COVID-19 Outbreak (Update: More than 2.9M cases and 132,313 deaths in US) (5 Viewers)

[FootballLady]

We are no longer that nation. We are far more politically, culturally, and economically balkanized. Huge chunks of our population are cynical to the point of social self harm (this is what leads to all the conspiracies and other nonsense). Its hard to get everyone on the same page when people have embraced ruthless partisanship as a part of their personal identities.

But there are other factors at play, too. That America was much more agrarian. There were many more small and local businesses that were easier to manage as opposed to sprawling corproations.Far more people controlled their day to day lives than in this rancid gig economy we allowed to happen. Things were, in terms of both personal and national commerce and business, substantially less complex than they are now.

And that's not even factoring in the fact that fighting a war, even the largest ever, comes with material and tangible goals that fighting a virus doesn't. Going to work in a factory in America during WW2 didn't come with inherent risks just by going to work. It does now.

Right. I'm not suggesting that we aren't different economically but in spirit. We are less willing to do what must be done for the sake of the country if it means we cannot do what we want. Yes, things are more complex when it comes to our global economy, which is why I'm thinking we need to radically re-evaluate our response to this event.

 

[St. Geezy]

I don't understand this thinking. And this is not an attack, I just don't get it. If reopening too soon will guaranteed result in massive infections and death, then why do it? If this disease is real, and by most accounts it is VERY real, why take the chance? People can recover from financial devastation, but people absolutely cannot recover from death. Meaning, if they die, they are dead, and literally couldn't care at all about the economy.

It seems a little like this and if this analogy doesn't work, I get it but bear with me. We are all in a plane that's approaching its destination in let's say 10 hours. We shouldn't exit the plane until it lands because if we do, lots of people will plummet into the ocean and die. But the heater on the plane is set to high and it's EXTREMELY uncomfortable for a lot of people on this plane. Now lets say if enough people die then the ATC won't let the the plane land and it will have to circle around for yet ANOTHER 10 hours and start all over again. Why not just wait until it's safe to open the door?

That's not EXACTLY analogous but you get my point, maybe. Lol

I read this last night and wanted to take my time before responding to collect my thoughts. I prefer to keep my life private, but for some background, I work in a business sector that is very reliant on things re-opening sooner rather than later, like many business sectors, and I work in a position where thinking of ways to safely re-open our business and society on a mass scale is one of the top things on my plate right now personally, so a lot of this comes from that mode of thought I have been in for the past few weeks already...

I subscribe to most of the same line of thinking you have as far as the severity of the situation. Throughout this entire thread actually, I have maintained more of a "this is a big deal," almost "fear-mongering" tone admittedly, in terms of the virus crisis itself and how quickly it can and did blow up, as well as literally predicting that New York would become the epicenter of this crisis based on my knowledge of the city after being there probably 6 or 7 times over the past year and a half or so, well before it got to the levels it has. I am/was firmly on the left when it comes to this whole thing. However over the past couple of weeks or so, I am beginning to find myself more down the middle and slightly to the right, and though I don't agree with him on virtually anything, I do agree with the concept Donald conveys in that "The cure cannot be worse than the problem."

We have a real problem on our hands here. This virus is clearly a killer, and is wiping out tens of thousands of people around the globe daily, and thousands in our country daily. But with that said, there is the other end of the spectrum. The country cannot afford a full, year long shutdown/quarantine, under any circumstance. It sounds easy, especially for those, like me, who are fortunate enough to be able to do their jobs from home just as if not more effectively as they do from an office and make the same amount of money doing it, but there are so many people out there who are gaining no income whatsoever, and the bills and needs are not stopping. It is not realistic to think that our nation can afford to live like this for over a year, nor is it realistic to think that our federal government can realistically afford to supplement everyone's income for an entire 12+ months until a vaccine is figured out, approved, and distributed, not just within our own country, but around the globe. It just flat-out can't happen, and if it goes on for more than another 30 days or so, society will begin to turn upside down - crime, riots, poverty, depression, suicide. It has already started to manifest itself in the form of peaceful protests, but that is going to increase in severity and tact more and more as each week passes.

So with all that said, I do think we absolutely must open, or else we will face a crisis similar to that of the 1930's Great Depression, that could span over a decade, and have lasting ramifications on families and individuals that go far beyond the negative impact of the death of a small percentage of society, which is significant in itself mind you, and I want to make that very clear. The solution, for me, is not to just blindly open and let everyone run wild, but instead, have a measured opening, even more measured than the one laid out to us, and a measured opening that does not let people think things are okay in any way whatsoever - which I think is happening right now to a degree, unfortunately. So what does that mean and how does that look?

- To start, the government and business sectors need to not only be looking at essential vs. non-essential business, or essential vs. non-essential employees, but they also need to be evaluating "essential to report to a building everyday employees versus non-essential to report to a building everyday employees." If you own a business or are a part of a job sector that has learned over the past month that it can still function just fine with its employees at home, continue to do so. If you are a business that relies on employees being in the building but can survive with only some in the building and some at home, do so.

- If you are a business, such as a barbershop or nail salon or convenience store, create policies that prohibit more than a certain number of people within your establishment at a time, and create policies that require staff members and clients to use hand-sanitizer frequently, wear masks, and establish required Lysol and disinfecting practices throughout the day.

- If you are a restaurant, have takeout continue to be your primary mode of operation, and allow a very minimal amount of people within your establishment for serving, and change how you deploy your servers and wait staff so that they're only handling one or two tables at a time, and encourage customers to tip better. If you are a restaurant that has primarily ALWAYS been an 80% takeout place but you keep a few tables for customer convenience if they want to hang out, get rid of your tables; no need for the added risk.

- If you are a supermarket, once people are more free to roam and more are needed to come into your store, only allow a certain number of patrons into your establishment at a time, increase hand-sanitizer stations throughout the floor, and re-deploy personnel to assist with enforcement of social distancing measures between the aisles, etc.

- If you are a city government, and in charge of a leisure building or place that is non-revenue generating but also promotes people congregating, such as a park or a gym, continue to keep it closed.

- If you are a sports league that does not generate revenue of any sort - namely children's sports leagues, park leagues, middle school teams, adult intramural leagues, junior varsity teams, etc. - sacrifice it for a year. The kids will be just fine, and you will be just fine, and this takes another unnecessary risk off of the table.

- If you are a school system, figure out how to decrease your class sizes by coming up with a plan for a part-time school year or partial school year, where maybe students go in for a half-day on rotation or half the kids go to school one week, then the other half goes the following week. Or maybe half the kids spend the day in the classroom while the others are doing some other indoor or outdoor educational activity, then you flip-mid day. Sharper minds can figure that all out for their own school districts, but that is the line of thinking to begin taking.

- If you are a business that needs to put people in harms way health-wise, identify staff members that are in the high risk population and come up with a plan to minimize their need to be in the workplace or create a new work function to accommodate them, or, flat-out help subsidize them.

- Encourage families with kids to re-evaluate their ability to become a single-income household so that one of the parents is at home with their kids in quarantine.

....and I can go on and on so I'll end there with the bullet points.

The bottom line is, what we are doing right now has made an impact, but the obsession with the "curve-flattening" has led to some taking that term as the end-goal, and many will begin trying to live how we used to live because of that. Business leaders, local government leaders, and obviously even the freaking President of the Unites States are falling into that trap, and it will lead to this whole thing flaring up again, and quickly. As we have seen many times right now in literally thousands of countries, cities, states, and provinces...if you have a few cases still out there, it is inevitable for it to flare up and explode. But once again, at the same time, we also cannot afford as a global economy to shut down society to the point we have been for the past month or so until a vaccine comes out, because it'll create unrecoverable chaos and other lasting ramifications.

The story would be much different if this was a pandemic killing 50% of the population, but it isn't and is "only" killing a very minute percentage of the population; albeit in totality that is a massive and unacceptable number, however it is not a number that should result in many of our businesses never recovering and many of our citizens that would be just fine if they got it going into an unrecoverable poverty.

We must open, but we must open in a smart manner.

My apologies to the TL; DR crowd, as well as to those that have lost a loved one and are viewing this from a much different and more emotional perspective.

 

[where yat brah]

That's a very comprehensive thought out good approach.
However, one KEY ingredient is missing........testing.
Anyone re-entering the workplace needs to undergo testing monthly (at the least).
Anyone boarding a flight should have a negative test result to show the ticket agent. That result should be no less than 72 hours old.

 

[EGLSShin]

Went out driving around about an hr ago just to get a view on whats going on, wanted to also see what kinda situation my fav places to eat were in. Theres a ton of traffic out there, it looked to be a normal day pre-pandemic. I am wondering if people are just fed up in general of stay at home order. Around my neighborhood, not much action, although, I got to witness my first social distanced birthday party my neighbor was putting on.

Around Veterans, Elmwood, Clearview, loads of traffic, saw a line of about 30 deep trying to get into Academy sports on Vets. Last time I drove around was weeks ago, interesting to say the least. I thought there would be less traffic

 

[St. Geezy]

That's a very comprehensive thought out good approach.
However, one KEY ingredient is missing........testing.
Anyone re-entering the workplace needs to undergo testing monthly (at the least).
Anyone boarding a flight should have a negative test result to show the ticket agent. That result should be no less than 72 hours old.

Yeah I have thoughts on that but chose not to get into it with the post getting as long as it did. I agree with you here, however the only thing is that it is tough to set or recommend business practices around a test we a.) don't know how it will work, b.) we don't know how expensive it would be to keep a steady supply of, and c.) we don't know how plentiful that supply would realistically be.

Will these be $5 tests that come in 20-packs and are readily available at every local drug store and at Wal-Marts, or will these be $100 tests that are one, single test that many individuals would only be able to afford to purchase and use once or twice a year and/or also create an unrealistically expensive line item expense on a business' financial ledger?

 

[SaintsFanInLA]

I read this last night and wanted to take my time before responding to collect my thoughts. I prefer to keep my life private, but for some background, I work in a business sector that is very reliant on things re-opening sooner rather than later, like many business sectors, and I work in a position where thinking of ways to safely re-open our business and society on a mass scale is one of the top things on my plate right now personally, so a lot of this comes from that mode of thought I have been in for the past few weeks already...

I subscribe to most of the same line of thinking you have as far as the severity of the situation. Throughout this entire thread actually, I have maintained more of a "this is a big deal," almost "fear-mongering" tone admittedly, in terms of the virus crisis itself and how quickly it can and did blow up, as well as literally predicting that New York would become the epicenter of this crisis based on my knowledge of the city after being there probably 6 or 7 times over the past year and a half or so, well before it got to the levels it has. I am/was firmly on the left when it comes to this whole thing. However over the past couple of weeks or so, I am beginning to find myself more down the middle and slightly to the right, and though I don't agree with him on virtually anything, I do agree with the concept Donald conveys in that "The cure cannot be worse than the problem."

We have a real problem on our hands here. This virus is clearly a killer, and is wiping out tens of thousands of people around the globe daily, and thousands in our country daily. But with that said, there is the other end of the spectrum. The country cannot afford a full, year long shutdown/quarantine, under any circumstance. It sounds easy, especially for those, like me, who are fortunate enough to be able to do their jobs from home just as if not more effectively as they do from an office and make the same amount of money doing it, but there are so many people out there who are gaining no income whatsoever, and the bills and needs are not stopping. It is not realistic to think that our nation can afford to live like this for over a year, nor is it realistic to think that our federal government can realistically afford to supplement everyone's income for an entire 12+ months until a vaccine is figured out, approved, and distributed, not just within our own country, but around the globe. It just flat-out can't happen, and if it goes on for more than another 30 days or so, society will begin to turn upside down - crime, riots, poverty, depression, suicide. It has already started to manifest itself in the form of peaceful protests, but that is going to increase in severity and tact more and more as each week passes.

So with all that said, I do think we absolutely must open, or else we will face a crisis similar to that of the 1930's Great Depression, that could span over a decade, and have lasting ramifications on families and individuals that go far beyond the negative impact of the death of a small percentage of society, which is significant in itself mind you, and I want to make that very clear. The solution, for me, is not to just blindly open and let everyone run wild, but instead, have a measured opening, even more measured than the one laid out to us, and a measured opening that does not let people think things are okay in any way whatsoever - which I think is happening right now to a degree, unfortunately. So what does that mean and how does that look?

- To start, the government and business sectors need to not only be looking at essential vs. non-essential business, or essential vs. non-essential employees, but they also need to be evaluating "essential to report to a building everyday employees versus non-essential to report to a building everyday employees." If you own a business or are a part of a job sector that has learned over the past month that it can still function just fine with its employees at home, continue to do so. If you are a business that relies on employees being in the building but can survive with only some in the building and some at home, do so.

- If you are a business, such as a barbershop or nail salon or convenience store, create policies that prohibit more than a certain number of people within your establishment at a time, and create policies that require staff members and clients to use hand-sanitizer frequently, wear masks, and establish required Lysol and disinfecting practices throughout the day.

- If you are a restaurant, have takeout continue to be your primary mode of operation, and allow a very minimal amount of people within your establishment for serving, and change how you deploy your servers and wait staff so that they're only handling one or two tables at a time, and encourage customers to tip better. If you are a restaurant that has primarily ALWAYS been an 80% takeout place but you keep a few tables for customer convenience if they want to hang out, get rid of your tables; no need for the added risk.

- If you are a supermarket, once people are more free to roam and more are needed to come into your store, only allow a certain number of patrons into your establishment at a time, increase hand-sanitizer stations throughout the floor, and re-deploy personnel to assist with enforcement of social distancing measures between the aisles, etc.

- If you are a city government, and in charge of a leisure building or place that is non-revenue generating but also promotes people congregating, such as a park or a gym, continue to keep it closed.

- If you are a sports league that does not generate revenue of any sort - namely children's sports leagues, park leagues, middle school teams, adult intramural leagues, junior varsity teams, etc. - sacrifice it for a year. The kids will be just fine, and you will be just fine, and this takes another unnecessary risk off of the table.

- If you are a school system, figure out how to decrease your class sizes by coming up with a plan for a part-time school year or partial school year, where maybe students go in for a half-day on rotation or half the kids go to school one week, then the other half goes the following week. Or maybe half the kids spend the day in the classroom while the others are doing some other indoor or outdoor educational activity, then you flip-mid day. Sharper minds can figure that all out for their own school districts, but that is the line of thinking to begin taking.

- If you are a business that needs to put people in harms way health-wise, identify staff members that are in the high risk population and come up with a plan to minimize their need to be in the workplace or create a new work function to accommodate them, or, flat-out help subsidize them.

- Encourage families with kids to re-evaluate their ability to become a single-income household so that one of the parents is at home with their kids in quarantine.

....and I can go on and on so I'll end there with the bullet points.

The bottom line is, what we are doing right now has made an impact, but the obsession with the "curve-flattening" has led to some taking that term as the end-goal, and many will begin trying to live how we used to live because of that. Business leaders, local government leaders, and obviously even the freaking President of the Unites States are falling into that trap, and it will lead to this whole thing flaring up again, and quickly. As we have seen many times right now in literally thousands of countries, cities, states, and provinces...if you have a few cases still out there, it is inevitable for it to flare up and explode. But once again, at the same time, we also cannot afford as a global economy to shut down society to the point we have been for the past month or so until a vaccine comes out, because it'll create unrecoverable chaos and other lasting ramifications.

The story would be much different if this was a pandemic killing 50% of the population, but it isn't and is "only" killing a very minute percentage of the population; albeit in totality that is a massive and unacceptable number, however it is not a number that should result in many of our businesses never recovering and many of our citizens that would be just fine if they got it going into an unrecoverable poverty.

We must open, but we must open in a smart manner.

My apologies to the TL; DR crowd, as well as to those that have lost a loved one and are viewing this from a much different and more emotional perspective.

I appreciate your response, I really do but I will NEVER take an approach where the economy, no matter how terrible is worth more than the lives of people. It is ENTIRELY too dismissive. To say...

that could span over a decade, and have lasting ramifications on families and individuals that go far beyond the negative impact of the death of a small percentage of society, which is significant in itself mind you...

...is reprehensible to me. It's easy to say and only so when you think it won't be YOU or YOUR loved ones in that small percentage. It's like the people who say, the world is overpopulated and needs a culling, but NEVER think they should be in that group that is culled. If you were to ask me, would you take a 10 depression but your family survives or you lose your mother, father, brother, son, daughter, cousins and the economy is great, I WOULD TAKE MY FAMILY AND FRIENDS LIVING EVERY TIME. We can recover from the economic hardship. I can't recover from the death of my loved ones ESPECIALLY if it could have been prevented.

I am not attacking you, I wanna be clear on my tone. I guess this is just a philosophical issue. I will always choose lives over money. I know that may sound overly simplistic but I can't in good conscience take the other route, it's a dangerous and slippery slope.

 

[St. Geezy]

I appreciate your response, I really do but I will NEVER take an approach where the economy, no matter how terrible is worth more than the lives of people. It is ENTIRELY too dismissive. To say...

...is reprehensible to me. It's easy to say and only so when you think it won't be YOU or YOUR loved ones in that small percentage. It's like the people who say, the world is overpopulated and needs a culling, but NEVER think they should be in that group that is culled. If you were to ask me, would you take a 10 depression but your family survives or you lose your mother, father, brother, son, daughter, cousins and the economy is great, I WOULD TAKE MY FAMILY AND FRIENDS LIVING EVERY TIME. We can recover from the economic hardship. I can't recover from the death of my loved ones ESPECIALLY if it could have been prevented.

I am not attacking you, I wanna be clear on my tone. I guess this is just a philosophical issue. I will always choose lives over money. I know that may sound overly simplistic but I can't in good conscience take the other route, it's a dangerous and slippery slope.

I have lost a second cousin to the virus, a close friend's father to the virus, and currently have an aunt in critical condition at East Jefferson due to the virus and likely won't make it.

I should have put a lot more emphasis on my understanding of the situation in that sentence you highlighted, because I totally intended it to not sound as tone-deaf as you've taken it, so I apologize for that. That said, what I was attempting to illustrate there is that this is a HUGE problem that people are dying, and it is unacceptable numbers, so with that in mind, we should be administering measures to help curtail and minimize that number which is a relative small percentage, while still allowing a way for society and the economic system to function.

All I meant there is that this is a <2% dying problem and not a 50% or even 20% dying problem (<2% is a guess, as we know for certain that there is a significant number of cases where people did not qualify for testing and are doing just fine with, but they are not being accounted for in the reported numbers). If this was a 20% dying or 50% dying problem, then my entire premise and line of thought on this topic changes, as does probably everyone's.

 

[SaintsFanInLA]

I have lost a second cousin to the virus, a close friend's father to the virus, and currently have an aunt in critical condition at East Jefferson due to the virus and likely won't make it.

I should have put a lot more emphasis on my understanding of the situation in that sentence you highlighted, because I totally intended it to not sound as tone-deaf as you've taken it, so I apologize for that. That said, what I was attempting to illustrate there is that this is a HUGE problem that people are dying, and it is unacceptable numbers, so with that in mind, we should be administering measures to help curtail and minimize that number which is a relative small percentage, while still allowing a way for society and the economic system to function.

All I meant there is that this is a <2% dying problem versus a 50% or even 20% dying problem (<2% is a guess, as we know for certain that there is a significant number of cases where people did not qualify for testing and are doing just fine with, but they are not being accounted for in the reported numbers). If this was a 20% dying or 50% dying problem, then my entire premise and line of thought on this topic changes, as does probably everyone's.

Ahhh, well my brother, on that we can agree. If it's a difference between choosing 50% of the people dying or 20%, I would opt for the 20%. Either way, it's an ugly choice but I would opt for less death. Ughhh, this is all just terrible.

 

[St. Widge]

Would be interesting to see if this is a legitimate correlation or if it's something else. I suspect we're gonna see spread in areas which haven't been hit yet. There are large swaths that have notably few cases. Areas that I think are really susceptible because so few have been exposed yet. They get a false sense of security, and whammo. They'll start seeing cases pop up.

But these protests with minimal levels of social distancing shouldn't be resulting in noticable spread for 10-14 days, I would think.

I think we're opening back up a bit too soon. I'd wait another month to see if the .mitigation measures continue to keep the cases low. At least maybe those opening up now will show whether it's a good idea or not.

The thing is, as a country, we seem to not be learning much from what's happening in other nations. Meh.

I wonder if it isn't the bump from Easter Weekend. I expected a bump from people either going to churches or having family gatherings. And it was about the same time as the rise in protests.

 

[St. Geezy]

Ahhh, well my brother, on that we can agree. If it's a difference between choosing 50% of the people dying or 20%, I would opt for the 20%. Either way, it's an ugly choice but I would opt for less death. Ughhh, this is all just terrible.

I agree 100% with you there...this is a lose-lose battle, and for lack of better phrase, we are screwed. I think it is a proposition of figuring out which is the lesser of two evils, followed by figuring out a way to realistically minimize the impacts of the choice. But yes, in totality, this thing has us by the balls, and I don't even want to begin to think about what happens if and when the strand mutations become more significant.

 

[N.O.Bronco]

I read this last night and wanted to take my time before responding to collect my thoughts. I prefer to keep my life private, but for some background, I work in a business sector that is very reliant on things re-opening sooner rather than later, like many business sectors, and I work in a position where thinking of ways to safely re-open our business and society on a mass scale is one of the top things on my plate right now personally, so a lot of this comes from that mode of thought I have been in for the past few weeks already...

I subscribe to most of the same line of thinking you have as far as the severity of the situation. Throughout this entire thread actually, I have maintained more of a "this is a big deal," almost "fear-mongering" tone admittedly, in terms of the virus crisis itself and how quickly it can and did blow up, as well as literally predicting that New York would become the epicenter of this crisis based on my knowledge of the city after being there probably 6 or 7 times over the past year and a half or so, well before it got to the levels it has. I am/was firmly on the left when it comes to this whole thing. However over the past couple of weeks or so, I am beginning to find myself more down the middle and slightly to the right, and though I don't agree with him on virtually anything, I do agree with the concept Donald conveys in that "The cure cannot be worse than the problem."

We have a real problem on our hands here. This virus is clearly a killer, and is wiping out tens of thousands of people around the globe daily, and thousands in our country daily. But with that said, there is the other end of the spectrum. The country cannot afford a full, year long shutdown/quarantine, under any circumstance. It sounds easy, especially for those, like me, who are fortunate enough to be able to do their jobs from home just as if not more effectively as they do from an office and make the same amount of money doing it, but there are so many people out there who are gaining no income whatsoever, and the bills and needs are not stopping. It is not realistic to think that our nation can afford to live like this for over a year, nor is it realistic to think that our federal government can realistically afford to supplement everyone's income for an entire 12+ months until a vaccine is figured out, approved, and distributed, not just within our own country, but around the globe. It just flat-out can't happen, and if it goes on for more than another 30 days or so, society will begin to turn upside down - crime, riots, poverty, depression, suicide. It has already started to manifest itself in the form of peaceful protests, but that is going to increase in severity and tact more and more as each week passes.

So with all that said, I do think we absolutely must open, or else we will face a crisis similar to that of the 1930's Great Depression, that could span over a decade, and have lasting ramifications on families and individuals that go far beyond the negative impact of the death of a small percentage of society, which is significant in itself mind you, and I want to make that very clear. The solution, for me, is not to just blindly open and let everyone run wild, but instead, have a measured opening, even more measured than the one laid out to us, and a measured opening that does not let people think things are okay in any way whatsoever - which I think is happening right now to a degree, unfortunately. So what does that mean and how does that look?

- To start, the government and business sectors need to not only be looking at essential vs. non-essential business, or essential vs. non-essential employees, but they also need to be evaluating "essential to report to a building everyday employees versus non-essential to report to a building everyday employees." If you own a business or are a part of a job sector that has learned over the past month that it can still function just fine with its employees at home, continue to do so. If you are a business that relies on employees being in the building but can survive with only some in the building and some at home, do so.

- If you are a business, such as a barbershop or nail salon or convenience store, create policies that prohibit more than a certain number of people within your establishment at a time, and create policies that require staff members and clients to use hand-sanitizer frequently, wear masks, and establish required Lysol and disinfecting practices throughout the day.

- If you are a restaurant, have takeout continue to be your primary mode of operation, and allow a very minimal amount of people within your establishment for serving, and change how you deploy your servers and wait staff so that they're only handling one or two tables at a time, and encourage customers to tip better. If you are a restaurant that has primarily ALWAYS been an 80% takeout place but you keep a few tables for customer convenience if they want to hang out, get rid of your tables; no need for the added risk.

- If you are a supermarket, once people are more free to roam and more are needed to come into your store, only allow a certain number of patrons into your establishment at a time, increase hand-sanitizer stations throughout the floor, and re-deploy personnel to assist with enforcement of social distancing measures between the aisles, etc.

- If you are a city government, and in charge of a leisure building or place that is non-revenue generating but also promotes people congregating, such as a park or a gym, continue to keep it closed.

- If you are a sports league that does not generate revenue of any sort - namely children's sports leagues, park leagues, middle school teams, adult intramural leagues, junior varsity teams, etc. - sacrifice it for a year. The kids will be just fine, and you will be just fine, and this takes another unnecessary risk off of the table.

- If you are a school system, figure out how to decrease your class sizes by coming up with a plan for a part-time school year or partial school year, where maybe students go in for a half-day on rotation or half the kids go to school one week, then the other half goes the following week. Or maybe half the kids spend the day in the classroom while the others are doing some other indoor or outdoor educational activity, then you flip-mid day. Sharper minds can figure that all out for their own school districts, but that is the line of thinking to begin taking.

- If you are a business that needs to put people in harms way health-wise, identify staff members that are in the high risk population and come up with a plan to minimize their need to be in the workplace or create a new work function to accommodate them, or, flat-out help subsidize them.

- Encourage families with kids to re-evaluate their ability to become a single-income household so that one of the parents is at home with their kids in quarantine.

....and I can go on and on so I'll end there with the bullet points.

The bottom line is, what we are doing right now has made an impact, but the obsession with the "curve-flattening" has led to some taking that term as the end-goal, and many will begin trying to live how we used to live because of that. Business leaders, local government leaders, and obviously even the freaking President of the Unites States are falling into that trap, and it will lead to this whole thing flaring up again, and quickly. As we have seen many times right now in literally thousands of countries, cities, states, and provinces...if you have a few cases still out there, it is inevitable for it to flare up and explode. But once again, at the same time, we also cannot afford as a global economy to shut down society to the point we have been for the past month or so until a vaccine comes out, because it'll create unrecoverable chaos and other lasting ramifications.

The story would be much different if this was a pandemic killing 50% of the population, but it isn't and is "only" killing a very minute percentage of the population; albeit in totality that is a massive and unacceptable number, however it is not a number that should result in many of our businesses never recovering and many of our citizens that would be just fine if they got it going into an unrecoverable poverty.

We must open, but we must open in a smart manner.

My apologies to the TL; DR crowd, as well as to those that have lost a loved one and are viewing this from a much different and more emotional perspective.

I want to say first off that I appreciate the well thought out response. So often these conversations become dominated by low hanging fruit and it poisons the capacity to carry on meaningful discussion.

So thank you.

I think every guideline you listed out is entirely defensible and I don’t think there is a single one I disagree with on it’s individual merits.

However, where I do draw some serious contention is the underlying assumptions you rested your case upon and upon which you want to apply those guidelines.

Namely, putting a timeline on re-opening and inferring that not doing so in thirty days will make the solution worse than the disease.

I think one thing that has habitually been difficult for many to process is the need to parallel process multiple what-if scenarios and go through a rigorous “compared to what?” analysis when doing so. While being open-minded and self critical enough to your own preferred prescriptions.

Becuase here is the thing, so far, no country has demonstrated the ability to beat the virus by leaning into it. By playing the game the way the virus plays best. The only thing that has worked is attrition and avoidance. Places that do it too late have been hit harder, places coming out too early(or worse, racing toward a not yet proven herd immunity) have only been punished even worse for it than had they chosen or maintained isolation.

And one of the unheralded things that ultimately makes an economy go is confidence. And fear is a confidence killer. Right now, the majority of Democrats AND Republicans are more concerned that we will ease restrictions too soon, which signals that fear is still present. And if fear is still present, you can’t simply force people to be confident.

And here’s the other thing, even if we do everything on you list in every state in the next thirty days, and we assumed that public sentiment flips the other way, what you outlined is still a MASSIVE contraction of the global economy that will rival the Great Depression. Except in that scenario we presumably still lack adequate testing and no real nationwide tracing system, and so what likely happens is we get far worse pockets of resurgence and a back and forth game of opening and shtutting things back down. A game far more pervasive and deadly, both to human lives and confidence, than had we spent more time reducing positive cases and getting the necessary infrastructure in place before re-opening. You also risk people rioting for being forced to work in what they feel is an unsafe enviorenment. Also compounding the risk of business infections that will have an even more crippling effect on supply chains. And there is a healthy body of historical evidence to back that areas that stayed locked down in 1918 faired FAR better economically in the mid and long-term than places that didn’t(and this slowly seems to be the case presently as well). So even though it may seem counter intuitive to you, the evidence demonstrates that the strength of your lockdown is going to determine the strength of your long-term economic growth and the speed at which you actually recover to pre-outbreak economic levels of growth. Not the other way around.

Either way, your scenario or the alternative, you are talking about the need for massive intervention not seen since the Great Depression. And that is where my argument steps in.

What needs to happen regardless, is a massive additional investment on the level of wartime spending toward setting up systems to support the forecasted unemployment and economic contraction, of getting a robust tracking system in place(that can be a source of tens of thousands direct jobs and multiple times that indirectly). Taking previously politically infeasible steps like canceling out types of debt, rents, mortgages, and coming up with ways to keep the necessities of life and safety in people’s hands that are projected to be impacted for the next years. Providing means to increase both compensation and protection for workers forced to work in hazardous conditions. Once that curve is better flattened, case loads drop, a robust testing and tracing system in place, then we can talk about implementing your guidelines nationawide. Because the moral case here is toward protecting the citizenry, not the GDP or the markets that don’t care if we the people live or die. That history and the present continues to show that deferring to them has only made things worse, economically and in human life, than taking care of ourselves and this disease first.

 

[St. Widge]

Went out driving around about an hr ago just to get a view on whats going on, wanted to also see what kinda situation my fav places to eat were in. Theres a ton of traffic out there, it looked to be a normal day pre-pandemic. I am wondering if people are just fed up in general of stay at home order. Around my neighborhood, not much action, although, I got to witness my first social distanced birthday party my neighbor was putting on.

Around Veterans, Elmwood, Clearview, loads of traffic, saw a line of about 30 deep trying to get into Academy sports on Vets. Last time I drove around was weeks ago, interesting to say the least. I thought there would be less traffic

I went out yesterday for groceries along Vets between Bonnabel and the Orleans Parish line and it seemed like traffic similar to a normal Friday afternoon. Although the Interstate traffic was more than I expected, it was not close to normal Friday afternoon traffic. Likely due to all the downtown offices being closed. But, I think that people are starting to treat this more like a long staycation than a stay at home order and that kind of worries me. I know my next door neighbor has had is grand kids and other relatives over just about every day this week (I never though he was very smart in the first place).

I get that the numbers are dropping dramatically in Orleans, although I'm not so sure about Jefferson, but now is not the time to act like everything is fine.

 

[DaveXA]

I wonder if it isn't the bump from Easter Weekend. I expected a bump from people either going to churches or having family gatherings. And it was about the same time as the rise in protests.

Great point. Forgot about that.

 

[St. Geezy]

I want to say first off that I appreciate the well thought out response. So often these conversations become dominated by low hanging fruit and it poisons the capacity to carry on meaningful discussion.

So thank you.

I think every guideline you listed out is entirely defensible and I don’t think there is a single one I disagree with on it’s individual merits.

However, where I do draw some serious contention is the underlying assumptions you rested your case upon and upon which you want to apply those guidelines.

Namely, putting a timeline on re-opening and inferring that not doing so in thirty days will make the solution worse than the disease.

I think one thing that has habitually been difficult for many to process is the need to parallel process multiple what-if scenarios and go through a rigorous “compared to what?” analysis when doing so. While being open-minded and self critical enough to your own preferred prescriptions.

Becuase here is the thing, so far, no country has demonstrated the ability to beat the virus by leaning into it. By playing the game the way the virus plays best. The only thing that has worked is attrition and avoidance. Places that do it too late have been hit harder, places coming out too early(or worse, racing toward a not yet proven herd immunity) have only been punished in even more diminishing confidence and in the cost of human lives.

And one of the unheralded things that ultimately makes an economy go is confidence. And fear is a confidence killer. Right now, the majority of Democrats AND Republicans are more concerned that we will ease restrictions too soon, which signals that fear is still present. And if fear is still present, you can’t simply force people to be confident.

And here’s the other thing, even if we do everything on you list in every state in the next thirty days, and we assumed that public sentiment flips the other way, what you outlined is still a MASSIVE contraction of the global economy that will rival the Great Depression. Except in that scenario we presumably still lack adequate testing and no real nationwide tracing system, and so what likely happens is we get far worse pockets of resurgence and a back and forth game of opening and shtutting things back down. A game far more pervasive and deadly, both to human lives and confidence, than had we spent more time reducing positive cases and getting the necessary infrastructure in place before re-opening. You also risk people rioting for being forced to work in what they feel is an unsafe enviorenment. And there is a healthy body of historical evidence to back that areas that stayed locked down in 1918 faired FAR better economically in the mid and long-term than places that didn’t. So even though it may seem counter intuitive to you, the evidence demonstrates that the strength of your lockdown is going to determine the strength of your long-term economic growth and the speed at which you actually recover to pre-outbreak economic levels of growth.

Either way, your scenario or the alternative, you are talking about the need for massive intervention not seen since the Great Depression. And that is where my argument steps in.

What needs to happen regardless, is a massive additional investment on the level of wartime spending toward setting up systems to support the forecasted unemployment and economic contraction, of getting a robust tracking system in place(that can be a source of tens of thousands direct jobs and multiple times that indirectly). Taking previously politically infeasible steps like canceling out types of debt, rents, mortgages, and coming up with ways to keep the necessities of life and safety in people’s hands that are projected to be impacted for the next years. Providing means to increase both compensation and protection for workers forced to work in hazardous conditions. Because the moral case here is toward protecting the citizenry, not the GDP or the markets that don’t care if we the people live or die.

However, where I do draw some serious contention is the underlying assumptions you rested your case upon and upon which you want to apply those guidelines.

Namely, putting a timeline on re-opening and inferring that not doing so in thirty days will make the solution worse than the disease.

I think one thing that has habitually been difficult for many to process is the need to parallel process multiple what-if scenarios and go through a rigorous “compared to what?” analysis when doing so. While being open-minded and self critical enough to your own preferred prescriptions.

Don't disagree with you at all here as far as the timeline and rush. I actually agree.

The only reason I used the 30-day barometer is because I started preaching it as a 30 to 60 day barometer at an earlier stage, and that feels like over a month ago, when in reality, it has only been about a week or two.

I should also instead say that that's not 30 to 60 days to open, but rather 30 to 60 days to come up with the plan, gather resources, and once all that is done, carefully open up society.

Because here is the thing, so far, no country has demonstrated the ability to beat the virus by leaning into it. By playing the game the way the virus plays best. The only thing that has worked is attrition and avoidance. Places that do it too late have been hit harder, places coming out too early(or worse, racing toward a not yet proven herd immunity) have only been punished in even more diminishing confidence and in the cost of human lives.

This has been the most frustrating part about all of this for me, that countries are looking at each other and continuously thinking "well, that won't be us." What that has led to is this silly game each nation keeps playing where the measures they take are all reactionary and two weeks too late. The things we did on March 15th should have been done on March 1st. The things we did on March 30th should have been done on March 15th...we continued and continued to react despite the blueprint for success, or perhaps better put, the recipe for assured failure, being right there in front of each and every one of us.

And now, the opposite is occurring. The things we should be doing on May 31st are being done today in some parts of the country. The things we should be doing on June 1st are being proposed to get done on May 15th. The things we should be doing on July 1st are being proposed to get done on May 31st.

It is all pure madness. People have no patience.

 

[N.O.Bronco]

Don't disagree with you at all here as far as the timeline and rush. I actually agree.

The only reason I used the 30-day barometer is because I started preaching it as a 30 to 60 day barometer at an earlier stage, and that feels like over a month ago, when in reality, it has only been about a week or two.

I should instead say that that's not 30 to 60 days to open, but rather 30 to 60 days to come up with the plan, gather resources, and once all that is done, carefully open up society.



This has been the most frustrating part about all of this for me, that countries are looking at each other and continuously thinking "well, that won't be us." What that has led to is this silly game each nation keeps playing where the measures they take are all reactionary and two weeks too late. The things we did on March 15th should have been done on March 1st. The things we did on March 30th should have been done on March 15th...we continued and continued to react despite the blueprint for success being right there in front of each and every one of us.

And now, the opposite is occurring. The things we should be doing on May 31st are being done today in some parts of the country. The things we should be doing on June 1st are being proposed to get done on May 15th. The things we should be doing on July 1st are being proposed to get done on May 31st.

It is all pure madness. People have no patience.

Can you expand on this part I underlined? Because I assumed it implied one thing but I am not actually sure so better to just ask.

I wholeheartedly agree that now is the time for that planning and laying the groundwork, and to be fair, a lot of that has been going on, albeit not very well at the most important level, even if the guidelines the fed offered are in fact pretty damn good. Since they are getting undercut by lack of enforcement, follow through, or contradictory actions.

But to me, if you are weighing economic concerns heavily, which you seem to be doing, nothing is going to be stronger for long-term economic health that maximally flattening the curve and not proceeding until a sufficient testing and tracing system can be implemented. What really concerns me is half asking this and then being stuck in this cycle of constantly ebbing and flowing economic activity becuase the structural elelements needed fail to get implemented adequately and we slog along far longer than the countries that arent being so reckless opening things back up.