunological memory to a similar antigen. Stimulation can occur via vaccination - but we don’t have any CoV vaccines in a vaccine schedule. One solution could be the tetanus vaccine, this covers diptheria, tetanus and pertussis. Children have been routinely vaccinated with this vaccine for some time, and it also allows for some non-specific immunisation against pathogens that are in transit - as the immune system is activated by the vaccine. The young individual now has non-specific immunity to coronaviruses.

 

What this means is more immediate recognition of SARS-CoV-2 and upregulation of the immune system before viral pneumonia in young individuals due to non-specific immunity - most likely to nucleocapsid protein, which is not highly immunogenic. 

I'm thankful that subscription based journals are free at the moment due to the pandemic so I was able to look into some proposed vaccine designs and some trials ongoing. One of which is mRNA vaccine and if you ask me, it's actually something new to me until recently because my childhood vaccinations until now are either a live attenuated, inactivated, toxoids, or conjugated polysaccharides. We know from basic immunology that while all immunogens are antigens, not all antigens are immunogens. One of the classifications for a substance to be one is it should be at least ~100 kDa so I was surprised that a circulating viral mRNA encoding for the spike proteins, once taken up by dendritic cells and B cells can elicit immunologic memory too. As it turns out, this is already a thing in veterinary medicine and just recently being tested for human use

 

Another vaccine candidate I presume is taking the spike proteins from the viral surface and injecting it to the patient which is the more traditional approach if you ask me.  Basically every developed country right now is racing towards a vaccine.

 

1 hour ago, RorzNZ said:

An interesting answer comes from Giuseppe Ietto. When we have a vaccine, not only does it convey immunisation against a specific pathogen, but also stimulates the immune system to generate a scattered immunity against non-self antigens - this includes other coronaviruses. Remember viruses are very basic - coronaviruses all usually have the same proteins. In fact they majority of younger individuals with covid present with mild-like seasonal Coronavirus symptoms. The immune response is seen as quick and fast. However in older individuals the immune response is slow - the immune system is very much a balance of an all or nothing approach. 

I think researchers and doctors are careful at the moment in order to avoid disease enhancement and potential autoimmune like adverse effects as you have said. Another consideration they're trying to look into is the duration of immunologic memory. Would memory cells last a lifetime just like OPV/IPV and MMR or it will be shots every few months like Gardasil or every few years like the annual flu shot?

1 hour ago, RorzNZ said:

That’s a good point. This type of inflammation is common, especially in protozoan infections. Even so, the body is pretty fine at regulating the immune system - would older individuals have higher or lower cytokine levels, and what would influence that?

The immune system knows when it's fighting a losing battle and when it does, Helper T cells produce excessive cytokines to keep other immune cells alive and increase their cytotoxicity in exchange of increased edema, hypotension leading to multiple organ failure, ARDS, and eventually "rigor mortis". This phenomenon is often observed with Ebola, untreated systemic MRSA, and in many reported cases, in Covid-19 too. Regardless of the etiologic agent, once a person undergoes a cytokine storm, the odds of survival are slim.

 

Also, even for a less deadly case. A viral pneumonia can still be deadly if untreated due to secondary bacterial infections. The patient's immune system might be able to wipe off the virus (influenza or coronavirus) but he/she's already weak to survive another onslaught of encapsulated, highly virulent and resistant bacterial pneumonia, which if left untreated can lead to sepsis.

[captain_to_fire]

1 hour ago, RorzNZ said:

We’re very lucky in New Zealand, it is now our job to keep the spread to a minimum and reopen businesses at the same time, and help other countries with their recovery process. 

I guess now isn't a good time to travel to any country including New Zealand

[Guest]

2 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

As I've said, there's more to be discovered about Covid-19 and the entire Coronaviridae but considering that increased ACE2 expression allows the virus to enter, it's possible that transmission might be higher with increase ACE2. Although I'm not aware of any thorough studies confirming this. But since it has been observed that intake of ARBs and ACEi's increases susceptibility to the virus, attending physicians of these hypertensive individuals are advised to either switch their medications (not easy) or force these at-risk people to just stay home.

I’m on the iPad so sorry if I said this, a cell has quite a lot of receptors, upregulation will undoubtedly increase ACE2 expression, but it probably won’t make a difference unless the patient has a high viral load. It has been observed, but the jury is out (I googled this too make sure because it’s a grey area for me!). If the hypertensive patient is infected with COVID, I would keep the patient on ACEi until clinical guidelines change. 

 

It certainly is quite interesting to see these effects, and indeed hypertensive patients have been removed from some epidemiological analyses of COVID as a result. Perhaps we will see some concrete evidence soon?

2 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

I'm thankful that subscription based journals are free at the moment due to the pandemic so I was able to look into some proposed vaccine designs and some trials ongoing. One of which is mRNA vaccine and if you ask me, it's actually something new to me until recently because my childhood vaccinations until now are either a live attenuated, inactivated, toxoids, or conjugated polysaccharides. We know from basic immunology that while all immunogens are antigens, not all antigens are immunogens. One of the classifications for a substance to be one is it should be at least ~100 kDa so I was surprised that a circulating viral mRNA encoding for the spike proteins, once taken up by dendritic cells and B cells can elicit immunologic memory too. As it turns out, this is already a thing in veterinary medicine and just recently being tested for human use

Your body can react to pretty much any substance, especially B-Cells. Consider the body’s reaction to lupus with RNP antibodies. Antibodies and TcRs epitope recognition is a small part of the antigen. Don’t forget your cytosolic receptors for antigen recognition, important for oglionucleotide recognition in AI-reactions and viral recognition. Immunogenicity will vary for antigens, but with correct adjuvants or tissue damage, non-self antigens will be recognised. 

2 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

Another vaccine candidate I presume is taking the spike proteins from the viral surface and injecting it to the patient which is the more traditional approach if you ask me.  Basically every developed country right now is racing towards a vaccine.

The most advanced IMO is Ad5-CoV. It’s the rbd of the spike protein in an adenovirus vector, it’s run by the Chinese in phase 2 trials since, I think, April 10th. The full spike protein and NP can elicit th2 responses and eosinophil infiltrate of the lung.

2 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

I think researchers and doctors are careful at the moment in order to avoid disease enhancement and potential autoimmune like adverse effects as you have said. Another consideration they're trying to look into is the duration of immunologic memory. Would memory cells last a lifetime just like OPV/IPV and MMR or it will be shots every few months like Gardasil or every few years like the annual flu shot?

Unfortunately when talking about lifetime immunity, it’s more the lifetime of the cell. Memory cells are quite long-lived. It’s more how mutagenic the pathogen is. Influenza undergoes antigenic shift and antigenic drift. 

2 hours ago, captain_to_fire said:

The immune system knows when it's fighting a losing battle and when it does, Helper T cells produce excessive cytokines to keep other immune cells alive and increase their cytotoxicity in exchange of increased edema, hypotension leading to multiple organ failure, ARDS, and eventually "rigor mortis". This phenomenon is often observed with Ebola, untreated systemic MRSA, and in many reported cases, in Covid-19 too. Regardless of the etiologic agent, once a person undergoes a cytokine storm, the odds of survival are slim.

 

Also, even for a less deadly case. A viral pneumonia can still be deadly if untreated due to secondary bacterial infections. The patient's immune system might be able to wipe off the virus (influenza or coronavirus) but he/she's already weak to survive another onslaught of encapsulated, highly virulent and resistant bacterial pneumonia, which if left untreated can lead to sepsis.

Love this bit. 

[lewdicrous]

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/495826-us-endures-worst-one-day-death-toll-yet-as-states-reopen

[Commodus]

13 hours ago, lewdicrous said:

Not sure of the validity of this, but I remember reading that some states (can't remember if it was only one or more than one state) were trying to hide/stop posting numbers. If that's true, then yea, the number of infections/deaths may be off, possibly more than what is predicted.

Is testing/treatment free in the US? Cause I can see the cost of it all stopping those who don't have insurance.

It's supposed to be free and often is, but there are reports of people paying thousands just to get it diagnosed in the early stages.  I've heard more than once that the privatized American health care system is exacerbating the pandemic because people decline testing or treatment they don't think they can afford.

[Bombastinator]

12 minutes ago, Commodus said:

It's supposed to be free and often is, but there are reports of people paying thousands just to get it diagnosed in the early stages.  I've heard more than once that the privatized American health care system is exacerbating the pandemic because people decline testing or treatment they don't think they can afford.

I have seen this.  Apparently one route is to go to a sports medicine doctor because they are getting less work lately and a lot of stuff they do is not always insurable.  They’ve got experience with such things.

[Zodiark1593]

According to a local news press, Cafe El Dorado has reopened for dine in with the local Sheriff refusing to enforce stay-at-home orders.   The owner of the cafe also comments that another month without business will most probably outright kill it. The article is behind a paywall though (Mountain Democrat, 2 free articles a month), so I won’t post the link here. 

[PhantomJaguarr]

I had a customer that walked without a mask and just told us to call the sheriff on him but this is ... wtf. I feel sorry for the employees having to risk their sanity and health for this type of .. bs. 

Quote

As it stands, the changed proclamation requires employees in retail establishments to wear masks, but face coverings are optional for customers. However, the proclamation still strongly advises that people wear masks for their own protection and the protection of others against the coronavirus.

 

Anger and frustration about the order reportedly erupted within three hours of its enactment, with opponents verbally abusing employees, threatening physical violence, and, in one instance, threatening gun violence.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/495818-oklahoma-city-officials-remove-mask-requirements-for-restaurants-stores

[Commodus]

18 minutes ago, PhantomJaguar77 said:

I had a customer that walked without a mask and just told us to call the sheriff on him but this is ... wtf. I feel sorry for the employees having to risk their sanity and health for this type of .. bs. 

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/495818-oklahoma-city-officials-remove-mask-requirements-for-restaurants-stores

There's an odd fatalism in some states, where it's not enough to open up stores too soon but to deliberately lift the safety measures key to those store openings.  Like they don't just want to pretend things are normal again -- they're eager to see mass deaths just so they can get that herd immunity sooner.  Admittedly this came after threats, but you'd think that authorities would hold fast.

[Bombastinator]

14 minutes ago, PhantomJaguar77 said:

I had a customer that walked without a mask and just told us to call the sheriff on him but this is ... wtf. I feel sorry for the employees having to risk their sanity and health for this type of .. bs. 

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/495818-oklahoma-city-officials-remove-mask-requirements-for-restaurants-stores

Isn’t it just fun when some dude thinks he knows better than people who spend their whole adult lives learning about a particular subject because he saw a program on TV and is happily willing to bet your but not his/her own life on it?

[Zodiark1593]

1 hour ago, Commodus said:

There's an odd fatalism in some states, where it's not enough to open up stores too soon but to deliberately lift the safety measures key to those store openings.  Like they don't just want to pretend things are normal again -- they're eager to see mass deaths just so they can get that herd immunity sooner.  Admittedly this came after threats, but you'd think that authorities would hold fast.

This is probably more an attempt to de-escalate if local enforcement is unwilling or unable to address those making the threats. If officials feel there is a substantial chance of someone making good on their threat, then the risk of a shooting would have to be weighed against the risk of heightened infection rates. Not an enviable position to be in if true. 
 

I don’t reside there, so I’m unsure of what’s going on or of the culture there, so I’m just giving my best guess based upon what articles I can find. 

[Commodus]

1 hour ago, Zodiark1593 said:

This is probably more an attempt to de-escalate if local enforcement is unwilling or unable to address those making the threats. If officials feel there is a substantial chance of someone making good on their threat, then the risk of a shooting would have to be weighed against the risk of heightened infection rates. Not an enviable position to be in if true. 
 

I don’t reside there, so I’m unsure of what’s going on or of the culture there, so I’m just giving my best guess based upon what articles I can find. 

Oh, I understand that they were trying to deescalate... it just feels like something you shouldn't bend on.  Knowingly putting many more lives at risk because of a few threats seems ridiculous.

[Zodiark1593]

36 minutes ago, Commodus said:

Oh, I understand that they were trying to deescalate... it just feels like something you shouldn't bend on.  Knowingly putting many more lives at risk because of a few threats seems ridiculous.

Given the locale, there’s probably a high firearm ownership rate, in a low income, rural area, with what appears to be some rather paranoid, somewhat mentally ill people around. Not exactly sure what the Mayor could do to reduce the risk of someone acting on their threat while also reducing the risk of virus spread. 

[mr moose]

I hope our country doesn't reopen the border with the US until we have a vaccine then.   It's one thing for them to want to endanger there fellow citizens, but damned if I am going to sit silent if my government lets them come here and endanger us to. 

[steelo]

8 hours ago, Commodus said:

It's supposed to be free and often is, but there are reports of people paying thousands just to get it diagnosed in the early stages.  I've heard more than once that the privatized American health care system is exacerbating the pandemic because people decline testing or treatment they don't think they can afford.

Testing is completely free in most (if not all) states. Also, copayment on private insurance has been waived for covid testing.

[captain_to_fire]

17 hours ago, RorzNZ said:

The most advanced IMO is Ad5-CoV. It’s the rbd of the spike protein in an adenovirus vector, it’s run by the Chinese in phase 2 trials since, I think, April 10th. The full spike protein and NP can elicit th2 responses and eosinophil infiltrate of the lung.

[emphasis is mine]

 

I'm actually concerned about that eosinophilic infiltrates as an side effect of Ad5-Cov if I'm reading it correctly. When there's eosinophil infiltration, there's synthesis of major basic protein which is toxic to parasitic worms but causes epithelial exfoliation and bronchospasm which in most cases requires a ventilator.

[atxcyclist]

3 hours ago, Zodiark1593 said:

Given the locale, there’s probably a high firearm ownership rate, in a low income, rural area, with what appears to be some rather paranoid, somewhat mentally ill people around. Not exactly sure what the Mayor could do to reduce the risk of someone acting on their threat while also reducing the risk of virus spread. 

And some people wonder why there's a rift in the political & social landscape in this country, holy shit. 'Just a bunch of poor, mentally-ill rednecks in that area'.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, captain_to_fire said:

[emphasis is mine]

 

I'm actually concerned about that eosinophilic infiltrates as an side effect of Ad5-Cov if I'm reading it correctly. When there's eosinophil infiltration, there's synthesis of major basic protein which is toxic to parasitic worms but causes epithelial exfoliation and bronchospasm which in most cases requires a ventilator.

There’s only major pathologies when whole spike protein or more so for whole virus vaccines - it is the NP protein that is responsible, in the Ad5 vaccine the RBD of the S protein is used, which reduces the pathologies significantly. Proper adjuvant is also necessary, I think they are stimulating TLR4,  but TLR3,7/8 and 9 are ideal targets.

[Rakanoth]

"Coronavirus cases fall in Japan despite lack of mandatory social distancing": https://thehill.com/policy/international/494994-coronavirus-cases-fall-in-japan-despite-lack-of-mandatory-social

 

I know this article is 5 days old, but take a look at their number of active cases: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/japan/. It's now consistently falling! And that's in a country which has some of the densest cities on Earth.

 

"Treat the patient, not the virus: how the shutdown morphed from a temporary, emergency response into a long-lasting bridge to an “all-clear” Hollywood ending": https://medium.com/@davidgoldhill/treat-the-patient-not-the-virus-f8dcd87231e7

 

God it's so true. We all jumped into this without considering second order effects of the lockdowns. I can't even figure out what the hell we are trying to accomplish anymore. "Two weeks to bend the curve" has turned into two months, with some indefinite lockdowns in place (either declared as indefinite or with constant kicking the can down the road). It is fucking outrageous to me that people jumped on board with this without a second thought, and the chant of the hive mind continues to be "two more weeks."

 

Those pushing lockdowns absolutely come from a place of privilege, and even if they have lost work, we bumped up unemployment to keep the middle class quiet. Everyone signed on with their "save grandma" and "save the healthcare workers" virtue signaling while completely ignoring the complete fallout from unaddeessed health needs, supply chain interruptions (particularly food), people with MH/substance use issues, people facing domestic violence, among others. They also seem to conveniently ignore the fact that social isolation itself is extremely detrimental to health outcomes.

 

I am guessing that people will stay complacent as long as stated continue to funnel them hush money and it doesn't directly affect them. This will go on as long as we allow it.

 

This is what I have to remind everyone of every time we discuss this virus: the virus isn't the big risk here. What we are doing in response is the risk.

 

The response is a massive, unethical, social experiment. We are guinea pigs on an uncharted "treatment" path. Society is the experimental patient.

 

What's really frustrating to me right now is, based on the many coronovirus discussions that I have witnessed or participated in, the entire debate has become political even though I feel like it never needed to be. I've always considered myself fairly liberal, or at least left of center, but from the start of this lockdown I had a real bad gut feeling about the long term economic impacts.

 

However, it seems you can't have any meaningful discourse on the main subreddits. If you're against the lockdown, you're immediately lumped in as an "idiot conservative." I guess I see why, as it's the more conservative states that are opening restrictions early. So what does this mean, I'm conservative now? I guess on this issue I am? But really I don't see how it needed to be a liberal vs conservative thing in the first place.

 

I actually still haven't understood why in most Western countries, lockdown was seen as a left/progressive thing while the opposite was seen as right-wing/conservative. Even in the UK where the government is conservative, much of the left has been clamouring for an even more strict lockdown. Funnily enough I read that in Sweden is the opposite - those questioning the government's strategy and demanding lockdown are mostly on the right.

 

The initial lockdown in March may have been justified for a few weeks. We honestly didn’t know if this thing was like smallpox or the plague, where it would kill 1/3 or the population.

 

It was apparent by late March, though - and I follow numerous bloggers who were doing the math and showing the science, and their blogs from then are still up and ignored - that we had overreacted, and by early April there was absolutely nothing to wait for except small incremental fatality rate improvements as we learned which meds were helpful, which populations were at risk, how infectious it was, etc.

 

Meanwhile, you can already see the media and their followers - on both sides- creating their own pseudo-history where they cherry pick various reports and timelines to push their narrative of it’s all Trumps fault or China is to blame 100%, etc.