The world really needs to stop self harming itself in order to protect a few boomers with power.
It's very clear that the vast majority of people under 50 are not at risk of dying from covid19 in developed countries with adequate healthcare.
Regarding anti body tests, there was literally just a notice from the CDC saying the current tests can't really be trusted for policy decisions. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/lab/resources/anti...
The numbers are absolutely clear: if you’re under the age of 50, you are overwhelmingly likely to have nothing more than a minor illness. Over 30% of infections are estimated to be asymptomatic. In New York, over 90% of hospitalizations (in addition to being heavily skewed to the elderly) involved one or more comorbidities. Nearly 90% had two or more.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scena...
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.the-scientist.com/news-opin...
Acknowledging that most cases are minor and not that bad doesn't mean you have to run down the entire path of doubting the virus' threat.
Creates pretty bad incentives if implemented (people will seek out the virus). Also relies on accuracy of individualized antibody tests.
I know it’s unconventional but this is not a normal situation. If it was done in an orderly and controlled fashion, possibly even incorporating vaccine testing, this had the greatest odds of actually fixing the problem as a whole.
I'm going to err on the side of not getting it if given a choice.
What I don't feel is correct is to institute policy based on things that the CDC says are not effective enough to determine policy. Or to support intentional infection based on not understanding the illness well enough. The reason I don't support that is not because I care about what the people forcing infection do to themselves, but what they do to the people that need to support them (hospitals, going out when ill and infecting others who didn't sign up for that, etc).
infection passports are problematic because these incentives crop up for people who are actually at notable risk but either need the economic livelihood or just don't believe the facts around the virus
And the problems they experience will have an impact economically going forward.
only a small percentage get seriously ill, less than 5% across all age groups, with much less in the younger groups
> And the problems they experience will have an impact economically going forward.
The US economy at large is/has been destroyed, with up to half of the layoffs likely being permanent job losses.
Europe has avoided mass layoffs, but the US is throwing tens of millions of its citizens under a bus. Lockdown has to end in weeks, not months.
The way to have done this was to have a swift, effective response to the virus. We missed that. Now we are suffering the consequences.
Other places did better and are not having to make as stark a choice.
In the US, this is anathema to the ruling party, so even trillion-dollar nominal relief legislation is structured to channel money with little oversight primarily to corporations, and erect preferential barriers to relief reaching states, local governments, and citizens' pockets.
There is more concern in the US ruling party over the "moral hazard" of a fast-food worker in a big city on the edge of poverty receiving unemployment that exceeds their $8 per hour salary, than there is over shell companies thrown together in a week receiving $55M no-bid contracts to resell PPE seized by the federal government from the states [1].
[1] See Blue Flame Medical, Oren-Pines, Panthera, et al.
While I would not phrase it so harshly, I understand the point. But looking further down the road: I worry that if we encounter a virus that truly does threaten the entire population, that we'll end up in a permanent, North Korea-like state. The precedent has been set for this by the Covid-19 experience.