2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2467483 21-Apr-2020 22:49

Paul1977:
Batman:it's not that simple ... we still have flights going in and out ... also from my understanding the govt has re-defined elimination as basically doing whack-a-mole

Yeah, the PMs definition of "Elimination" meaning zero tolerance to infections doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Didn't we have zero tolerance before Level 4?

Makes perfect sense to me. Contrast that to some other countries crazy talk about herd immunity.

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#2467487 21-Apr-2020 23:03

It will be interesting to see how each approach pans out long term. With the herd immunity approach you pay up front and the other approach you pay down the back. With the down the back payments not all the costs get correctly attributed to the fight, making the up front method look worse than it really is. By cost I'm not just thinking about dollars I'm thinking of human cost which is a much bigger consideration.

I really dont know which method is going to work out for the best.

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#2467494 21-Apr-2020 23:23

freitasm:

"Singapore coronavirus outbreak surges with 3,000 new cases in three days"

previous model states. now taiwan may be in trouble. we need to learn from these events or we'll be next

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#2467498 21-Apr-2020 23:29

Batman:

freitasm:

"Singapore coronavirus outbreak surges with 3,000 new cases in three days"

previous model states. now taiwan may be in trouble. we need to learn from these events or we'll be next

In both cases it looks like the new infections were imported. We need to be very vigilant at our borders and have processes in place to manage people coming into the country.

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#2467503 21-Apr-2020 23:41

This is a really bad sign. People have had their warnings IMO. Large fines are now needed. Level 4 still means stay at home, and level 3 isn't much different.

More than 2000 Kiwis caught flouting lockdown rules as alert level 3 draws closer

In the first three weeks, 1200 were handed out, but in the last week alone that's more than doubled to over 2000.

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/04/coronavirus-more-than-2000-kiwis-caught-flouting-lockdown-rules-as-alert-level-3-draws-closer.html

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#2467507 22-Apr-2020 00:29

Technofreak:

It will be interesting to see how each approach pans out long term. With the herd immunity approach you pay up front and the other approach you pay down the back. With the down the back payments not all the costs get correctly attributed to the fight, making the up front method look worse than it really is. By cost I'm not just thinking about dollars I'm thinking of human cost which is a much bigger consideration.

I really dont know which method is going to work out for the best.

You've raised a false dichotomy. For the herd immunity concept to be worthwhile, the underlying assumption must be that herd immunity can be developed/that we can reasonably believe at this moment in time that this is a realistic prospect and that it can be developed at a price that is socially, morally and economically acceptable. The former is a scientific and epistemic question; the latter is a value judgment. On the former, the evidence suggests assuming that herd immunity can be developed is very optimistic: see for example this and this. Further to the content of the latter article, I heard a live news report on TVB in Honk Kong (a reasonably reputable TV channel) reporting that a leading Hong Kong University professor (Yuen Kwok Yung) and his team looked at a number of patients who had recovered in Wuhan and found many did not have antibody.

In making the value judgment, conventional wisdom suggests that in making the cost and benefit analysis of deciding which course of action to take, you consider (amongst many other things) the credibility of those pushing the herd immunity approach. In assessing their credibility, you will look to many things, which must include the empirically observable results that they have achieved so far. On that front, things aren't promising -- Sweden's upfront and immediate observable results are not good. Other proponents (e.g. a certain PM of a certain country) have well-blotted copybooks as being crackpots or even outright liars. Remember, given that once people are dead, they stay dead, a moral and sensible person must place significantly greater weight upon the (at a minimum) strong correlation of observable bad outcomes with the choice of trying to achieve herd immunity.

In contrast, people who aren't dead can be given welfare payments, given mental health treatment to stop them from self-harming or worse, and can be provided re-training opportunities etc. There's also a need to be consistent in evaluating which approach to take: you can't on the one hand complain about about back-end costs not being properly attributed whilst sheeting home 100% of the consequence/cost of something negative which may have been been contributed to by the approach society chose to fight the COVID-19, if the consequence was merely exacerbated by COVID-19 and its handling.

These decisions are hard to make but in critiquing any chosen approach, people need to seriously examine their underlying assumptions.

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#2467531 22-Apr-2020 06:33

Paul1977:

Batman:it's not that simple ... we still have flights going in and out ... also from my understanding the govt has re-defined elimination as basically doing whack-a-mole

Yeah, the PMs definition of "Elimination" meaning zero tolerance to infections doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Didn't we have zero tolerance before Level 4?

When they changed to elimination, it always meant the same then as it does now. Eliminate. That never meant L4 was to eliminate from our shores, it was the elimination focus, to break the chain of transmission. THEN, as they stated back then, to target whats left by ring fencing. They now have contact tracing at a faster pace, they now have a test capability of 6000 per day. The focus now is ring fencing the expected few cases and expected minor outbreak. Nothing has changed.

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#2467532 22-Apr-2020 06:35

Technofreak:

Paul1977:

Yeah, the PMs definition of "Elimination" meaning zero tolerance to infections doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Didn't we have zero tolerance before Level 4?

So elimination no longer means elimination? Has someone rewritten the definition?

Nope!

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#2467533 22-Apr-2020 06:54

Technofreak: It will be interesting to see how each approach pans out long term. With the herd immunity approach you pay up front and the other approach you pay down the back. With the down the back payments not all the costs get correctly attributed to the fight, making the up front method look worse than it really is. By cost I'm not just thinking about dollars I'm thinking of human cost which is a much bigger consideration.
I really dont know which method is going to work out for the best.

Herd immunity is a term often used in vaccination. There is no vaccination for covid-19 at this time.

This is a pandemic. If you look at previous pandemics what happened? Lots of people died and economies stopped functioning.

The UK nearly lost it's prime minister except for medical intervention. There is potential for losing many more people in a non isolation environment. Hospitals? How many people can we treat intensively at one time? Not many. Talking about herd immunity at this time in the context of covid-19 is not a medical strategy it is a political strategy.

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#2467534 22-Apr-2020 07:15

mattwnz:

This is a really bad sign. People have had their warnings IMO. Large fines are now needed. Level 4 still means stay at home, and level 3 isn't much different.

Agreed - if our Australian neighbours can hand out instant $1k fines we should be too!

edit: sp

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#2467542 22-Apr-2020 07:43

Batman: previous model states. now taiwan may be in trouble. we need to learn from these events or we'll be next

What a criminally irresponsible naval captain.

The video hinted that we may need to keep an eye on the Republic of Palau, since it was visited by the ship before Taiwan.

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#2467545 22-Apr-2020 07:54

tdgeek:

When they changed to elimination, it always meant the same then as it does now. Eliminate. That never meant L4 was to eliminate from our shores, it was the elimination focus, to break the chain of transmission. THEN, as they stated back then, to target whats left by ring fencing. They now have contact tracing at a faster pace, they now have a test capability of 6000 per day. The focus now is ring fencing the expected few cases and expected minor outbreak. Nothing has changed.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/121123513/coronavirus-modelling-expert-says-lockdown-should-be-extended-two-weeks?cid=app-android

From the above:

University of Auckland Professor Shaun Hendy says extending the Government's level four lockdown would make it more likely than not that coronavirus is effectively eliminated in New Zealand.

The Government's elimination strategy doesn't necessarily mean eradication, but instead a suppression of the virus so fully that any cases that appear could be easily managed.

The PM in her announcement on 20 April also confirmed that the Government’s interpretation of the term “elimination” doesn’t mean the complete and permanent elimination of the virus from NZ:

"Elimination doesn't mean zero cases, it means zero tolerance for cases, it means when a case emerges, and it will, we test, we contact trace, we isolate, and we do that every single time with the ambition that when we see covid we eliminate it. That is how we will keep our transmission rate under "one" and it is how we will keep succeeding."

So, it all comes down to how you interpret the term “elimination” and the PM has defined it as meaning “zero tolerance for cases” and not what a lot of other people thought it meant, which is “zero cases”!

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#2467553 22-Apr-2020 08:06

Washington Post: Coronavirus restrictions begin to ease in some places as wedge between states and White House over testing deepens

Individual states and localities — as well as foreign governments — began to announce a gradual easing of restrictions imposed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus Monday, amid protests that openings were not fast or extensive enough.

The demonstrations came as a dispute over the availability of virus tests, and the need to test far more widely to provide crucial data before reopening the economy, deepened a wedge between many of the nation’s governors and the White House. While governors want the federal government to take responsibility for ensuring the availability of tests, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that the administration favors a “state-driven approach.”

President Trump said on Twitter that the demand for more tests was driven by the same “Radical Left, Do Nothing Democrats” who earlier had demanded the federal government intervene to provide more ventilators for acute-care coronavirus patients.

...New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, whose government has been among the most successful in stemming the spread of the virus — in large part due to a strict lockdown — said restrictions there would remain in place for another two weeks before the government reviews whether to ease them. New Zealand has reported 1,440 cases of the virus, with 12 deaths and 974 recovered patients.

“We have done what very few countries have been able to do,” she said. “We have stopped the wave of devastation.”

Separately, a number of countries in the Arab world have announced restrictions on the celebration of Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, which begins later this week. Some have announced ongoing mosque closures. Saudi Arabia’s highest religious body on Monday urged Muslims worldwide to observe social distancing requirements in their countries and to pray at home.

The United Arab Emirates said Monday that virus patients and medical workers caring for them are not required to fast.

Asked Saturday about his retweet of remarks questioning whether Muslims would observe social distancing restrictions in this country as Christians did during Easter, Trump said “there could be a difference. And we’ll have to see what will happen. Because I’ve seen a great disparity in this country.”

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, in a tweet including the hashtag “#Islamophobia,” called Trump’s remarks “incoherent.”

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#2467554 22-Apr-2020 08:07

frednz:

tdgeek:

When they changed to elimination, it always meant the same then as it does now. Eliminate. That never meant L4 was to eliminate from our shores, it was the elimination focus, to break the chain of transmission. THEN, as they stated back then, to target whats left by ring fencing. They now have contact tracing at a faster pace, they now have a test capability of 6000 per day. The focus now is ring fencing the expected few cases and expected minor outbreak. Nothing has changed.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/121123513/coronavirus-modelling-expert-says-lockdown-should-be-extended-two-weeks?cid=app-android

From the above:

University of Auckland Professor Shaun Hendy says extending the Government's level four lockdown would make it more likely than not that coronavirus is effectively eliminated in New Zealand.

The Government's elimination strategy doesn't necessarily mean eradication, but instead a suppression of the virus so fully that any cases that appear could be easily managed.

The PM in her announcement on 20 April also confirmed that the Government’s interpretation of the term “elimination” doesn’t mean the complete and permanent elimination of the virus from NZ:

"Elimination doesn't mean zero cases, it means zero tolerance for cases, it means when a case emerges, and it will, we test, we contact trace, we isolate, and we do that every single time with the ambition that when we see covid we eliminate it. That is how we will keep our transmission rate under "one" and it is how we will keep succeeding."

So, it all comes down to how you interpret the term “elimination” and the PM has defined it as meaning “zero tolerance for cases” and not what a lot of other people thought it meant, which is “zero cases”!

The so called issue with elimination stems back to the level 4 description. The end goal is elimination, removal of all cases, not removal of all cases in level 4. The strategy has been well defined, Im not going to re repeat it. If your interpratation is that our end goal is to remove most of it and happeily accept there will always be a few cases, thats your opinion, that not what I have seen said on many occasions, Dr A has spelt this out often, what the steps after Level 4 will mean

As to Hendy saying that its likely that every case will be removed by extending L4 by 14 days thats rubbish. Sounds easy if you say it fast. If it was that easy we would extend L4, then easy, all over. No, its a marathon. Most of it is wiped out, it will take time to completely remove it, how they will do that has been widely stated.

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#2467585 22-Apr-2020 08:38

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