Cirque Du Soleil Files for Bankruptcy Protection
wsj.com
wsj.com
Vaccine or bust basically.
I feel like I have a higher chance of dying driving down the street. Am I being ignorant?
Not, it's called 'optimism bias' [1]
You don't even know if it's 3.5K deaths _due to_ COVID in the first place. The way US counts the deaths from this is "unique" in that if someone had COVID when they died, but they did not die _from_ COVID, they're still counted as a COVID death. That's why countries like Russia with much less formidable healthcare systems have "lower" fatality ratios. They're counting those who died _because of_ COVID, not _with_ it.
Why are we counting our deaths like this? I genuinely do not have a rational explanation, assuming there is one.
And soon you won't even know if the number of cases is accurate either, since CDC has put out guidance that there is a chance of false positives in newer tests if you had common cold. Which most people have _several times a year_.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/lab/resources/anti...
Quote: "Some tests may exhibit cross-reactivity with other coronaviruses, such as those that cause the common cold."
This situation is extremely complex and we simply don’t have the tools and resources to deal with it effectively.
While the former overestimates, the latter underestimates. I dont have any reference to prove it, but my gut feeling tells me that the latter is probably even further away from the true number than the former. In any case, they are absolutely not comparable.
There are still a bunch of people who die and don't get attributed, and there are people who die because there's a pandemic on and they don't get healthcare as a result, either because there isn't capacity or to avoid infection.
The way US counts the deaths from this is "unique"
in that if someone had COVID when they died, but
they did not die _from_ COVID, they're still counted
as a COVID death
In a literal sense the only actual cause of death ever is a cessation of cardiovascular function.
You don't die "from" AIDS. You die from pnuemonia, malnutrition, opportunistic infections that attack your weakened immune system, etc.
You don't even die directly "from" cancer. The tumors on your pancreas don't directly kill you in the sense that stepping on a landmine directly kills you.
That's why countries like Russia with much less formidable
healthcare systems have "lower" fatality ratios. They're
counting those who died _because of_ COVID, not _with_ it.
Your odds of dying from disease during any given month are pretty low. If you get COVID-19 and die, the overwhelming probability is that.... yes, it was COVID-19.
While not a perfect method of accounting it is assuredly more accurate than assuming the opposite, which is what countries like Russia are apparently doing.
If a person has cancer (or hepatitis, or psoriasis, or dementia, or whatever) for two years, and then they contract COVID-19 and die the next week, it certainly may have been the cancer that did them in, but it was almost certainly the COVID-19 that put them over the edge. In reality, a number of factors did them in, but if you had to pick one it would be their acute bout with COVID-19 that proved the deciding factor.
Even if you had stage 4 cancer and would die in a week anyway?
Then there's the issue of excess deaths caused by _not going to the doctor_ because you can't do "elective" procedures like stents and such, or just because you're afraid of getting infected. You can die of cardiovascular (or other) disease this way, and if you had e.g. asymptomatic covid (like most people who have it) you'd be counted as a COVID death then.
Even if you had stage 4 cancer and would die
in a week anyway?
But now, consider: most people are not in the absolutely final, terminal phase of a deadly illness.
To what percentage of dead COVID-19 sufferers would a situation like that possibly apply?
A very tiny one, surely. That is why tallying COVID-19 deaths in this manner is acceptable and accurate.
It perhaps introduces a small amount of error, but is superior to Russia's method (which sounds like outright denial of reality) and the error % introduced is in any event, is at least an order of magnitude (if not two) smaller than that posed by the number of undiagnosed COVID-19 cases.
It normalizes against external factors, such as poor testing infrastructure or (in some countries) government pressure to keep the numbers low.
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/04/16/tracking...
Causation is difficult. Obviously the answer is somewhere in the middle. I just hope that in the coming years, researchers are permitted and incentived to analyze the numbers in detail.
Look at states, or regions in other countries, that were under lockdown even though they did not (yet) have high numbers of COVID infections.
Hospitals in these places also cancelled elective surgeries, and people avoided going doctors. But there was no excess mortality.
Read that again. Seems implausible AF.
This is provably the case, since the average death rate is very steady year on year, yet shot up this year. People are dying in droves from something, and if not COVID then what do you propose? Hell, in reality the US and other countries are underreporting their figures, because there's still a whole tonne of unexplained deaths above the COVID numbers and no other explanation as to why those deaths have occurred.
See the following for further explanation.
[1]: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronav...
I think it’s reasonable to wonder that, though.
There's a common trend of mixing up the fatality percentage and the odds of dying to this. You seem to be falling into that confusion. A mortality rate of 2.3% doesnt mean you have a 2.3% chance of dying to it. If you're elderly and/or have a preexisting respiratory condition, then you have a much higher likelihood of something going very wrong. The younger and healthier you are, the lower the likelihood is that your health will be severely impacted.
That's why young healthy people such as myself (25, regular exercise, no preexisting conditions) need to be more worried about other people. It isn't about my health, it's about theirs.
This is not a factual statement. America is skewing younger with more complications than Europe.
While it is always a good idea to think about others, the young aren't as immune to this as they think they are.
Or, as I crudely put it to one youngster: You use condoms, right? Well, Covid statistically is more dangerous and more contagious than anything a condom protects against. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and keep your distance.
Considering all the suffering going on in the world? No, not at all.
There was a huge overreaction to 9/11 in the US which caused much more suffering than the event itself.
I’m quasi American and I have always hated the people who worked in those towers. The primary business of financialization is to rob the masses of their wealth / pensions. They are a well dressed and well behaved parasitical class.
Osama Bin Laden’s stated intention was to drag the US in to a quagmire and the US obliged.
Despite what MMT people may believe, the US will now have to get used to being a much poorer country. That adjustment will not be easy.
It's a bit like the stats for dying driving. It doesn't include people who survive but lose their legs or can't function independently anymore. In both cases think of the affected percentage which is so much higher.
However, this isn't the real problem. Unlike most illnesses this one has a very long incubation time (like 1-2 weeks) unlike the flu where you get sick in a day or so. This means you can be walking around making people ill and spreading the disease even though you're totally fine. (Which is why walking around with out a mask isn't healthy for other people)
So the real issue isn't you getting sick and dying but the fact that you're spreading the illness to 20+ other people and making the problem so much worse. All these sick people will eventually effect you (as they already have) overwhelming health and social services.
I feel certain live performances and sports with physically-present audiences will return, as that experience seems to fill some kind of deep-seated human need. (One I certainly share)
But I increasingly fear that COVID-19 represents something like an asteroid-versus-dinosaurs event where, even though life continued, it looked drastically different. Perhaps it will be a good thing in the long run, but much will be lost.
Maybe we don't want e.g. theaters any more. They've had declining audiences for quite a while and are, at least over here, heavily subsidized by the government. That money could also be used on other things that more people care for. Starting anew isn't necessarily a bad thing.
https://www.insidehook.com/daily_brief/news-opinion/amsterda...
Here in LA this is killing off some standup clubs. I’ve speculated that it’ll decimate a whole generation of up and coming comics; if you’re a club that’s struggling and needs to sell half the seats at a higher price per, you’re going to reach for tried and true artists and not anyone slightly risky.
But now I think a generation of dancers will be lost. Dancers can't just "pause". Staying in shape without access to studios and performances is incredibly difficult. The career of a dancer is incredibly short in the best of times. I think many will start to realize the gravity of the situation and move on.
Even if I could live for a year or two on 40% of my previous salary (much closer to minimum wage than it is to tech salaries), and the government approved extensions to allow UI to be paid for that long (it’s not), our employers still have other bills to pay. They need to pay rent and insurance on the theatre, and the scene shop, and the warehouse full of sets and props and costumes. Equipment needs regular maintenance and inspections. Consumables will expire. It will cost more when we start up again.
There are lots of other pieces in the live entertainment system. We can’t just go back to work if the other businesses we rely on have gone bust in the meantime. Want stagehands to work through the night? You’ll need 24/7 catering. Want stage lights? You’ll need rental companies. Want equipment to be serviced? And on and on.
Finally, I know many people are taking this opportunity to retire, or change careers. Nobody is joining the industry right now. All the classes and certifications I was scheduled for in the past 6 months have been cancelled. We’ll have a lack of skilled workers when we do get back to work.
It will take many years, after a vaccine is created, for this industry to recover.
While there might be a aspects of a performance that can be conveyed through a video feed a large part of the experience is probably lost by attendants not being able to participate in person.
I end up out of pocket easily double the ticket price when all is done.
But the real killer is everyone will want the equivalent ticket of the cheap seats. How do you stratify your prices while streaming?
Cirque du Soleil was an entirely different matter. Everything was shiny, cool, happy. My son had a great time. I had a great time. Sad to see them close. Hope they can come back to life somehow.
Having been back-stage at a circus many times for work, it's a really tough and hard life to live in...
They eventually removed all of their animals from their show, not because of external pressure, but because they could no longer care for the animals as they used to.
For those that haven't seen their VR experience, try and see it, it's jaw-dropping good.
Covid is destroying the entire entertainment industry. Huge entertainment companies, staging and rental industry, broadway theaters, touring etc are just getting hammered. In some ways, Cirque is more likely to come through than most since they have the cash flowing in from Quebec government.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=RDEMP3dHAEi0ZvUl0krV3T...
Hey, anyone looking to hire an ex-circus performer? My digital cv is here https://circusscientist.com/cv
Mostly Android apps but I can do Wordpress, data input, server management, creative coding...
The show does go on(line): https://bigtopentertainment.co.za
My dad was a professional programmer (Cobol and Fortran!!) so I have been programming since I was a kid actually.
As a brit, I envy the US their bankruptcy process. It is a lot less punative than the UK system...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cirque_du_Soleil#:~:text=On%20....
I seriously hope they manage to come back from this. Their shows are magical.