Coronavirus (COVID-19) Discussion Thread

[Mnementh]

RolStoppable said:

Mnementh said:

The true fact that COVID-19 (as pretty much all illnesses) is more dangerous for older people has somehow transformed into: it is no problem for younger people. But that is just not true. COVID-19 is also for people in their 20s or 30s much more dangerous than the flu. But the flu also especially hits hard elderly people and the same is true for COVID-19. That doesn't change the fact, that younger people die form COVID, or what is often forgotten suffer long-term problems in long COVID.

It's also fact that people die in car crashes. But that didn't mean that cars got outlawed, rather step after step was taken to make driving safer without taking away people's driver licenses in the meantime.

Yes, it's fact that young people can seriously suffer from COVID, but it's also fact that the vast majority does not.

We *do* a lot stuff to prevent fatal car crashes: airbags, seat belts, traffic laws, traffic signs, car inspections, road safety, speed restrictions, mandatory driving instructions and so on. People get their driving license revoked, if they break rules. They also get fined. And they might even go to jail in cases of rule breaking which strongly endangers others. You are right, these are steps to make driving safer, and the same happens with the illness.

In Germany die about 3000 people each year in car crashes, but in 2020 died 30K+ people of COVID. So the problem with the epidemics is already 10 times worse than car crashes. It is obvious, that regulators are willing to tackle the problem with regulations, similar to traffic regulations. Seeing as the problem is already 10 times as big, you can expect that these regulations exceed traffic regulations - and we have a lot of these already. And germany isn't the country hit worst with the epidemic either. So yes, some regulations regarding COVID are surely made with a broad stroke, but traffic regulations had a century time to grow, time we don't have in the case of the pandemic. So regulators are struggling to find the right solutions. And I don't agree with all rules they make. But I can also see, that given the urgency and the big realm of unknowns, regulators had to make some decisions that possibly can be made better with more knowledge and more time to try out stuff.

I don't want to defend every stupid rule made. But you have to admit: Sweden tried to follow your suggestion of isolating the most endangered groups, but ended up with double the deaths per capita as germany, while hit with similar economic trouble. Instead of following such ways, we should look to countries that got away with much less trouble in dealing with the pandemic: Vietnam, Thailand, Taiwan, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Cuba, South Korea.