Of course one can have a healthy economy with some sick people. We did, in January. The majority of COVID victims were sick then too, before virus, in nursing homes. No one thinks the virus will incapitate sufficient numbers to actually have an effect on the labor force, like it did for bubonic plague. Most of those dying now were not participating in the labor force anymore.
Maine had 50 new cases from Wednesday to Thursday, and none of these were attributed to a particular outbreak. I think that’s the biggest jump we’ve had. Due to reopening and/or more testing? Probably both.
And now the Maine governor has made it clear that visitors will be on the honor system to quarantine for 14 days when they flood into the state this summer. Great. 
People at the beach may pee in the ocean, which the American Chemical Society says is ok: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqR2bLsdhs4
What science? I think science said they didn’t know, but now as more is known, being outdoors is a much lower risk for catching Covid than indoors. Not trying to change your mind on this, just sharing what is coming out about being outdoors.
"But if you’re worrying about how many particles a passerby is generating with their exhalations, it may help to know that a recent study (https://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/2764367/effectiveness-surgical-cotton-masks-blocking-sars-cov-2-controlled-comparison) managed to quantify how many virus particles were detectable after patients who had Covid-19 and who were not wearing masks coughed five times into a petri dish at a distance of roughly 8 inches.
The scientists detected 363 virus particles on average per 1 ml of petri dish. That seems like a lot, but again, that was at a distance of 8 inches. If you’re 6 feet away (72 inches), much of that will disperse before you can inhale it — particularly if you’re outdoors, where factors like increased distance, decreased duration of exposure, and improved air ventilation are all working in your favor.
It may also help to know about two new studies suggesting that most Covid-19 transmission happens indoors, not outdoors. In China, a study of 318 outbreaks (https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.04.20053058v1) found that transmission occurred outdoors in only one of them. In Japan, a study (https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.28.20029272v2) found that “the odds that a primary case transmitted Covid-19 in a closed environment was 18.7 times greater compared to an open-air environment.” Note, however, that both of these are preprint papers (not yet peer reviewed).
An understanding of infectious dose, combined with an understanding of transmissibility as laid out above, should also help calm excessive levels of worry about picking up the virus from objects like mail or groceries. Remember that to kickstart an illness, you have to have enough virus particles to get an infection going, and it’s got to be live, infectious virus, not just dead RNA (genetic material that won’t harm you). The latter will simply fall apart after enough time on inert objects — up to 24 hours on cardboard and up to three days on plastic and stainless steel.
“Viral RNA does not imply the presence of infectious virus,” Kasten explained. “The virus, without host cells and a bit of moisture to keep it temporarily going, can fall apart, leaving bits of its RNA lying around like bleached bones in the sun. A researcher can come along with PCR [polymerase chain reaction, a common method in molecular biology] and detect the RNA, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they detected infectious virus.”
Agree with this but to me it seems that some people are frustrated because the goal posts have been moved.
People were told to stay at home to flatten the curve so as not to overwhelm the healthcare system, but once that was accomplished (in many places) things haven’t opened up and in fact, the goal posts have moved to needing a vaccine or effective treatment to fully open.
Many people could easily grasp the idea of flattening the curve and therefore could support it, even the ones who might have some level of distrust of authority.
But by requiring a vaccine or effective treatment to fully open up (as some states are), two things that might take years, or decades, or may never happen, it appears it will be much more difficult to get even ‘moral’ or ‘loyal’ people, and/or those who respect authority to support that stance. Especially when they consider the economic and other health costs (delayed diagnoses, mental health, etc.) of such a policy.
Not sure that fits. Someone who values authority would also be need to accept what the expert economists say, no? And what happens when experts from those disparate disciplines (PH & econ) disagree? Folks are just then picking one authority to follow.
Most at the beach are not in the ocean. OK to pee in the sand? And not all human waste is liquid.
I think a local government could find a way to limit crowds at the beach and keep the bathrooms open, and should. But they haven’t asked me.
I get the problem, but the scientists and experts have not addressed this problem specifically, so one can’t say ‘listen to the experts’ as they are silent on this problem/issue. Nothing wrong with the Mayor/Gov (aka politicians) making a choice, but then let’s call it what it is, a decision absent scientific data.
LA now has a snitch line. People can call and snitch on businesses that are open against the rules. There are a lot of people congregating in front of take out places here. That’s okay. But my hairdresser in a one on one situation is not okay.
And where is the snitch line for reporting large parties?
Close contact is close contact. A party is unnecessary but there’s not reporting there. Some shop owner making a living letting in just a few customers at a time may be necessary for her to stay in business. But the city will come down full force on that person, shutting off utilities and issuing fines.
It’s this sort of disparate treatment that makes no sense to me.
The nature and behavior of this virus are not settled science, people across the planet are still learning. It’s not like Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetics, or Kepler’s laws of planetary motion. We are in a process of discovery.
And beyond the discovery is the prediction of the future - how people will behave, how different policies might affect public health. There is no settled science that says what is “right” or “wrong”. Even the most informed models can be grossly wrong.
Or maybe right.
So people “believe” or “trust” different spokespersons. Nothing nefarious about that. I generally have been assuming that most of the faces on the screens I watch are doing their best and telling the truth as they know it. I don’t assume they are all equally good at predicting the future or understanding human behavior as it intersects with public health, or the public health consequences of economic destruction.
I wear masks when indoors with people I don’t live with, and would outdoors on crowded streets. I limit in-person interactions to retail transactions and neighborhood conversations at an 8’+ distance. I don’t see any problem with people sitting at the beach, and see more risk from drunk drivers leaving newly opened bars than from the people there carrying coronavirus to my mother in her senior community.
As to the healthy economy, there are two things. First, even if every single business in my state were open right now, I wouldn’t go to them. I wouldn’t have my cleaner in my house, I wouldn’t go to restaurants, I wouldn’t fly on planes, I wouldn’t go to Sharks games. That’s one problem with this “healthy economy” idea: to have a healthy economy, consumers have to want to consume. Many do not, and just as the government shut-downs didn’t shut down the economy, because it was already shut down by individuals deciding to stay home, so the government can’t make people want to buy things just by making it legal for them to buy things.
Secondly, many people have suffered huge economic losses. Many have lost jobs. Even if they wanted to consume, many don’t now have the same resources they formerly had. They aren’t going to spend like they used to, because they can’t afford it.
We’re in for a tough economic time. We can’t wave a magic wand of re-opening and make that untrue.
38 new cases in Maine since yesterday. The director of the Maine CDC said, “We might be at a level where we are talking less and less about a surge but rather a plateau. A high plateau, to be sure. A plateau doesn’t mean that things are getting better, but that things are staying the same at a rate that might not be very desirable to us.”
Except we don’t have SOME sick people. We have them by the tens of thousands, they’re infectious as hell, they fill up hospitals and they scare consumers. In a consumer-based economy that will not work. How many people on this forum have said they’re not interested in going out to eat? In going out to shop? In traveling? Many. You’re dreaming if you think things will be back to normal if we ignore this virus or don’t find ways to contain it. Dreaming. Ask any economist.
I have not seen one post on this forum from anyone who thinks things will go back to normal if we ignore this virus and don’t find a way to contain it. I have read some helpful discussion about how and when to move from Stay at Home to something less restrictive.
Most states ARE moving from Stay at Home to something less restrictive.
But we’re not talking strictly about being outdoors. That’s allowed. What’s not allowed is sitting around in groups outdoors. That’s a big difference.
Even though there can be times when people who value authority have to pick among conflicting ones, in this case, expert economists do not seem to be too enthusiastic about a quick reopening either.
http://www.igmchicago.org/surveys/policy-for-the-covid-19-crisis/
https://www.aei.org/economics/federal-passivity-wont-reopen-the-economy/?mod=article_inline
The problem with looking at case counts is that (1) not all states report things the same way, and (2) increased testing will increase case counts. So an increase in case counts does not necessarily mean an increase in actual cases. Sometimes, it just means we’re counting more that weren’t counted before.
So with (1), states not reporting the same way. Some states report new cases based on when the symptoms are thought to have started, some on the date the test was given, some on the date the test result comes back. Some states are going back to identify earlier deaths (Jan-Mar) that were probable deaths, some with covid tests to confirm. States vary one which date is reported in these cases. (Death counts are also problematic, for these reasons.)
For (2), previously in many areas, you could not get a test, even of symptomatic, unless certain criteria were met. As more testing becomes available, more people with mild or no symptoms are identified.
When looking at case and death counts, I also prefer to look at things on a per capita basis, as that puts the numbers in perspective.
Hospitalizations seems to have the fewest problems, which should then be compared against available beds, ICU beds and ventilators.
We need to reject this false choice, as indeed most people on this board are doing. We don’t have to choose between opening up right this minute, or staying closed until there is a vaccine or an effective treatment. Both those choices are bad, and we don’t need to do either of them.
Instead, we can get test/trace/isolate set up, as states and localities are doing right now, and open up carefully and gradually, as states and localities are also doing right now. We can realize that some things, we now know, are not very dangerous, like going for a walk on a beach when nobody is within six feet of you, and some things look to remain dangerous, like having a birthday party inside with 75 people in an area where cases remain high. We can let our fast increasing knowledge of this virus guide us.
It is more like, we did not clearly win or lose, but are going into overtime.
As a practical matter, without a vaccine or effective treatment, the economy will not come back to anywhere close to the previous normal even if all additional restrictions were lifted immediately, due to widespread fear of the virus.