Coronavirus in the United States - news and thoughts

Do you think the United States was more prepared than South Korea? Japan? Singapore? Taiwan?

 

The economist has a great article about Taiwan. You want to see how to handle a pandemic? Read what Taiwan did.

 

This is such a tired defense. We've all watched the video, not the edited one, but the original. He was referencing democrats concern about the virus and criticism of Trump over his handling of it as their new hoax. Thus implying that it was no big deal. It was CLEAR from his language over the days and weeks that he did not consider the virus a serious threat. How people keep defending this is just hilarious. Cons really do have TDS.

Regarding the preparedness of the United States for a pandemic, there have been multiple perspectives on that. Some have said the US was in great shape, like John's Hopkins, others have said it was not in great shape. Ultimately, if you do believe John's Hopkins, then that is NOT a defense of Trump, but rather a black mark against his administrations handling of the pandemic. If the US was in such great shape, how did they bungle this so badly? I think it's more realistic that the US was not well prepared for it, for many reasons. Some of which come from the fact that the US federal government never took a sufficiently strong stance against coronavirus until it was too late. Compounding this issue is that the administration has gone through so many reorganizations that it just doesn't operate efficiently and it refuses to provide specific leadership to the states because of some strange belief that the states have to take care of themselves.

 

I think there is a big distinction between calling something a hoax but downplaying the concern over it I'm not in his head (thankfully) anymore than anyone else on here. Not sure what he was thinking unless it was to downplay the talk of 3 million deaths possible in the US to keep people from panicking. Not defending his words, intent or outcome just trying to stop some from continuing to state that Trump called the virus a hoax.

 

COVID-19 Crisis Shows Governments and Private Companies Spent a Decade Being Fiscally Irresponsible

 

I don't think there's a big distinction at all about calling a virus a hoax, and calling the concern over a virus a hoax. The effect is the same, and that's the public believing there's nothing to worry about. You wouldn't worry about a fake virus. Nor do you worry about a virus that isn't particularly virulent, unless you're a hypochondriac.

As for the US being most prepared, we are potentially in great shape for an outbreak. We have a good ratio of hospital beds to people, decent infrastructure, and good ways to communicate to the public. But all this potential means nothing if you don't act in time. And that is something Trump didn't do. Remember, not only did he call the concern over Coronavirus a hoax, Trump also doesn't take responsibility.

We had time to act in January and February to unleash our pandemic response potential. Trump squandered this time.

 

You can do it if you maintain social distancing. Try to avoid touching things. You need fresh air and exercise. Just try to give others on the trial a wide berth. Suggest wearing a mask of. Some kind.

 

Guess why they swallowed that stuff?

 

Everyone on here references articles and statements from the world renowned scientific & medical community experts as gospel and I provide a article from John Hopkins concerning the issue or lack of one and now you are asking my opinion as if the article is flawed? So now the experts don't know what they are talking about?
When you say prepared do you mean by shutting things down early rather than waiting later but hopefully prior to hospital overload (herd immunity thinking)? IMO it is way too early to determine which approach will likely prove best in the long run. I am of the herd immunity thinking. I have yet to see anyone who can explain how those countries who were really proactive in shutting things down early will be able to proactively open their countries back up without future spikes in infections and then continually having to shut things down over and over again until a vaccine is available. Maybe wear masks and goggles till a vaccine comes out? The countries you mentioned have done a great job in containing the virus but I wonder if they have done too good of a job. Plus those countries, I would imagine, have a slightly different viewpoint on personal rights and freedoms than the US on a whole......don't you know we can do whatever we please and whenever we want to do it

 

Good point about Taiwan. I don't know how they did it, but apparently they based their reaction on past experience with SARS. For perspective, Minnesota (just selected this state because it's where I live) is pretty far down the list of states, in terms of numbers.

Location..........population.....cases.........deaths
Minnesota.........5.6mil.............865.............24
Taiwan.............23.8mil............355.............5

Even places like Iowa (786/11), Delaware (450/14), and Idaho (1,014/10) have higher numbers than Taiwan, which is 80 miles from China. Do you have a link for that Economist article, or is it a pay site?

 

New York has been on lock down for 18 days and cases still skyrocketing. Geez, we need some good news and fast.

 

The reason we didn’t go to herd immunity strategy was because of the projections of the number of people who would die. Not hundreds of thousands as predicted now. Millions. With hospitals overrun. Comparing South Korea, Taiwan, California and Washington to other states in the US makes clear what the better approach is. The idea is to not overwhelm the system. It isn’t way too early. Because when it is too late, it is too late.

 

it was in the actual magazine I’ll look for it online when I have time.

 

I would say look at hospitalization and death trends and less on positive cases as testing procedures may have changed, test backlogs just getting posted etc. Someone said Cuomo stated that 2/3rds of those in the hospital had been released so that sounded very encouraging if true.

 

I generally defer to experts but often you have to understand what they’re looking at. For instance, when saying the US is really far down the healthcare spectrum compared to other countries isn’t in conflict with saying that the care you pay for here is world class.

As for this particular issue, South Korea literally ran a nation-wide Coronavirus drill in November 2019. They tested at a far higher per capita rate out of the gate than anyone and were successful in containing it. We haven’t come close to their response or preparations from my vantage point.

Singapore literally takes everyone’s temperature as you debark at their airport upon other measures. They had it contained but recently allowing increased traffic (maybe a bit of overconfidence) has caused an uptick so they’ve instituted shelter in place rules as of this week.

So without reading the Johns Hopkins study in detail, I’m dubious as to what “most prepared” means in the context of their study since by preparedness at I’ve seen and subsequent outcomes it isn't true, at least as I would measure it.

Now, I do agree with your sentiment about tamping down on this disease too well. I’m not sure it’s sustainable without a readily available vaccine in the next 3-6 months. But I’m not sure what the alternative is either. Do you tell your citizens a number of you are expendable?

 

Good post- disagree on the "few" but ok. The "what's it matter part" is where I disagree, and why I found the attitude of certain people troubling. Every person is entitled to their opinion but the question is does every opinion deserve equal weight. Unfortunately, in this country we now have news sources providing a relatively constant drum beat of lies and disinformation. By every objective measure, Fox news is less accurate than any other news source, though MSNBC gives them a run. PolitiFact - Fact-checking Fox, MSNBC and CNN: PunditFact's network scorecards

On many matters I find these inaccuracies annoying but agree with you that in the grand scheme what does it matter. However, any objective person saw Covaid coming as the experts were practically yelling at us. What do these idiots do? Keep lying, minimizing, diverting, and blaming others. I think in the grand scheme of things the potential death of hundreds of thousands, and a family member of mine, "matters" when but for the disinformation we could be doing much better than this.

Again, people are entitled to their opinions but on life/death matters, the village idiot should be moved to the side so intelligent conversation can be had. The internet provides a megaphone for idiots and in this situation has caused tangible harm. That is worth addressing to me, but that is just me.

As an aside, consider another developing scientific issue - global warming. The experts are ALL again screaming in our faces about it, but we are ignoring these pleas in favor of listening to politicians say "it is a hoax." Wonder how this will turn out? If just a few folks begin to question the anti-science lies, maybe humanity can act based on its most intelligent thoughts rather than following people who are clueless. My hope.

Anyway, good luck to all.

 

Lt. General Honore, Commander of Joint Task Force Katrina, on Jared Kushner saying that distributing lifesaving materials from the federal stockpile is not the government's job: “He doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about. He’s totally clueless.”