What if we had continued as normal?

mr_fegelien wrote: »

Let's say when at the start of this year, the world saw the news about the coronavirus in Wuhan but world governments refused to close down and operated as normal. Where would we be now?

Would we have achieved herd immunity? Would the economic and mental health damage be less for the time being and in years to come? I'm not sure I agree that lockdown was a good idea?

What do you think yourself?

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

The US is engaged in a large scale experiment on behalf of the world to see what happens in certain states when you don't lock down, wear masks or generally pretend the virus is no worse than the flu. Results won't be surprising I think, but we need only wait a few more weeks to see the result.

Eh some of the preliminary results are in, and it's not looking good

Ask Sweden?

This is something I have been wondering about. We all saw the overflowing hospitals in Italy and Spain, and the general consensus was that it was going to be an unmitigated disaster in the US due to the structure of their healthcare system. What happened in Italy and Spain was the central reason for our very strict lockdown.

Certainly, it looked like this was the right conclusion when coronavirus hit New York, but even then the situation wasn't as bad as it was in Bergamo or Madrid a few weeks earlier. Now we have it spread to Texas and Florida and California, and despite the numbers being diagnosed there doesn't appear to be overflowing hospitals, doctors deciding who gets a ventilator and who is too far gone, no further pictures of refridgered trucks outside hospitals, or the army bringing bodies to crematoriums.

In fact, despite the numbers being diagnosed, deaths are nowhere near what they were in April and May in the US. While clearly they are increasing, not at the rate they did in early April. So I guess we will see what the outcome is. Yes, they have definitely had way more deaths to date than they would have had if they had imposed a full lockdown. But there is some reason to believe that in two or three years, they might have had less deaths than other countries that swung from full lockdown to half reopening to full lockdown. Certainly they may be picking up on cancers earlier. The rate of suicide goes up at the same time as the rate of unemployment goes up - it was estimated in Ireland that there were between 300 and 500 additional suicides when the unemployment rate went from 4.5% to 8.5% in the earlier part of the recession. Clearly the suicide numbers will be less than the additional deaths from covid, and probably the numbers ultimately dying from undiagnosed cancer, but when you add all the "avoidable" deaths that will have resulted from lockdown, there may not be a huge difference between that and those who would have died from covid if it had been left run free.

What this will all come down to is the vaccine. If we get a working vaccine in H1 2021, then the lockdowns will have been worth it. If we don't, then those who let the virus run free may come out of it in a better position than the rest of us.

I don't think there was a realistic choice at the time.

However, the numbers of (apparently) asymptomatic cases now around the meat processing plants does have me wondering will it be more like the flu, without the vaccine? The vulnerable groups are the same, so assuming asymptomatic remain asymptomatic with no long term consequences, where does that leave us? It's a bad thing for the transmission of the virus, but if it can be so far from the worst case scenarios?

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

Maybe 1000-2000 more deaths in the country and overall things would be much better than they currently are.

Not if you were one of the 1000-2000.

Tenzor07 wrote: »

Ask Sweden?

They could be right on some measures but completely wrong on others. Luckily for Sweden though they don’t have the diehard Trumptard types blocking A&E departments or protesting about haircuts. Swedes have the common sense to social distance, wear masks and practice good hand washing etiquette.

What I always ask these types of people is, If Covid 19 is a hoax and communism in the back door as these Trumptards claim, then surely Donald Trump is one of the globalists along with Mr. Gates and Soros. Why is he going along with the lie?

They then proceed to call you a paedophile or CPC agent.

Fear would have stopped people going to work as it would have been everywhere, so accesses to food would have become scrappy shops would open hit and miss even garages, widespread hoarding of food, the civil defense, and the army would have had to be back up the Garda. The very vulnerable who could not leave their house in those situations would have food parcels thrown at their front door every now and then by the civil defense.

Hospitals would have become a scary place so lots of unscheduled home berth and people who really need a hospital staying at home. Doctors and nurses in full PPE would be given Garda escorts to work and prioritised for fule along with anyone maintaining power and water.

Mostly we would have been grand but it would be a very scary place until we got something sorted.

It would not be the thousands of more deaths alone that would be the issue, but the fear and irrational behavior generated by the thousands of more deaths which would have caused the real problems

Hello 2D Person Below wrote: »

Baseless nonsense.

Go back and read the first post - its the whole point of this thread.

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

In the long-term, between increases in deaths due to cancer, mental health etc the difference will be narrow between doing nothing and what we did do.
Covid isn't the deadly killer we were told it was back in February and all perspective on the big picture has been lost in favour of trying to eliminate covid

Ah yeah, and sure all the people who die of Covid would have died anyway in the long term so it's grand.

As long as you can do your shopping while not having to wear a mask, it's all worth it!