Best Posts in Thread: We have been lucky so far

Here is one of many articles that covers most of the points I mentioned in my previous post.
https://theconversation.com/what-coronavirus-success-of-taiwan-and-iceland-has-in-common-140455
This second link is less detailed on the things that Taiwan did but I have included it because it gives a good explanation of the political reasons why Taiwan is not part of the WHO.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/04/asia/taiwan-coronavirus-response-who-intl-hnk/index.html
Politics should not be part of the solution to a science problem but it is.

 

Balancing economic activity and public health is a difficult problem in the face of this pandemic.
While I agree that allowing economic collapse will ultimately cause a lot of suffering also, I disagree that the option to just quarantine at-risk people and do away with all rules and restrictions for everyone else is the answer.
Those most at risk still need food, medical care etc., so they will still come into unavoidable contact with others (helpers, nurses, doctors).
If you look at the infection rate among hospital staff already now, with rules and restrictions in place for everyone, it is already having an incapacitating effect on hospitals. How would that develop if all rules and regulations were abandoned? I'll spell it out for you: it will lead to hospital closures all over the place.
How would a healthy younger person who breaks a leg or needs urgent appendicitis surgery like that?

No, the answer must be to allow some unavoidable economic damage, like for the airlines and tourism/hospitality industry, while yes, getting most everyone else back to work (but I think most have already done just that), but getting rid of restrictions and rules sounds like Bolsonaro (president of Brazil) to me.

I don't see why governments would collapse or wars would start because of a temporary 15-20% loss of economic activity (until we can all get vaccinated).
What seems like a bad idea though is governments declaring "lack of funds" at a time when they should be borrowing money to stimulate the economy.

 

well, you cannot prove what did not happen. the idea that thousands were saved is just a guess. perhaps no one was saved. but say ten thousand were saved. then the phils has spent 20 percent of its economy on behalf of 12,000 deaths. it still makes no sense at all, especially when the vast majority appear to be older people with co morbidities (in all countries).

 

what you say may be true. but if the phils has invested 20 percent of its gnp to fight on behalf of 2000 deaths i hope we would agree it cannot do the same tomorrow when another virus presents itself. the US has apparently donated more than 20 percent of its economy and a huge multiple absoute dollar amount. it too cannot do the same again tomorrow when disease X presents.

what would the impact have been on existing dieases in either country with the same investment?

in the seventies, there was a national debate on spending millions (now billions) on kidney disease treatment (dialysis) or the same money on research to prevent kidney disease?

we have to accept as a fact that many of these issues are either/or questions. we cannot do everything or save every life. the response to covid has weakened human civilization on the entire planet. not the diease but the insane mindless reponse to it

 

I think people may have been confused as you stated "killing more people than any virus disease does" but qualified that later by naming HIV as the VIRUS you were writing about.

But that is also preventable in most cases - just wearing something akin to a face mask but in a different place (i.e. a 'barrier').

Anyway, this source (May 2018 but gives figures for 2016)

https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/the-top-10-causes-of-death

states that HIV is no longer in the top 10.

"Of the 56.9 million deaths worldwide in 2016, more than half (54%) were due to the top 10 causes. Ischaemic heart disease and stroke are the world’s biggest killers, accounting for a combined 15.2 million deaths in 2016. These diseases have remained the leading causes of death globally in the last 15 years.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease claimed 3.0 million lives in 2016, while lung cancer (along with trachea and bronchus cancers) caused 1.7 million deaths. Diabetes killed 1.6 million people in 2016, up from less than 1 million in 2000. Deaths due to dementias more than doubled between 2000 and 2016, making it the 5th leading cause of global deaths in 2016 compared to 14th in 2000.

Lower respiratory infections remained the most deadly communicable disease, causing 3.0 million deaths worldwide in 2016. The death rate from diarrhoeal diseases decreased by almost 1 million between 2000 and 2016, but still caused 1.4 million deaths in 2016. Similarly, the number of tuberculosis deaths decreased during the same period, but is still among the top 10 causes with a death toll of 1.3 million. HIV/AIDS is no longer among the world’s top 10 causes of death, having killed 1.0 million people in 2016 compared with 1.5 million in 2000.

Road injuries killed 1.4 million people in 2016, about three-quarters (74%) of whom were men and boys."

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Many of those deaths were related to pathogens, mostly viruses and bacteria, even if not a direct cause, and many were preventable.

I hope no one ever quotes death figures for Covid-19 in respect of 'other deaths being more common' because if some degree of control had NOT been brought in for Covid-19 then it is a strong guess the deaths would have been in the millions (and still may be).