Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[danlb_2000]

This is where I've been the entire time.

500,000 people losing their lives is a tragedy. Average age 71. Life expectancy is 79. So we lost 4 million life-years to COVID deaths.

But 331,000,000 people each lost a year of their lives when they were banned from working, playing, and praying in response. That's 331 million life-years lost to COVID lockdowns.

I won't make a claim about which one is "worse" than the other, but the pro-lockdown crowd refuse to even acknowledge the latter as a consideration.

The equation of which was worse get's even more complicated when you consider that we don't know how much worse the deaths would have been if we had not done the lockdowns.

 

[havoc315]

From https://abcnews.go.com/International/countries-learn-israels-covid-vaccine-rollout/story?id=75930083, "To examine the effect of widespread vaccinations among older Israelis, researchers from Weizmann Institute of Science, Tel-Aviv University and Technion analyzed Israeli Ministry of Health data on hospitalizations and PCR testing from March 2020 to February 2021. The researchers found that infections fell among all age groups between between mid-January and mid-February, but the effect was most striking among the largely vaccinated group -- people 60 or older." This is not looking at individuals who completed their vaccinations, it is statistical analysis based on age group.

To maybe convince you that you are wrong about the "very real risk" of severe illness in people who are vaccinated, the story references another study which actually looks at 600,000 people who were vaccinated. It states, "While peer-reviewed published results from the study are not yet available, data from Clalit's study are showing a 94% drop in symptomatic COVID infections among those vaccinated and that those individuals also were 92% less likely to develop severe illness than those not vaccinated."

Doing the math, the vaccinated were 94% less likely to have any symptoms at all and among the 6% who did, they were 92% less likely to develop severe illness. That calculates to the vaccinated having a 99.52% lower likelihood of developing a severe illness. Deaths will only be a fraction of the severe illnesses.

Neither the Federal Government nor Disney has defined acceptable risk to mean the risk of dying from COVID is equal to or lower than the risk of dying from the measles. They have only defined that the the current risk with limited availability of vaccine doses is too high to change policies.

I showed the chart from Israel among those who were vaccinated..

Neither the Federal government nor Disney have quantified risk in absolute numbers. They have quantified it as masks until we reach herd immunity.

 

[havoc315]

The equation of which was worse get's even more complicated when you consider that we don't know how much worse the deaths would have been if we had not done the lockdowns.

We don't know with certainty. But not that hard to form rough estimates. Without lockdowns AND other mitigation measures, the disease would have spread until herd immunity. Based on what we know about the IFR and CFR...
Likely the very general ballpark of 1-2 million deaths. Instead, we are likely looking at 600,000-700,000 deaths before herd immunity, thanks to the mitigation measures we did take. Likely would have a couple hundred thousand fewer deaths with greater use of reasonable mitigation measures.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

There I'll disagree with you. The experts have been very consistent with the caveat that science is not static, recommendations can change as more is learned. Evil is those who have chosen to attack the scientists and public health officials, who have lied about them and defamed them, and have failed to take adequate mitigation measures causing hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths. It's truly Un-American, immoral and evil.

I genuinely don't understand how you can look at California and Florida data side-by-side and conclude that mitigation efforts have been useful in any way whatsoever.

Biologists, virologists, physicians, etc. all have their role to play in the laboratories and hospitals, but we're ignoring 12 months of field data just because it's not perfect double-blind yada yada. Mitigation hasn't worked. Masks, *the way people wear them in the real world and not a machine blowing air through fabric in a laboratory setting*, don't work.

 

[danlb_2000]

There I'll disagree with you. The experts have been very consistent with the caveat that science is not static, recommendations can change as more is learned. Evil is those who have chosen to attack the scientists and public health officials, who have lied about them and defamed them, and have failed to take adequate mitigation measures causing hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths. It's truly Un-American, immoral and evil.

Yeah, most people just weren't exposed to how science really works in their day to day lives, and then all of a sudden science became of daily importance to them.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

The equation of which was worse get's even more complicated when you consider that we don't know how much worse the deaths would have been if we had not done the lockdowns.

I mean we have some sense of that. Florida and California per capita data are almost exactly the same, just on different timelines.

That doesn't answer "what if we did nothing" and it doesn't answer "what if we all locked down even harder than California," but it does answer "was there any marginal benefit to California's approach over Florida's approach" and the answer is "not really."

 

[Touchdown]

Cap, California’s wave was driven by a varient. So no you can’t compare California to Florida.

 

[havoc315]

I genuinely don't understand how you can look at California and Florida data side-by-side and conclude that mitigation efforts have been useful in any way whatsoever.

Biologists, virologists, physicians, etc. all have their role to play in the laboratories and hospitals, but we're ignoring 12 months of field data just because it's not perfect double-blind yada yada. Mitigation hasn't worked. Masks, *the way people wear them in the real world and not a machine blowing air through fabric in a laboratory setting*, don't work.

Let's start with basic logic that doesn't require much knowledge of science:
If person A doesn't have any contact with person B, then person A can't spread a virus to person B.
So we absolutely know with absolute certainty, if you reduce contacts, then you reduce viral spread.

And every study of real world data has shown that mitigation works. They have shown that mask use reduces spread, they have show lockdowns reduce spread.

Face masks: what the data say

The science supports that face coverings are saving lives during the coronavirus pandemic, and yet the debate trundles on. How much evidence is enough?

www.nature.com

 

[TrainsOfDisney]

I genuinely don't understand how you can look at California and Florida data side-by-side and conclude that mitigation efforts have been useful in any way whatsoever.

How do you look at the data in New Zealand and Australia?

 

[danlb_2000]

I genuinely don't understand how you can look at California and Florida data side-by-side and conclude that mitigation efforts have been useful in any way whatsoever.

Biologists, virologists, physicians, etc. all have their role to play in the laboratories and hospitals, but we're ignoring 12 months of field data just because it's not perfect double-blind yada yada. Mitigation hasn't worked. Masks, *the way people wear them in the real world and not a machine blowing air through fabric in a laboratory setting*, don't work.

Any yet, you are cherry picking field data to support your case. Yes, California and Florida is an interesting comparison, but there are other places where there was a clear drop off in cases when mitigation efforts were put in place. If California had taken the same route as Florida when it comes to mitigation there is no way to say for sure that there cases wouldn't have gone up.

 

[James J]

Meanwhile, Boris Johnson has just announced the UK roadmap for the next few months with the aim of all restrictions being lifted by 21st June...

 

[havoc315]

Yeah, most people just weren't exposed to how science really works in their day to day lives, and then all of a sudden science became of daily importance to them.

Too many people were/are looking for absolutes. "Why should I wear a mask, clearly there is still a chance that some virus particles could get through!"
"That state had a mask mandate and people still died!"

Now seeing it with a vaccine, as if it's an absolute protection.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

Cap, California’s wave was driven by a varient. So no you can’t compare California to Florida.

Okay, let's do New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Rhode Island then.

No, nothing is univariate and there are a million "well what about..." exceptions, but considering ALL of the data, severity of mitigation efforts has not correlated to favorable health outcomes.

That's what I mean about "the science." A virologist is only concerned with virology, because that's his expertise. Fair enough. But the economists and data scientists and mental health experts need to be heard too.

 

[DisneyCane]

I showed the chart from Israel among those who were vaccinated..

That may be what you "think" you showed but that isn't what you showed. Here is a link to the actual paper which states "In order to distill the possible effect of the vaccinations from other factors, including a third lockdown imposed in Israel on January 2021, we compared the time-dependent changes in number of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations between (1) individuals aged 60 years and older, eligible to receive the vaccine earlier and younger individuals (0-59 years old); (2) early-vaccinated cities compared to late-vaccinated cities; (3) early-vaccinated geographical statistical areas (GSAs) compared to late-vaccinated GSAs; and (4) the current lockdown versus the previous lockdown, imposed on September 2020."

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.08.21251325v1

The chart does not show hospitalizations of people confirmed to have been vaccinated no matter how many times you say it does. The abstract of the paper from which that chart was pulled clearly states it does not.

 

[danlb_2000]

Okay, let's do New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Rhode Island then.

No, nothing is univariate and there are a million "well what about..." exceptions, but considering ALL of the data, severity of mitigation efforts has not correlated to favorable health outcomes.

That's what I mean about "the science." A virologist is only concerned with virology, because that's his expertise. Fair enough. But the economists and data scientists and mental health experts need to be heard too.

Where is the data to support that statement? Is there a study that showed that the death rate would have remained the same if there had not been lockdowns?

 

[CaptainAmerica]

Let's start with basic logic that doesn't require much knowledge of science:
If person A doesn't have any contact with person B, then person A can't spread a virus to person B.
So we absolutely know with absolute certainty, if you reduce contacts, then you reduce viral spread.

And every study of real world data has shown that mitigation works. They have shown that mask use reduces spread, they have show lockdowns reduce spread.

"Lockdowns reduce spread" is like saying "getting shot in the head guarantees you won't die of cancer." Congrats... I guess?

 

[CaptainAmerica]

How do you look at the data in New Zealand and Australia?

I mean they're islands so...

 

[TrainsOfDisney]

I mean they're islands so...

So what? They still did things that worked. Did they not?

 

[havoc315]

Any yet, you are cherry picking field data to support your case. Yes, California and Florida is an interesting comparison, but there are other places where there was a clear drop off in cases when mitigation efforts were put in place. If California had taken the same route as Florida when it comes to mitigation there is no way to say for sure that there cases wouldn't have gone up.

Florida has actually had it a bit worse than California, even if they haven't had massively different numbers. And California was actually doing pretty well, until mitigation measures were reduced.

An interesting and easy study, that will take a few minutes with a spread sheet: Go through each state, eliminated deaths before June 2021. (since nobody had mitigation measures before March, and deaths lag). Look at how each state has done since June 2021... which mitigation measures were generally in effect, with great degree in variability between states. I suspect you'll see a clear trend, that states that have taken more aggressive measures have done better.

A great example is comparing the Dakotas with Hawaii and Vermont.

 

[DisneyDebRob]

This is where I've been the entire time.

500,000 people losing their lives is a tragedy. Average age 71. Life expectancy is 79. So we lost 4 million life-years to COVID deaths.

But 331,000,000 people each lost a year of their lives when they were banned from working, playing, and praying in response. That's 331 million life-years lost to COVID lockdowns.

I won't make a claim about which one is "worse" than the other, but the pro-lockdown crowd refuse to even acknowledge the latter as a consideration.

Because it’s a ridiculous comparison. You are talking about deaths to people losing a year of there life to be not being able to go to do a few things. Praying doesn’t need to be done in a church by the way. Also your life expectancy of 79 just fldropped a whole year by this virus.
Not saying I am pro lockdown at all, just saying it’s a really bad comparison. Come at it from a different angle because comparing half a million deaths and counting in this country to.. I can’t do the things I cou do for a year doesn’t work.