Coronavirus

[Viking]

 

Bill Gates:

 

Everyone is trying to understand where we go from here. How long will the economic shut down last?

 

Bill Gates, pretty smart guy, with access to virus experts. No dog in the race. His take is even with the current shut downs in New York and Washington State the virus numbers will not peak there until late April (think about that curve that is shown everywhere). And the shut downs will need to last another month afterwards. And that is if the whole US quickly follows suit. So his take is we might start to be able to open the economy up in early June (and based on what we see in China the restart of the economy is very slow and consumers are slow to spend given continuing fears of catching the virus and fear of job loss).

 

A county by county approach will not work for the simple reason that peoples movements are not controlled.  And the counties that go back to work will allow the virus to resume its exponential growth in those areas (their low numbers today will eventually become big numbers). Trying a county by county approach will only extend the economic shut down to even longer than indicated above. Counties that go back to work early will simply start seeding new clusters in their area and they will silently spread to other counties. Again, the movement of people is not controlled within the US.

 

At some point you have to let people go back to work. The government cannot provide stimulus indefinitely. I think society needs to understand there is going to be pain with this....The idea that this could have been handled different with less pain is also not completely accurate (specific to the US). I said earlier it's impossible to lock down a country of this size which relies on personal transportation. I also don't think there is a realistic method (in the US) of squishing down the curve enough to avoid overwhelming a healthcare system which is built for AVERAGES.

 

Tell people over 55 to stay home. If they have jobs provide them a loan which should be repaid. Otherwise let others get on with life. Encourage them to social distance outside of working hours. But, I have a hard time believing individuals are going to stay put for more than a month as it is.

 

I'm sure a lot of you will disagree with this...But frankly I don't care. What's on the other side of a long term lock down is far more scary.

 

With all due respect, it cracks me up when people say ‘can’t do it’. That is a completely false statement. If we have learned anything the last 2,000 years it is that humans survive because they adapt. The virus does not give a shit what you think you can or can’t do. I do know one thing: eventually a country will do what it takes to get the virus under control. They will need to make the pain stop. So they simply will have no choice in the end.

 

All that matters is if you do the right thing or not. Right now you have a model staring you in the face that works: 6-10 week national lock down. If you try a different approach you are likely going to have a much worse health and economic outcome than the 6-10 weeks lock down plan. You just do not know it yet. But you will in another 2 or 3 weeks :-) And the longer you dither the worse the health and economic damage gets.

 

The virus has hit well over 100 countries in the world. We have lots of examples as countries have tried to fight the virus. We also have decades of history of past virus outbreaks that provide useful information (obviously not the same but still useful). Lots is known about how to deal with this virus.

 

Based on what is known once a country gets to the community transfer stage it has two options:

1.) lock down: if done china style, 6 weeks of pain. Radical lifestyle changes and manic testing regime.

2.) no lock down = prolonged shit show

[ERICOPOLY]

China offers some great lessons on how countries and the world will look once they get control of the virus. China is now banning all foreign travel into China. They are essentially walling off their country to ensure foreigners do not bring the virus back to China. Does not sound to me like business as usual for lots of industries even once you get the virus under control.

 

You're assuming tech is static though. Developments in screening have gone from virtually non existent to 10-minute tests being experimentally available in just weeks. Once you can screen people within minutes, why would you still need to shut borders?

 

Because if you were exposed to the virus 10 minutes ago you won't test positive in 20 minutes?

[minten]

With all due respect, it cracks me up when people say ‘can’t do it’. That is a completely false statement. If we have learned anything the last 2,000 years it is that humans survive because they adapt. The virus does not give a shit what you think you can or can’t do.

 

This is not about humanity though, is it. Humanity will surive this virus whatever we do. It's about individual humans making individual choices and a significant percentage of these humans have enormous trouble listening to any rules now, let alone in a few months. If death % was higher perhaps you'd have chance, but I agree with Castanza any lockdown over a month can't be done because too many individuals will simply no longer obey as they know this virus will most likely never affect them.

[Viking]

With all due respect, it cracks me up when people say ‘can’t do it’. That is a completely false statement. If we have learned anything the last 2,000 years it is that humans survive because they adapt. The virus does not give a shit what you think you can or can’t do.

 

This is not about humanity though, is it. Humanity will surive this virus whatever we do. It's about individual humans making individual choices and a significant percentage of these humans have enormous trouble listening to any rules now, let alone in a few months. If death % was higher perhaps you'd have chance, but I agree with Castanza any lockdown over a month can't be done because too many individuals will simply no longer obey as they know this virus will most likely never affect them.

 

If that is the case then the virus will win. Pretty straight forward. The virus also won in 1918. Not a pretty picture for many communities and countries. The story of life: you make choices and live with the consequences.

[Castanza]

 

Bill Gates:

 

Everyone is trying to understand where we go from here. How long will the economic shut down last?

 

Bill Gates, pretty smart guy, with access to virus experts. No dog in the race. His take is even with the current shut downs in New York and Washington State the virus numbers will not peak there until late April (think about that curve that is shown everywhere). And the shut downs will need to last another month afterwards. And that is if the whole US quickly follows suit. So his take is we might start to be able to open the economy up in early June (and based on what we see in China the restart of the economy is very slow and consumers are slow to spend given continuing fears of catching the virus and fear of job loss).

 

A county by county approach will not work for the simple reason that peoples movements are not controlled.  And the counties that go back to work will allow the virus to resume its exponential growth in those areas (their low numbers today will eventually become big numbers). Trying a county by county approach will only extend the economic shut down to even longer than indicated above. Counties that go back to work early will simply start seeding new clusters in their area and they will silently spread to other counties. Again, the movement of people is not controlled within the US.

 

At some point you have to let people go back to work. The government cannot provide stimulus indefinitely. I think society needs to understand there is going to be pain with this....The idea that this could have been handled different with less pain is also not completely accurate (specific to the US). I said earlier it's impossible to lock down a country of this size which relies on personal transportation. I also don't think there is a realistic method (in the US) of squishing down the curve enough to avoid overwhelming a healthcare system which is built for AVERAGES.

 

Tell people over 55 to stay home. If they have jobs provide them a loan which should be repaid. Otherwise let others get on with life. Encourage them to social distance outside of working hours. But, I have a hard time believing individuals are going to stay put for more than a month as it is.

 

I'm sure a lot of you will disagree with this...But frankly I don't care. What's on the other side of a long term lock down is far more scary.

 

With all due respect, it cracks me up when people say ‘can’t do it’. That is a completely false statement. If we have learned anything the last 2,000 years it is that humans survive because they adapt. The virus does not give a shit what you think you can or can’t do. I do know one thing: eventually a country will do what it takes to get the virus under control. They will need to make the pain stop. So they simply will have no choice in the end.

 

All that matters is if you do the right thing or not. Right now you have a model staring you in the face that works: 6-10 week national lock down. If you try a different approach you are likely going to have a much worse health and economic outcome than the 6-10 weeks lock down plan. You just do not know it yet. But you will in another 2 or 3 weeks :-) And the longer you dither the worse the health and economic damage gets.

 

The virus has hit well over 100 countries in the world. We have lots of examples as countries have tried to fight the virus. We also have decades of history of past virus outbreaks that provide useful information (obviously not the same but still useful). Lots is known about how to deal with this virus.

 

Based on what is known once a country gets to the community transfer stage it has two options:

1.) lock down: if done china style, 6 weeks of pain. Radical lifestyle changes and manic testing regime.

2.) no lock down = prolonged shit show

 

300k National Guard members

 

900k Law Enforcement Officers

 

Roughly 26k per state.

 

Cities on a good day have 3-4k police officers. If you go full scale China lock down you will easily eat up half of the state resources for just the 2-3 major cities in each state. So you direct the rest to block highways and major roads? What about back roads? Who will deliver all the food to individuals doors like they did in China? Are ou going to tell people they can't go to the grocery store?

 

It's a logistical nightmare.

 

_________________

 

On the financial side what do we do? Let the Fed keep printing? None of these small businesses are going to get bailed out. Anything more than a month is ludicrous.

[rb]

On the financial side what do we do? Let the Fed keep printing? None of these small businesses are going to get bailed out. Anything more than a month is ludicrous.

Some of the ideas are very scary.

 

What this has shown is that if you don't lock it down and lock it down good then it turns into a horror show. See Italy and Spain. NYC is not at that point but it will get there. In Europe France is next and the Netherlands and the UK after it.

 

Do you think the economy will go on its merry way and people spending and supporting small businesses while you you have a horror show going on? How is the economy gonna work nicely when you have a seized up health care system?

 

The real nightmare scenario is that the US will fuck it up. And by all measures it looks like the US will fuck it up. It'll cost even more money. The more that you don't keep it under control the more money it costs too.

[minten]

Do you think the economy will go on its merry way and people spending and supporting small businesses while you you have a horror show going on? How is the economy gonna work nicely when you have a seized up health care system?

 

After locking things down a few weeks the curve will be bend and hospitals will be better equiped. You won't reach zero or even close to it.. And yeah, I do think the economy will work nicely. It's a horror show in many parts of the world and first world economies don't care and never did. It's a horror show even in parts of those first world countries themselves in some areas and the economy doesn't even care then. When media get tired of covering this, people will lose interest and continue to do what they've always done.

[mcliu]

Chinese style lockdown in US is not practical. Lots of guns in the US..

[Castanza]

Some of the ideas are very scary.

 

What this has shown is that if you don't lock it down and lock it down good then it turns into a horror show. See Italy and Spain. NYC is not at that point but it will get there. In Europe France is next and the Netherlands and the UK after it.

I don't think it's possible to do a hard lock down in the US. Too many logistics involved. One way or another you are going to have millions of people making hundreds of interactions a day.

 

Do you think the economy will go on its merry way and people spending and supporting small businesses while you you have a horror show going on? How is the economy gonna work nicely when you have a seized up health care system?

No, I don't think the economy will keep chugging along on cruise control. But I think it would coast. I absolutely think people will go out to bars, go shopping, if they are allowed to work. But as I said, I think it would be best for High Risk individuals to stay home and quarantine. I also think some precaution of social distancing etc should take place. I'm not saying to allow stuff like Spring Break, or allow flights, concerts, sports, etc.

 

The real nightmare scenario is that the US will fuck it up. And by all measures it looks like the US will fuck it up. It'll cost even more money. The more that you don't keep it under control the more money it costs too.

 

I think people who are arguing for a hard shutdown are greatly misrepresenting the long term economic costs of that. To quote Bernanke "We just open up the computer and move the decimal point a few spots."

 

 

 

[mcliu]

NYC can’t even lockdown the city when it’s the epicentre, how can you lockdown the whole country?

 

Need to find a US solution, can’t just copy China.

[Guest Schwab711]

There is not a simple trade-off between lockdown and economic activity that exists. That seems to be the misconception in this thread. You can't just ignore the virus and keep economic growth. With each passing week, economic activity will be severely restricted as people avoid the virus on their own. It's happened all throughout history when pandemics have sufficient CFR's such that people change their behavior.

[Dalal.Holdings]

We could have copied S Korea (not China) and avoided lockdown. There are still regions in the country that can right now. Even the places that are late can. It involves contact tracing, widespread testing (of contacts especially), and strict isolation of known positives. This would require federal leadership, but instead we have almost no centralized leadership and rely on patchwork local/state leadership which precludes us from achieving the S Korea model.

 

As a result, this is set up to play out in the United States in a highly patchwork manner--some regions will surge later as others are resolving and maybe the late surge individuals will travel to the now senescent regions and re-expose the population...

[Guest Schwab711]

 

Do you think the economy will go on its merry way and people spending and supporting small businesses while you you have a horror show going on? How is the economy gonna work nicely when you have a seized up health care system?

No, I don't think the economy will keep chugging along on cruise control. But I think it would coast. I absolutely think people will go out to bars, go shopping, if they are allowed to work. I also think some precaution of social distancing etc should take place. I'm not saying to allow stuff like Spring Break, or allow flights, concerts, sports, etc.

 

 

The issue is your assumption does not match prior economic behavior of people during past pandemics (e.g. 1918) nor does it match current behavior in areas that are not under lockdown-like orders.

 

Restaurant activity was down 50%+ Y/Y in Florida, despite the spring break videos that make it seem like it was still popular to go out (pre-lockdown order).

 

If your assumption was true, we'd be having a different conversation about trade-offs. There's no evidence it's true, that's why it's not being seriously considered. That might be why you think there's mass hysteria when everyone is actually trying to limit economic damage in the long-run. Folks fully understand the economic damage of a nationwide shutdown. The idea is that it is actually minimizing damage because we either have lockdown and are healthier or effective lockdown (due to individual behavior to avoid illness for a sufficient period of time that leads to widespread SMB bankruptcy) and have far greater numbers of severe illness/death.

 

Either way, mass bankruptcy/economic loss. One is short-term, thus stimulus/printing can offset it some and we are a healthier nation. The other is a prolonged period of economic and healthcare distress. That's what folks mean when they say you can't 'pretend the virus away' or ignore it. They aren't ignorant of the trade-offs you are raising.

[cwericb]

Short term pain for long term gain. Ignore this at your own peril.

 

China seems to be able to control this with a population of 1.3 billion and the US with a population of just 300 million can't?

 

The more time spent dithering around, the worse it will get.

[rb]

NYC can’t even lockdown the city when it’s the epicentre, how can you lockdown the whole country?

 

Need to find a US solution, can’t just copy China.

That's pretty much just part of the US stupidity. China did it and it worked great. But the US can't copy China cause it's the US, blah blah. It's had a 2 month head start on China. Did it find a solution. It just crossed its fingers. Is it working on a solution now? No. It just crosses it fingers harder. Meanwhile pretty much anyone that knows what they're talking about just says that shutdown is the only way.

[mcliu]

Shutdown makes sense, but you can’t do it China style. How are you gonna mass detain people and force them into quarantine camps? How are you gonna force people to stay in their homes?

[cwericb]

" How are you gonna force people to stay in their homes? "

 

"Chinese style lockdown in US is not practical. Lots of guns in the US.."

 

Perhaps you answered your own question.

[cwericb]

Putting things in perspective;

 

Total US deaths:

 

March

13th 7

14 9

15 12

 

24th 225

25 247

26 268

[Guest Schwab711]

Shutdown makes sense, but you can’t do it China style. How are you gonna mass detain people and force them into quarantine camps? How are you gonna force people to stay in their homes?

 

It doesn't have to be 100% effective. More effective it is, the shorter it is, but I saw something that ~90% reduction in interactions lowers Ro such that infections will decline.

 

90% is not the same for every area and not exact

Depending on how familiar you are with exponential behavior, the talk of Ro may or may not be helpful.

 

What's important is non-perfect shutdowns work if they are generally effective

[alwaysdrawing]

Flu season looks like a blip on the NYC Influenza Like Illness data tracker.  So much for orthopa's theory--deaths and illness rates now clearly indicate no widespread incidence back in Jan/Feb. 

 

https://weinbergerlab.shinyapps.io/NYC_syndromic/

[rb]

Shutdown makes sense, but you can’t do it China style. How are you gonna mass detain people and force them into quarantine camps? How are you gonna force people to stay in their homes?

I'm not actually disagreeing with you. I also think Castanza has a point about Americans not wanting to stay more than a month or whatever.

 

What I'm saying is that it's pretty clear what's going to develop. That's what I mean by it's scary and the US will fuck it up.

 

So a few more weeks will pass and the US is gonna start printing 2000-3000 dead per day. By contrast Iraq war i think was less than 5000 total. At that point the military talk is gonna start to emerge. People will start talking about declaring war on the virus, blah blah blah. But since shutdown is pretty much the only thing that works they'll do something along those lines. But they won't call it shutdown. They'll call it freedom isolation or something like that. You also don't need 100% compliance but enough people will comply for it to work.

 

You basically get to to the same end, only it takes longer and the economic damage is greater. Problem is that at this rate 1 week costs a hell of a lot of money.

[Viking]

Here is a summary of where Washington State is at today. Long article but it presents a good summary of all the hard choices and personal hardship. This crisis will be especially devastating for small businesses.

 

- https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/coronavirus-washington-state-leveling-off/2020/03/26/682790e6-6f6b-11ea-a3ec-70d7479d83f0_story.html#comments-wrapper

 

 

[Jurgis]

I agree with rb that fear is a yuge motivator. If deaths climb, people will agree with almost anything. We already agree with workplaces, restaurants, clothing stores being closed. You might think Americans won't agree to martial law, enforced quarantine, etc., watch what happens if deaths explode.

 

Now, OTOH, if deaths don't explode then other motivators trump (lol). So it depends. There is some number of deaths where people say "we don't care, we just not gonna lockdown". And there is a number of deaths where people are totally fine with lockdown of pretty much any severity.

[minten]

I agree with rb that fear is a yuge motivator. If deaths climb, people will agree with almost anything. We already agree with workplaces, restaurants, clothing stores being closed. You might think Americans won't agree to martial law, enforced quarantine, etc., watch what happens if deaths explode.

 

Now, OTOH, if deaths don't explode then other motivators trump (lol). So it depends. There is some number of deaths where people say "we don't care, we just not gonna lockdown". And there is a number of deaths where people are totally fine with lockdown of pretty much any severity.

 

I'm not totally sure it's actually number of deaths.  People die all the time.  I'm guessing it's more like the perceived (not objective) risk of you dying yourself.

[Viking]

Another perspective from Washington State. Perhaps a glimpse into the ‘new normal’. Reinforces the idea that leadership is perhaps the most important ingredient in a successful response.

 

- https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/27/opinion/coronavirus-seattle.html?algo=top_conversion&fellback=false&imp_id=18775815&imp_id=631755493&action=click&module=trending&pgtype=Article&region=Footer

 

“There really is no middle ground,” said Bill Gates, whose foundation has put up $100 million to blunt the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. “It’s very tough to say to people, ‘Hey, keep going to restaurants, go buy new houses, ignore that pile of bodies in the corner.’ ”

 

President Trump’s talk of opening the United States for business by Easter is greeted in this precinct of sanity as the heartless bluster of a career con man. The public radio station in Seattle, KUOW, has stopped airing Trump’s live briefings because the volume of misinformation he puts out cannot be corrected in real time.