15 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

it's the other way around numbnuts.  They shut down for 5 days and then go right back to having concerts, movie theaters, sporting events and church.  It's been a friggin' year mate, how do you still not get it?

lol stringent 5 day lockdowns over a single case is "freedom" numbnuts. This place is orwellian. 

5 hours ago, Joe Shades 73 said:

Unless there is a vaccine that is 100% effective at stopping transmission, politicians will use the excuse that there is a possibility someone may die or even just get sick to impose restrictions on people

How is week three of Trump's second term looking to you right now?

I'm chatting with a colleague in Australia right now.  He says it is a mixed bag.  Quite a bit is open, yes.  On the other hand many internal borders are still not open and some regions were in full lockdown for eight months and other places still haven't opened back up.

14 minutes ago, Kz! said:

lol stringent 5 day lockdowns over a single case is "freedom" numbnuts. This place is orwellian. 

No, it's not freedom, it's pandemic management.  Like humans have been doing for THOUSANDS of years.  

1 minute ago, dawkins4prez said:

No, it's not freedom, it's pandemic management.  Like humans have been doing for THOUSANDS of years.  

Humans have been forcibly closing businesses for thousands of years due to the presence of a virus. I learn so much in CVON.  

Just now, Kz! said:

Humans have been forcibly closing businesses for thousands of years due to the presence of a virus. I learn so much in CVON.  

So like a year later you still know absolutely nothing about the history of quarantines?  You love walls, think it's a great thing that works and don't even know one of the primary reasons they were built.

8 minutes ago, Kz! said:

Humans have been forcibly closing businesses for thousands of years due to the presence of a virus. I learn so much in CVON.  

Not quite 1000 years ago, but...🙃

Quote

By the late fourteenth century, the effects of the plague were so bad that Italian city-states resorted to desperate measures in an attempt to preserve public health. Without definite knowledge of what caused the disease, Italian health commissioners fell back on a common theory that the air itself was infected. In their view, the only way to stop the epidemic was to somehow clean the air. "In their pursuit of corruption-free air, commissioners inspected wine, fish, meat, and water supplies; they worried about sewage; they regulated burials, and decreed the destruction of the clothing of the deceased.”³⁶ These measures may have saved lives by cutting down on secondary sources of infection. But besides burning the clothing of the deceased, they did little to curb the rampant spread of the plague.³⁷ More extreme measures were taken by Viscount Bernabo of Reggio, who ordered, "every person with plague be taken out of the city in to the fields, there to die or recover.”³⁸

The doctrines of contagion set up in Italy led to two vitally important "forms of public health control… municipal quarantine and isolation of the victims.”³⁹ In 1374, both Genoa and Venice began determining the ports of origin of incoming ships, and "turned away any coming from infected areas.”⁴⁰ Three years later, in 1377, the first maritime quarantine was established at Venice’s trading colony of Ragusa. All ships that visited the colony were required by law to anchor outside the harbor for a period of thirty days while port authorities inspected the crew and cargo in order to determine any potential health threat.⁴¹ The quarantine law consisted of four tenets:

(1) That citizens or visitors from plague-endemic areas would not be admitted into Ragusa until they had first remained in isolation for 1 month; (2) that no person from Ragusa was permitted go to the isolation area, under penalty of remaining there for 30 days; (3) that persons not assigned by the Great Council to care for those being quarantined were not permitted to bring food to isolated persons, under penalty of remaining with them for 1 month; and (4) that whoever did not observe these regulations would be fined and subjected to isolation for 1 month.⁴²

Ultimately, the Italian city-states extended their quarantine time requirement to forty days. Originally termed trentino, the adjustment to forty days of quarantine caused the name to be modified to quarantino, a "term derived from the Italian word quaranta, which means ‘forty.”⁴³ Some suggest this was based on the "Hippocratic belief that the 40th day distinguished acute diseases from chronic.”⁴⁴ Other authors contend that it was changed due to Christian practices, such as the observation of Lent, the length of the great flood of Noah, or the length of Jesus’ stay in the wilderness. Regardless of the reason, the increased quarantine time offered an improvement; it better insured that the ships in question did not pose a health risk to the city.

  

Unknown Artist, "Great Plague of London- 1665,”
Wikipedia Commons

 

In addition to establishing a maritime quarantine for incoming ships, Italian health officials instituted a "reactive quarantine – the restriction of infected persons and their families (and often anyone they had been in contact with) to their homes as a means of preventing further spread of disease.”⁴⁵ Often the authorities would assign individuals to guard the homes of the quarantined in order to insure they did not escape. In Milan, "where cases of the plague were first discovered, all the occupants of the three houses concerned, dead or alive, sick or well, were walled up inside and left to perish.”⁴⁶ This extreme action appeared to have worked, as out of all the large Italian city-states, Milan was the least afflicted with the Black Death.⁴⁷

In 2007, archeologists working in Italy’s Venetian Lagoon discovered a mass grave of more than 1,500 victims of the bubonic plague (see Figure 4). In Venice, those who caught the plague were immediately sent to the small island of Lazzaretto Vecchio. Once there, any physicians brave or foolish enough to tend to the infected treated them until they either survived or perished. Lazzaretto Vecchio may have been the world’s first lazaret, or quarantine colony.⁴⁸

The forty-day quarantine was strictly adhered to and maintained for the next 300 years throughout Europe. In northern Italy, the quarantine continued in order to avoid the importation of diseases to their busy commercial ports. In 1652, the city of Genoa quarantined people "who had been in close and direct contact with infected people or merchandise” for the standard period of forty days.⁴⁹ In addition, maritime vessels had to follow strict procedures:Vessels from England, if they come directly without touching at infected or suspected paces, and with clean bills, are allowed entry after a few days; first, however, goods and merchandise are sent to the pesthouse where they are purified for 20 days, and if they touch any of the above [infected] places they must observe complete quarantine.

^{https://vtuhr.org/articles/10.21061/vtuhr.v2i0.16/}

 

This conversation is boring. You think it's appropriate to shut down businesses for 5 days over a single case of coronavirus. I find the idea completely ridiculous. There's really no bridging that divide.

10 minutes ago, Kz! said:

Humans have been forcibly closing businesses for thousands of years due to the presence of a virus. I learn so much in CVON.  

 

6 minutes ago, dawkins4prez said:

So like a year later you still know absolutely nothing about the history of quarantines?  You love walls, think it's a great thing that works and don't even know one of the primary reasons they were built.

 

2 minutes ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

Not quite 1000 years ago, but...🙃

 

 

2 minutes ago, Kz! said:

This conversation is boring.

Perfect.

13 minutes ago, VanHammersly said:

 

 

 

Perfect.

To be fair, that was in response to Dawk's post. Simul-hit post with rocker's response. Point stands, stringent 5-day lockdowns due to one infection is completely insane and anyone who supports the idea is a complete moron.

8 minutes ago, Kz! said:

To be fair, that was in response to Dawk's post. Simul-hit post with rocker's response. Point stands, stringent 5-day lockdowns due to one infection is completely insane and anyone who supports the idea is a complete moron.

Like he said, approaching it with a brief overreaction allows them to live a normal life and allows business to operate as usual once the lockdown's lifted.  1 side's argument is "we can briefly shut everything down so that our lives and economy can get back to normal and we'll save countless lives in the process" and the other side's argument is "yeah, but what about a book from the 1940's!".  Which argument is more sound?

3 minutes ago, VanHammersly said:

Like he said, approaching it with a brief overreaction allows them to live a normal life and allows business to operate as usual once the lockdown's lifted.  1 side's argument is "we can briefly shut everything down so that our lives and economy can get back to normal and we'll save countless lives in the process" and the other side's argument is "yeah, but what about a book from the 1940's!".  Which argument is more sound?

That's a great argument, but the disturbing reality is that the virus isn't going away. You call it a "brief" shutdown to return to normal, but what happens when there's another infection tomorrow? Another "brief" shutdown? Oh wait, there's an outbreak two weeks from now with 30 cases. Whelp, better briefly shut it down for the good of the people so we can get back to "normal." I just don't think it's sound policy. Sorry.

5 minutes ago, Kz! said:

That's a great argument, but the disturbing reality is that the virus isn't going away. You call it a "brief" shutdown to return to normal, but what happens when there's another infection tomorrow? Another "brief" shutdown? Oh wait, there's an outbreak two weeks from now with 30 cases. Whelp, better briefly shut it down for the good of the people so we can get back to "normal." I just don't think it's sound policy. Sorry.

Sounds like it's working for them, since they're back to normal in a lot of ways that we're not.  I mean, there are really only 2 ways to approach the virus.  Take it seriously in the beginning, get it under control, and get strict every time it pops up, or largely ignore it, implement inconsistent half measures and let it run wild.  They chose the former, we chose the latter.  And they've had around 900 deaths, while we've have almost 450K.

2 hours ago, Kz! said:

You really get to see who is into freedom and who would literally give everything up for a little bit of security in a situation like this. It's fascinating, really.

Sadly, there are people who will not voluntarily curb the spread of infection. Sad, but true. They have to be kicked in the ass.

I wish it were different.

38 minutes ago, VanHammersly said:

Sounds like it's working for them, since they're back to normal in a lot of ways that we're not.  I mean, there are really only 2 ways to approach the virus.  Take it seriously in the beginning, get it under control, and get strict every time it pops up, or largely ignore it, implement inconsistent half measures and let it run wild.  They chose the former, we chose the latter.  And they've had around 900 deaths, while we've have almost 450K.

Yes "normal" is now periodic 5 days shutdowns whenever there's a positive case. This route also has severe consequences even if you don't want to acknowledge them.

I know most of this is just trolling, but the truth is there probably is no great answer to this. But there is a wrong answer, and that's what we have done in the US. We messed this up by not taking it seriously on the federal level and not committing to a strategy on the local level. CA is a great example of how this back and forth waffling has been a disaster. The shutdown back in March was early and aggressive, and CA weathered the initial storm. But then Newsom caved to the polls and re-opened too soon, which was a debacle since we still didn't have robust testing. So the virus then starts spreading, and you need to try and lock things back down. I have always thought you could only get people to buy into one lockdown, but you couldn't re-open and then shut back down again without real anger. That's basically what we all did. 

In my opinion, the right move was to shut it down in Mid-March and stay closed for 3 months. During that time we needed to massively test and quarantine. We also needed real stimulus that paid bills for people -- I am Libertarian as hell, but this is like the one example of when the Federal Government needs to step up and protect its citizens. Instead we dropped the ball on testing, half-arsed stimulus and re-opened too quickly. But this opening/closing/opening/closing dance is a joke -- it KILLS businesses. Think of a restaurant that buys perishable inventory to re-open, then has to toss it all out again when they get shut back down. 

This is what we get with politicians that have no practical real world experience.

11 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

I know most of this is just trolling, but the truth is there probably is no great answer to this. But there is a wrong answer, and that's what we have done in the US. We messed this up by not taking it seriously on the federal level and not committing to a strategy on the local level. CA is a great example of how this back and forth waffling has been a disaster. The shutdown back in March was early and aggressive, and CA weathered the initial storm. But then Newsom caved to the polls and re-opened too soon, which was a debacle since we still didn't have robust testing. So the virus then starts spreading, and you need to try and lock things back down. I have always thought you could only get people to buy into one lockdown, but you couldn't re-open and then shut back down again without real anger. That's basically what we all did. 

In my opinion, the right move was to shut it down in Mid-March and stay closed for 3 months. During that time we needed to massively test and quarantine. We also needed real stimulus that paid bills for people -- I am Libertarian as hell, but this is like the one example of when the Federal Government needs to step up and protect its citizens. Instead we dropped the ball on testing, half-arsed stimulus and re-opened too quickly. But this opening/closing/opening/closing dance is a joke -- it KILLS businesses. Think of a restaurant that buys perishable inventory to re-open, then has to toss it all out again when they get shut back down. 

This is what we get with politicians that have no practical real world experience.

And if we shut from mid-march until mid-June and the numbers surged afterward? Run it back?

1 minute ago, Kz! said:

And if we shut from mid-march until mid-June and the numbers surged afterward? Run it back?

Had we gotten the testing in place, the hope would be limited quarantines for outbreaks. 

But no -- once you re-open, you re-open. You can't toy with businesses like this, IMO.

The limited quarantines and lockdowns in the beginning didn't work either.

Remember this?  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-51826317

So yeah, I believe there is no right answer.   People should just accept it's here and will be for years to come.  I hate to think what will happen when another sickness crops up.

The sooner we accept a new way of normal the better.  I've accepted several new norms over my lifetime, none of which I'm happy about.

Member when they tried to take credit for it and call it the Trump Vaccine? Member?

Quote

You’ve had a few weeks now dealing with the Biden administration. What’s the main difference between them and the Trump administration?

First of all, I don’t want to take sides. But there is a clear difference. The current president is very much science-driven and -oriented. President Trump was much more gut-feeling-oriented. And with vaccines, because of complicated science, gut feeling is not the right way to go. I believe that people in the previous administration did their best to organize an operation to help the American people. But the indications are that the new people understand better what they are doing.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-01-28/covid-is-here-to-stay-pfizer-ceo-albert-bourla

4 hours ago, Kz! said:

That's a great argument, but the disturbing reality is that the virus isn't going away. You call it a "brief" shutdown to return to normal, but what happens when there's another infection tomorrow? Another "brief" shutdown? Oh wait, there's an outbreak two weeks from now with 30 cases. Whelp, better briefly shut it down for the good of the people so we can get back to "normal." I just don't think it's sound policy. Sorry.

The hope is that the vaccines will make the virus no longer cause people to get sick so there won't be a need to shutdown anymore, stop with your negativity

6 hours ago, Kz! said:

lol stringent 5 day lockdowns over a single case is "freedom" numbnuts. This place is orwellian. 

Many people like to be told what to do by the government because they are incapable of making decisions for themselves

Good to see some clear thinking posters are coming around to the idea that there is no "simple" answer.  This thing is difficult and complex and affects everything and each local region/country has its own set of unique circumstances to deal with.

 

Note: Masks do help in controlling the spread.

3 minutes ago, DrPhilly said:

Good to see some clear thinking posters are coming around to the idea that there is no "simple" answer.  This thing is difficult and complex and affects everything and each local region/country has its own set of unique circumstances to deal with.

 

Note: Masks do help in controlling the spread.

Californis had some of the strictest lockdowns yet the worst state when it comes to infections and not just because they have the most people