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Comment by matz1 | Hacker News Reader

Racking up death? The cdc latest estimatate the ifr to be only 0.65%.

Of 328 million people if 70% became infected, with a .65% fatality rate, we’d have around 1.3 million dead. The typical leading cause of death (heart disease) kills like 600k a year. Seems like racking up the dead to me. And it would probably be higher if we just pretended like things were normal and let hospitals get overwhelmed. That fatality rate is with a huge reaction by the country.

It appears that you don't understand exponential growth. What just began in the USA is an all-but-reversible process now. This isn't just about death count, it's about a complete disablement of any sort of economy or infrastructure. We're basically fucked now.

Re-read your comment in like, a few months. I'd prefer not being prescient here.

0.65% of California is still 260,000 people, even if we assume that only 50% of the population will contract it (a very conservative estimate) it is still a over a 100,000 needless deaths. So far California has reported just over 7000 deaths.

> only 0.65%

...

In the context of "brutal for the economy", 0.65% deaths pales in comparison to 20% unemployment.

Unfortunately we don't have a choice between unemployment being 20% vs 3%. The choice is between the current unemployment and whatever the rate would be if the govt issued no lock-downs and let the virus run rampant. I don't know what the unemployment rate would be in a world with overflowing hospitals and many thousands of deaths per day, but I bet it would be a heck of a lot closer to 20% than 3%.

Hospital are frequently overwhelmed already even without this "pandemic". Many thousand deaths per day are normal situation even before this.

That's the point buddy. They will now be irrecoverably overwhelmed. Every portion of the infrastructure is going to be overwhelmed.

My point is the hospital are no more overwhelmed then what has frequently happen in the past. We don't need lockdown back then, why we do lockdown now ?

I mean, even with all restrictions lifted a significant enough percentage of people would engage in behavior to avoid the disease that would have a real impact on the economy.

We aren’t talking about 3.5% unemployment vs 20% unemployment. We’re talking a deep recession in both cases. One with a deeper recession and less death, and a less deep recession but more death. Good luck trying to quantify that. I’m just gonna keep working from home, and avoiding bars/restaurants/shopping until it passes.

Poverty—though deadly—does not come close to the same mortality rate as COVID-19. Also we know how to deal with 20% unemployment (whether we are willing is another issue).

So frankly you are wrong. 20% unemployment is the thing that pales in comparison

> Also we know how to deal with 20% unemployment

We absolutely do not. Many states have been backloged with unemployment requests[0]. Tens of thousands of people are going back to work now, but were unable to get unemployment for 3~4 months. I've read about people spending 5~8 hours on the phone, told to fill out some other forms, and still get a letter saying they're entitled to $0, while others get more money than they got while full-time employed. Those that are going back to work, may never have the time to fight with the state to get the money they were entitled to.

At least in America, we've completely and totally failed at dealing with unemployment.

[0]: https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2020/05/04/gov-pritzker-says-th...

Well, the knowledge exists. 20% unemployment was seen widely internationally after the 2008 financial collapse. The results were devastating, don’t get me wrong, but some of the effected areas were able to recover fairly quickly. So we do know how to deal with 20% unemployment, but—sadly—we might not be willing to for some reason.

We're choosing to not deal with unemployment. Which is to say, we could solve a lot of the issues associated with it very easily but prefer bailing out the stock market over the poor and middle class.

Unemployment will be an issue even if we open up because bars, restaurants etc will go under regardless the moment they have a confirmed coronavirus case. Then they have to shut down, sanitize the place etc which is devastating for small businesses.

> Then they have to shut down, sanitize the place etc which is devastating for small businesses.

Its unnecessary to do all of these. When someone in the workplace get sick, ask them to take sick leave to recuperate, then back to work when they recover, just how it has been done before this "pandemic". No need to shutdown, No need excessive sanitization. Most people who contract the virus don't get sick.

No, it is absolutely necessary and your comment on 'most people don't get sick' is objectively wrong. It's estimated that around 40% of people are asymptomatic, others do get varying degrees of sick after catching the coronavirus. Because it's highly contagious, it can very rapidly spread through an entire company and then we're back to where I just said. Where they have to shut down, sanitize the place and prevent people/customers from getting sick.

Though given your posting history you seem to have a running theme going on of massively downplaying the virus and the fact that you put 'pandemic' in scare quotes indicates that you're probably just an asshole.

>It's estimated that around 40% of people are asymptomatic, others do get varying degrees of sick after catching the coronavirus

Alright using your number the asymptomatic + mild symptom will make up the majority of the cases. Nothing to be worry about.

>Because it's highly contagious, it can very rapidly spread through an entire company and then we're back to where I just said

So what if it spread when the majority of the people will be fine.

>Where they have to shut down, sanitize the place and prevent people/customers from getting sick.

It is unnecessary to do so. Its excessive.

>Though given your posting history you seem to have a running theme going on of massively downplaying the virus and the fact that you put 'pandemic' in scare quotes indicates that you're probably just an asshole.

Because the reality is the virus is not as scary as the media reported. The lockdown is way more destructive than the virus itself.

Its your choice if you want to live in fear and paranoia.

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