At What Point Does The Economy Take Precdence?

[Deskdiary]

Young people and new that otherwise healthy people in their 20s, 30s and 40s are succumbing is being reported because it's exceptional. They are the exception that proves the rule.

The fact is the vast vast majority of people will survive, some of whom may well only have mild symptoms, so (and I fully accept this is going to annoy people - and unlike many on on AB I'm not an expert!) at what point do we learn to accept the losses, get people out of the lockdown and focus on the economy?

If the lockdown continues for too long, if as a result of the lockdown people remain furloughed, and if companies start to go to the wall, at some point surely we need to run the risk and end the lockdown.

Frankly, if the economy becomes becomes fubarred, the issues people are currently facing will pale in comparison.

[naomi24]

Sorry ..Deskdiary. Desktop was someone who used to be around a long time ago.

[Zacs-Master]

They’re surviving at the moment. But are you not worried that people with zero underlying problems are dying and there’s no explanation?

[Deskdiary]

So the mortality rate is somewhere between 0.5% ans 1%? Yes?

I accept 0.5% to 1% is crappy, but by any objective measure, 0.5% to 1% is a tiny minority. Add in to the mix that a large proportion of the 0.5% to 1% will be old or have underlying issues, then the % reduces.

[naomi24]

237SJ at 22:28, I think that's highly likely.

[Zacs-Master]

So tell me why people are dying who have zero underlying conditions?

[royfromaus]

Open up too soon and the virus explodes again;



Open what up too soon, jim?

[ToraToraTora]

DD: what do you mean by "taking precedence"? You mean we stop all measures to stop the spread and let the virus do its worst? Effectively going with herd immunity? Just trying to understand what you intend.

[Prudie]

That's a bit like asking why do healthy adults die in their sleep or babies from cot death for no reason. Nobody has the slightest idea.

[Deskdiary]

"So tell me why people are dying who have zero underlying conditions?"

They are the exceptions that prove the rule.

You've lost this one - good try, but ultimately a fail.

[TheChair]

The statistics that Naomi linked to were compiled at the end of February, when total deaths were around 2,800. Just over a month later, total deaths are 64,541. I wouldn't place to much confidence in figures extrapolated from the February data.

[Zacs-Master]

The virus is indiscriminate. Therefore you cannot predict the outcome so stop trying to extrapolate unverified figures to weigh up against the world economy. The world economy is a very distant second to the survival of mankind. And, no, I’m not exaggerating.

[NickorWan]

It isn't really about the 1% or whatever the figure is, it is about the number that would need hospitalisation at the same time. The death rate would go up quite a bit I suspect if we couldn't care for the sick.

[jim360]

The problem with looking at things that way is that 1% of a great many people is far more threatening than 50% of nobody much. The Ebola outbreak of 2014 accounted for the deaths of something like 40% of all the infected, but as there ended up being only about 30,000 infected it becomes rather less intimidating. And the other thing is that a deadly virus struggles to spread too far almost because of how deadly it is. When there are a lot of people who don't really suffer much then they find themselves free to travel and spread it further, so that the vulnerable are that much more likely to catch it and die as a result.

I'm also not entirely in agreement with the suggestion that because many of the victims appear to have underlying issues that somehow brings the rate down. There's no reason to assume that those people would have died any time soon, for one thing; or, in the entirely opposite direction, since we are all going to die anyway then you may just as well argue "what does it matter what gets us in the end?" Neither is entirely comforting.

That morbid thought aside, it's also clear that, apart from a few lone holdouts, everyone seems to have more or less accepted that the human cost of allowing Covid to propagate far outweighs the economic threat, for the time being. In the US, Trump was expressing a hope to open the US back up by Easter, but he has since abandoned that as the scale of the disease in the US finally became apparent.

[naomi24]

TheChair, we had this conversation on here a week or so ago. If memory serves at that date the mortality rate worldwide was about 4%.

[Prudie]

I respect your view ZM but I distinctly recall agreeing with you 2 or 3 weeks ago when this first started when you worried more for the economy. You've clearly changed your mind.

[Zacs-Master]

I have revised my opinion as any sensible person would do given new information

[Zacs-Master]

This is a snapshot of air travel over the US at the moment. If that doesn’t scare you, then nothing should
https://ibb.co/YpXKGZq

[royfromaus]

Tell me how long this fiscal lottery can go on, Zacs.

[sevenOP]

jim360 -"I'm also not entirely in agreement with the suggestion that because many of the victims appear to have underlying issues that somehow brings the rate down. There's no reason to assume that those people would have died any time soon, " "

The common flu may have caused those deaths also, but we in this situation because of the coronavirus.

[Zacs-Master]

I’d say around 6 to 8 months before all world governments realise they’ve promised more than they can possibly deliver.