Shanghai Disneyland will close in effort to contain coronavirus

You know the fatigue of "but New York!" As it turns out, taking NY out of the equation paints a far worse picture and makes you wonder why states think now is a good time to reduce mitigation efforts.

Well, here's an update on the 3,000 deaths/day projection. It was incomplete and not the final projection of the model. Who knows how it ended up at the White House or in the NYT?

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/05/05/848729029/fact...y-scenario

Jeff said:

As it turns out, taking NY out of the equation paints a far worse picture and makes you wonder why states think now is a good time to reduce mitigation efforts.

It only doesn't make sense if your goal is to save as many lives as possible.

I think based on observable actions, it's clear that's not the goal. (and as I've been saying all along, I don't think it ever was)

Quite simply, your goals aren't the same as what our various states' are.

I don't think it's any more complicated than my last post suggested - hospitals can handle many more sick than we threw at them. The decision has been made to trade more infections (plodding toward herd immunity) and the deaths that come with them (hoping to mitigate as much as possible with the additional unused hospital space) to get more normality in the process (both in terms of individual sanity and liberty - depending on where you fall on that one - and greater economic stability).

I think your disconnect between death and the economy is the flaw in your argument. I think you're suggesting that some amount of death is acceptable if it eases the economic burden, but there's no evidence that it does. If death rates are still high, there is no normal anyway. You gonna hang out at Applebees when your local cases spike? (Rhetorical... I know you wouldn't go to Applebees in the first place. 🤮) Economic stability when people are dying is a myth.

People die every day. There is a balance there. Even with a vaccine, I expect people will die of Covid for years/decades to come. People die of the flu (about 80k a couple years ago) even though there is a vaccine. Is there some number of Covid deaths that can occur and we still have economic stability? Presumably the answer is yes. May be differences as to the number though.

People do die everyday, and right now twice as many are dying every day. That doesn't occur without some undesirable effects.

Jeff said:

I think your disconnect between death and the economy is the flaw in your argument.

It's not my argument. It's what I suggested early on in terms of guessing how this would play out and exactly how it appears to be playing out at this point. It's more commentary, I suppose. Like I said, as far as I can tell, there's no other answer as to what's happening. The decisions being made by our leaders in no way suggest that saving as many lives as possible is the plan of action. I think they're making tradeoffs based on what they saw happen in the first 6 weeks. I'm not sure how the pieces fit together in any other way based on the reaction and actions taken (by those who make the decisions, of course) so far.

You wondered why states think now is a good time to reduce mitigation efforts. There's no argument, I'm just saying...look at the pieces. It seems obvious what the intentions are.

If we continue the stay at home suggestions for another 2-6 weeks will that make things any better or worse when we begin a phased reopening? I don't think the economic impact of continuing to extend things is going to save the number of lives that would, essentially, make that worth it. It's true that dead people can't spend money, but if you don't let those who are still living spend (and make) money either, but still make them pay rent and their car payment and their utility bills - something's gotta give. It's a bad situation in an already bad system. Since we didn't go with the "Let's legitimately lock it all down for a month: Don't go outside, the dog pees on the carpet, you get one trip to the grocery store every 14 days, but at the same time we also suspend any and all payments on absolutely everything for a month and then try to pick back up in May" route, it seems to me this is the logical solution, as sucky and scary as that is.

20% unemployment brings with it some undesirable effects. State and local governments making significant cuts to spending (to education, government programs aimed at the poor, etc) brings with them some undesirable effects. Not only increased deaths which bring undesirable effects.

The reality is every day we balance life and economic activity. Not to say everyone will agree on any particular balance being made. But if you start with the idea that we can't do that, I don't think you can have a productive discussion about a lot of different policies. And the "listen to the experts" line only goes so far. Experts aren't charged with making policy decisions. Under our system of government, politicians do that. Now they should (and do) consult with experts but the final decision is with the politicians not the experts. In this situation, experts can estimate the numbers of cases/deaths that will result with any given level of normality but they aren't there to decide which level of normality to allow.

Bob Chapek just announced on the investor call that Shanghai will be reopening May 11th.

To be clear, leaders at the federal level aren't making any decisions or being clear about anything. That's why our testing effort still sucks, governors are buying PPE and tests from South Korea, etc.

You can let people out and go make a living... and in some cases, you get meat processing plants that have to close because everyone is getting sick and Wendy's is running out of burgers. And service jobs, well, we'll see how that works out in the next few weeks. Trust me, my local economy needs the service and hospitality industry probably more than anywhere else on earth, but there's no evidence yet that they can open without being a global vector for infection.

Look, I get that there's massive unemployment. I don't know what the answers are. It would be easy for me to say, "Yeah, everyone go to work, go to the gym, do your thing, sorry if you get sick," but that's because I work remotely and can afford to get literally everything delivered to me and be a hermit for the next year. I don't really wanna be that guy. But I also go back to that thing where there isn't much of a sliding scale between low-infection and out-of-control. Outside of NYC, we're trending the wrong way though, and the curve flattening will have been for nothing.

We failed hard. We could have sucked it up and locked down hard and nearly contained community spread early on, the way Australia and New Zealand did, but we didn't, so nothing has effectively changed. 🤷‍♂️ There's nothing "normal" about twice as many people dying on any given day compared to the historical average.

Another article about how there may not be a normal no matter what.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/new-normal-ex-fda-ch...t-n1200146

David C. Grabowski, a Harvard University researcher who studies nursing homes, said that when the final data is in, nursing homes will probably account for about half of all of the Covid-19 deaths in every state, as they already do in Massachusetts, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, among others.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/05/nyregion/coronavirus-new-york-update.html

Add in meat packing plants, cruise ships, etc, anywhere people are bundled together, inside, for long periods of time and our numbers are very skewed.

Shanghai Disneyland reopens May 11

That puts them closed at about 107 days. If the US parks followed a similar timeline they wouldn't open til around July 1st.

SteveWoA said:

Nobody knows for sure yet, and that's the entire point.

Jeff said:

But we do. The virus wasn't here last year.

Coronavirus spread around the world starting last year

No, the CNN writer can't read. That's not what happened at all. Here's the version from someone who knows how to read and write:

The findings, published today in Infection, Genetics and Evolution, also further establish the virus only emerged recently in late 2019, before quickly spreading across the globe.

99er said:

That puts them closed at about 107 days. If the US parks followed a similar timeline they wouldn't open til around July 1st.

For all their faults, I suspect the Chinese did a much better job at handling this than we did. Then again, maybe the arrogance that led to our failure to act will be the same arrogance that makes us think we're ready to re-open.

I agree with everything you just said. Honestly despite what any expert or the federal government might say, I have a feeling everyone is going to just open by July 4th because "Murica".

ApolloAndy said:
Then again, maybe the arrogance that led to our failure to act will be the same arrogance that makes us think we're ready to re-open.

Again, I think if we define the terms/expectations for 'ready to re-open', you'll find yours differ from our leaders who are making the decisions. Hell, you'd probably get 10 different answers just from those of us participating in this discussion.

I, like Jeff, don't have a good answer as how to proceed, but if anyone thought we'd live the next 12 to 18 to 24 months like we lived the last 4 to 6 weeks, well then I don't know what to tell you. That was never going to happen.

We're going to let the line out until we see hospitals approach their limits and then hold tight and fine tune. That's what I hear everytime someone utters the phrase "the new normal" - that equilibrium point will be the new normal. If you think it's arrogant to open things to the degree we are now, you're gonna be appalled at how many people our leaders are willing to let die in the next year or two. That's the new normal.

I can't imagine them re-opening things to whatever degree and then pulling back in any significant way. Imagine the backlash. The proverbial **** would really have to hit the fan for them to say, "We went too far. We're going back."

At best, maybe we're gambling that our numbers are off and once you let this thing start to spread, the threat for the majority of the population out and about on a day-to-day basis (read: younger) isn't nearly as high as less granular numbers would suggest.