is 180000 dead due to coronavirus an acceptable loss to not shut down the economy?

Author: n8nrgmi

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@Greyparrot
Now that you have returned from your Googling of the phrase "cherry-pick" let's do a thought experiment to test whether you are considering evidence then coming to conclusions or instead doing the exact opposite.

If someone made a thread saying that gun control laws have a generally positive impact on crime rates and they used as evidence the fact that a small county in Nebraska with a population of 400 that had banned guns had less crime per capita than another random small county of 400 in Idaho which had not, would you say they were coming to a logical conclusion based on sound reasoning or would you point out that they were blatantly cherry-picking and therefore their conclusions were not likely to be entirely valid?
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@Greyparrot
so now that only 6% have died because of covid, compared to the 94% that died with it, sure does change things.  2.6 average comorbidities is significant.  Then take out the nursing home murders, er I mean deaths and what risk is it really?  Enough to close the economy?  I don't think so.  Much like the H1N1 if you are at risk, be careful, stay home etc.  2019   49,157 pneumonia deaths, so what's the magic number for putting people out of work and bankrupting businesses?
You may recall the saying, people don't die from HIV it's something else that kills them, usually pneumonia.  I think that's very true with covid as well.  It makes an already bad situation (condition) worse.  But that's true for any illness they get on top of what they already have so.....
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@TheDredPriateRoberts
The lockdown was absolutely unnecessary.

"SCIENCE" <tm> told us millions would die if there was no lockdown. That science was absolutely wrong and clearly overblown given what we now know from cities and countries that did not lockdown. It was about as effective on mortality rates as wearing a mask, but with a MUCH higher social cost due to the loss of employment, education, and quality of life.



What the science is now discovering as the lockdowns are lifted is that most of the policy efforts to fight COVID only delayed the inevitable deaths of people susceptible to dying from the disease, and may have made it much worse by not hastening the herd immunity of the healthy while also not isolating the at-risk people adequately. The lockdown policies actually ensured the virus would linger on long after the expected seasonal cycle of flu-like viruses. In a few months, we will conclusively have the annual death totals of all Americans from all sources from the CDC, but the data up to now already supports the predicted deaths from at-risk people.

The lockdowns across the country past the hospital curve flattening were proven absolutely unnecessary, and the disproved predictions of millions of dead originating from bad science should be held accountable.

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@TheDredPriateRoberts
I have developed a personal algorithm for weeding out junk science.

If people with much more to lose than I do like billionaires and Speakers of the House personally dismiss the science, then it's pretty safe for me to assume it is junk science.


Same thing about Global Warming. Millionaires don't see any actual danger to their personal wealth or quality of life. Why should I worry then about my paltry wealth?

Millionaires leave states over a few tax percentage points or noticeable increasing violence from riots but don't care about global warming? Junk science confirmed.

The vast majority of millionaires utilize fossil homes and fossil transportation without a worry in the world. Millionaires still investing heavily in real estate on coastlines for future wealth prospects. No hesitation at all, and boy do they have a LOT more to lose if they are wrong about the science.

Those rats have yet to abandon that ship.
n8nrgmi
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the "we should get herd immunity" argument is stupid. herd immunity is where ninety or so percent of the population gets the disease. which means millions die. if we can avoid that, that's the optimal route. other countries are much lower in their death rate... there's no reason we can't be like them. 
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@n8nrgmi
which means millions die

Thoroughly debunked by all the statistics of cities and countries without a total lockdown policy.

You are perpetrating junk science with that "millions dead" fantasy.

Even if all the at-risk people managed to get COVID instead of 30-50%, we wouldn't even get close to a million deaths. It's not even remotely possible even if you tried.






Mind you, Trump's lockdown policies were all based on this now thoroughly debunked junk science, but it's too late to reeducate the public.



"The trouble with being too easily led by models is we can too easily be misled by models. Epidemic models may seem entirely different from economic models or climate models, but they all make terrible forecasts if filled with wrong assumptions and parameters."
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@Greyparrot
i'm not promoting a total lockdown. i'm promoting masks and social distancing. and, by definition, herd immunity is like ninety percent of the population gets the disease. the thing is, the death rate for those who get the disease, is like .7%. so do the math with 330 million people in the usa.... millions dead. 
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@n8nrgmi
No there is no reason to purposely infect 100% of the population, but at the end of the year, we will conclusively know just how small of an impact the lockdown actually was at protecting at-risk people. 

Millions of lives were never going to be lost if we did not have a lockdown policy. The USA doesn't even have that many critically at-risk people that would fail to fight the virus off.

the death rate for those who get the disease, is like .7%

That's a statistic calculated before scientists discovered that the overwhelming number of infected people showed no symptoms. Many were getting the disease unknowingly.

There are currently only 9 million people over 70 in the USA. Even if all 100% were to get infected, given that we know around 10% do die in that age range, and discounting that most of this data comes from monitoring people over 70 with symptoms requiring hospitalization, that still does not even reach 1 million for total deaths.  Even in the most worst-case scenario imaginable.
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@TheDredPriateRoberts

Tucker exposed the nonsense of the punitive lockdowns way back in June, along with the misinformation to justify the lockdowns.


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@Greyparrot
That's a statistic calculated before scientists discovered that the overwhelming number of infected people showed no symptoms. Many were getting the disease unknowingly.
Statistics calculated before discovering and including asymptomatic people had a death rate of >1%. Based on this article, 0.7 isn't too far off the mark


It seems like later studies are suggesting an IFR of 0.5 - 1.0


205 days later

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@Greyparrot
Or we could've done what Sweden did and never shut down. They pretty much have nothing to worry about over there and the herd immunity strategy seems to be working.
Lockdowns are completely useless when the people living in these places think being asked to put on a mask is an affront on their liberty. Public policy can’t make people care about their health and safety.


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@Double_R
Lockdowns are completely useless when the people living in these places think being asked to put on a mask is an affront on their liberty. Public policy can’t make people care about their health and safety.

Well yes, that's the point. You have to live in North Korea for a lockdown policy to make any sort of sense logistically.
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@Greyparrot
Well yes, that's the point. You have to live in North Korea for a lockdown policy to make any sort of sense logistically.
No, you just need a citizenry that believes in science over conspiracy theories, and is not so childish as to care more about not letting the government tell them what to do than to follow basic health and safety guidelines.
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@Double_R
Like I said. North Korea. Everywhere outside of North Korea exists a healthy mistrust of people in power instead of cult-like religion to an institution.
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@Greyparrot
There is nothing cult like about following science, and this idea that we’re just sheep believing whatever our leaders tell us is just plain stupid. We have a system of checks and balances for a reason. 

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@Double_R
"following science"
Again, another buzzphrase coined by the radical left.

We can and should embrace science, but we cannot follow it. It is up to us to make the hard choices. Not scientists.



Greyparrot
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When it comes to navigating the pandemic, many proudly proclaim: "Follow The Science." It's a popular and feel-good message. To me, #FollowTheScience means that science is essential to making good and rational decisions and implies that science makes policy decisions clear. The first half of that sentence is right. The second half is dangerously wrong. I think we must address what science is and is not.

Of course, science is necessary to navigate the pandemic. Science -- in the form of randomized trials -- allows us to separate therapies that work (dexamethasone) from those that do not (hydroxychloroquine). Science has allowed us to develop two mRNA vaccines, which may yet free us from this plague. The rapid development of a vaccine on this timespan is a great success of science, or as the "The Onion" reports, "Nation Can't Believe They Spent So Long Overlooking Obvious Solution Of mRNA Instructions For Spike Protein Encapsulated In Lipid Nanoparticle."

At the same time, science will never be sufficient to guide choices and trade-offs. Science cannot make value judgments. Science does not determine policy. Policy is a human endeavor that combines science with values and priorities. In other words, science can help quantify the increased risk (or lack thereof) of school reopening on SARS-Cov-2 spread, and help quantify the educational losses from continued closure, but science cannot tell you whether to open or close schools. Making the decision requires values, principles, a vision of the type of society we want to be. How much do we care about the kids that rely on public school? Is it enough to offset a theoretical (but unsubstantiated) risk of viral spread? On this topic, I agree with others that we have chosen poorly.

When it comes to COVID-19 policy, we have faced and continue to face immense trade-offs. Every restriction we place may slow viral spread, but may carry dozens of unforeseen countervailing consequences. Scientists can help define these trade-offs, but scientists have no special ability to speak about values on behalf of all citizens. In other words, science is necessary but not sufficient to deal with COVID-19. Thinking otherwise is a dangerous view that steals political power from people and gives it to scientists under false pretenses.

There are several other misconceptions about science in the age of COVID-19. Let me discuss a few.

1. Credentialism is not science. Science is not the degrees someone has or where they trained. Is their view justified or is it unsupported? I joke that when someone disagrees with you about COVID-19 policy, you ask if they have an MD, MPH, PhD, faculty appointment, policy expertise, and infectious disease background. But if they agree with you, none of that matters. They are a self-taught savant and amateur expert!

2. Science is not dogmatic; it demands testable, falsifiable hypotheses. The hallmark of science is that when there are competing ideas, we can agree on studies that will decide who is correct. Believing in things that cannot be falsified or tested is religion. Science is everything else. I worry we have a lot of religion when it comes to COVID-19.

3. Science is never censoring. Over the course of the pandemic, YouTube removed videos by university professors with unpopular views, and Facebook and Twitter have labeled some posts as false or inaccurate. Even if we disagree with these speakers, this is dangerous. Science is the idea that we must confront, discuss, debate, and refute ideas. Using brute force, the power of the platform, to proclaim the truth is antithetical to our creed.

The simple fact is that most heretical ideas will turn out to be false, but some may be true. Academic freedom is the idea that we allow many people to be wrong, so that some may be right. That doesn't mean we blindly accept everything folks say, in fact, it means the opposite, we must interrogate and challenge them, but we must create an environment where folks can argue their case, even if initially unpopular.

4. Science is not a popularity contest of consensus. In an era of petitions, it seems as if science is the belief that most scientists hold. This is incorrect. Science is a process to make sense of the world, and folks in the minority may well be vindicated. In fact, throughout history, there have been many moments in medicine where the majority was wrong.

5. Science is applying criticism impartially, equally, fairly. Let's say there are two studies about masks. One is a randomized trial with a wide confidence interval, the other is a retrospective observational study with myriad deficiencies. It is completely fine to fault the RCT for having results that are compatible with a broad range of outcomes, and I did, but one cannot celebrate the observational study as "proving masks work" simply because its conclusion aligns with one's worldview. In other words, we have to apply critical appraisal fairly. If we try to convince others that weak or faulty evidence proves something works, we are not scientists, but magicians.

6. Observational studies on hot topics are a self-fulfilling prophecy. For popular and debated questions, such as the benefit of hydroxychloroquine, vitamin D, and other interventions, retrospective observational studies are guaranteed to give you what you wish. I don't mean any specific study will be positive or negative, but some studies will be positive and some will be negative.

Consider this: there are thousands of datasets, and tens of thousands of investigators and these folks carry strong biases in both directions (that an intervention helps or is useless), and there is enough flexibility in analysis, that it is guaranteed with enough time, we will get observational studies showing that these practices help or hurt. The only way out of the maze is randomization. Randomized trials are desperately needed on hot topics, as these constrain multiple testing, and limit analytic flexibility through pre-specified protocols.

7. What works, in theory, does not always work in practice. There is an entire branch of science called Implementation science, which studies the gap between what works in ideal settings and what works given the messy realities of the real world. Some scientists fault the public for not heeding public health recommendations, but these folks miss the point. How you communicate your message and the sustainability and uptake of your message are part of the intervention itself, and you must be judged by what is achieved. Public policy is a pragmatic science. It is what happens when science meets real life.

Science is a tool. It is quite possibly the best tool human beings have ever devised, but just like any tool, it has limits. It cannot tell you how to adjudicate trade-offs. It is not merely what the majority believe. It requires open-mindedness and humility. It may not offer insights where bias and multiple hypothesis testing dominate. It requires one to constantly question one's assumptions, to devise experiments that may surprise. It is necessary to battle a pandemic, but it is not sufficient. We can and should embrace science, but we cannot follow it. It is up to us to make the hard choices. Not scientists.


Double_R
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@Greyparrot
Again, another buzzphrase coined by the radical left.
No, it’s a response to an ideology that divorces public policy from the findings of science by claiming it takes values into account when it’s really just an assertion of values alone.

If you want an example of a partisan buzzword try “radical”.

We can and should embrace science, but we cannot follow it. It is up to us to make the hard choices. Not scientists.
What hard choices is the political right in this country making regarding COVID?
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@Double_R
What hard choices is the political right in this country making regarding COVID?
Ending a tyrannical lockdown.

No, it’s a response to an ideology that divorces public policy from the findings of science 
You misspelled political scientists. People like you that swear Fauci is an unbiased scientist contribute to devastating school lockdowns. You caused that tragedy along with a bunch of gullible people on the right who believed with cult-like fascination that Fauci was unbiased.

If you want an example of a partisan buzzword try “radical”.
The wonky Lockdown of non at-risk people was absolutely a radical policy.
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@Double_R
I can understand from a leftist's viewpoint that sacrificing millions of kids with school lockdowns was worth it to ensure Trump was removed from power, but Trump is now gone for at least 4 years. Why are we continuing the insane lockdowns now? Are not the radical left terrorists appeased with Trump gone? Or will it take a genocide of all opposition? What will it take to save America's kids?

How many more years of lost youth is acceptable due to Orangemanbad?
Double_R
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@Greyparrot
Ending a tyrannical lockdown.
In other words, nothing. Exactly my point.

People like you that swear Fauci is an unbiased scientist
People like me are not the ones who are obsessed with Dr. Fauci. That would be the people who have no grasp of how this virus works and seem to think the entire world is in on the conspiracy, so you need a figure head to attack and also paint as a deity to the other side.

People like me put our trust in the scientific community, as do you I’m sure when it comes to anything else that hasn’t been politicized.

The wonky Lockdown of non at-risk people was absolutely a radical policy.
You do know that people who are not at risk spread the virus to those who are right?

Double_R
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@Greyparrot
I can understand from a leftist's viewpoint that sacrificing millions of kids with school lockdowns was worth it to ensure Trump was removed from power, but Trump is now gone for at least 4 years. Why are we continuing the insane lockdowns now?
It’s like you are pretending to be a conspiracy theorist for satire.

Crazy thought, if the left weren’t actually pushing for these lockdowns, how could that be proven to you?

If this were before the election we would have easily said “it’ll be proven if Trump is gone and the lockdowns remain” but Trump is gone and the lockdowns remain, yet here you are... still holding onto the same conclusion but searching for a new answer to fit your contorted picture.