Barozi said:
EricHiggin said:
No. That could be part of the reason however as doing more testing doesn't make up the entire gap. I'm saying the more testing, the more likely you're going to find more people who have it. If you don't test at all, you're not going to have any confirmed cases, if you start testing, you're going to find people who have it. The more you test, the more cases you'll come up with in overall in general as a country. Maybe the US has way more asymptomatic cases which is why the people may not be as inclined to see the need in masking up, leading to more spread. Maybe because the US people were lied to by the head Gov specialist about the importance of masks, which he admitted, the people don't believe the suggestion of masking up now. There are a ton of reasons why the spread may be worse, or that the numbers themselves may not be as legitimate as depicted.
Also, while I haven't paid near as much attention to the death rate lately, because of the media, I immediately noticed that the news seems to be heavily focused on the increase in confirmed cases, and no longer deaths for about a week now. This is a major change from how they were laser focused on the deaths not so long ago. I wonder why they would do that? Is it because they don't care anymore, or because it's no longer so scary, so change to showing bigger increasing numbers of the general spread perhaps?
Another reason to question the numbers overall. You don't really know how many cases you have exactly without testing though. So how can you say you should be testing more based on more cases? Covid 19 symptoms aren't entirely unique. Just because you think someone might have it, doesn't mean they actually do. You have to test to confirm. Then there's also the asymptomatics who show little to no signs. What if the US has more of them then they may think? Maybe they are grouped together more which could explain why some aren't as inclined to wear a mask, unknowingly leading to more spread anyway.
100% correct though they didn't take into account the anti body tests that a lot of other nations don't? You surely can't assume everything has been taken into account. None of us know everything, because none of the experts and professionals themselves even know, or can be reliably trusted, so while there is no spoon fed final answer, it's clear there's more to it than just some nations are weaker and/or idiotic. If that's the automatic assumption someone wants to make though that's up to them.
As far as I've seen, covid 19 is much more like a cold than the flu. Which also means like a cold, your bodies immunity to it is kinda weak and short lived. Short lived like 2 weeks to 3 months, maybe a little longer. That would certainly explain why some are potentially getting infected a second time now. It's also the reason why a vaccine would be extremely tough to make and distribute, because it would almost certainly have to be administered multiple times a year to truly be effective. It's part of the reason they don't bother with cold shots, but do bother with flu shots. Your immunity against the flu is like 2 years to 10 years, so a (bi)yearly shot makes sense. Asking people to stay home for a while and get better won't solve it if your immunity is gone after a few months. This is why masking up would seem to make some sense, and why it's being pushed more and more. If you can't build up a strong long lived immunity, then you have to try and prevent yourself from getting it in the first place, or spreading it to others. If they do somehow come up with a vaccine, trying to get people to take it bi yearly or more will be the next problem to overcome.
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More testing results in finding more infected. This is so obvious I don't know why you even mention it.
The important part is the positivity rate. US ranges between 8 and 10 percent here while many European countries are already sub 1%.
Why is that? Two possible explanations:
1. The US isn't testing enough.
Positivity rate will decrease when you test more people. Takes no genius to understand as you test the symptomatic people first then their family members then their working colleagues and then other random people that had contact with them (if you can trace them). Chances you'll find infected people will decrease during every step.
The US is doing aroung 800k tests a day. To get the positivity rate down to 1% they would need to do AT LEAST 6.4m-8m tests A DAY. And that's only if these extra millions of tests don't show any more infected. So is the US testing enough? Probably since doing that many tests every day doesn't seem possible.
2. There simply are more infected people in the US.
You can test all you want but if let's say 5% of the US population is infected RIGHT NOW, the positivity rate will never go below 5%. Doesn't matter if you test 100k a day, 1 million a day or the whole population a day.
More infections lead to more deaths. This shouldn't come as a surprise either. Of course there are other factors to consider, especially the average age of the infected. There aren't as many deaths as during the first peak because the average age has decreased by quite a bit. The US was already as low as 650-700 deaths a day at the beginning of July. Three weeks later and it's back up to ~1000 a day.
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Possibly the same reason as to your explanation of point 2?
How much testing they could, should, or even can do is questionable. How much more testing after a certain point is also questionable, but would eventually be a waste as you say. Do the professionals even have a good idea where that level is, and if so, is that the reason for how it's being handled as of now?
More confirmed legitimate cases should lead to more deaths overall in general. Though more confirmed cases does not guarantee the same amount or increased death rate. That doesn't mean a higher faster spread is something to turn a blind eye to, but it would suggest the illness is losing ground otherwise.
Conina said:
EricHiggin said:
Also, while I haven't paid near as much attention to the death rate lately, because of the media, I immediately noticed that the news seems to be heavily focused on the increase in confirmed cases, and no longer deaths for about a week now. This is a major change from how they were laser focused on the deaths not so long ago. I wonder why they would do that? Is it because they don't care anymore, or because it's no longer so scary, so change to showing bigger increasing numbers of the general spread perhaps?
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Or is it because infections and deaths don't happen at the same time but the death increases will be a few weeks behind the infection increases.
The earlier you react to alarming developments the better.
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There should be some truth to that, but the rise in death rates per confirmed cases is not guaranteed. It depends on who and where it's spreading through, and how thoroughly those infected are following the quarantine suggestions/requirements. If it's just young healthy people spreading it among themselves, as long as they are distancing from those more at risk, then there is little reason for the death rate to rise all that much. Along with those at greater risk doing everything reasonably possible to protect themselves. As time goes on, the death rate should naturally decline as the unfortunate individuals who've passed away already due to some fragility will leave less hosts to kill off. Not that we want that to be the baseline of defense, it's just a truth of any illness, as long as people aren't too careless and as long as it doesn't mutate in a more hostile manner.
Not necessarily, though when it comes to life and death, people do give more leeway if more was done than actually necessary, even with considerable inefficiency and waste. In terms of looking at it from just both extremes, overreaction would almost always be preferred to lackadaisical behavior, I would admit. What you really want is to be on guard and made aware of potential problems/issues asap so you can prepare, but you don't want to react to quickly if you don't have to. This is why the economy topic is such a conundrum. On one hand nobody wants anyone to have to suffer or die, but on the other hand, you can't just shut everything down completely in advance, and indefinitely, to try and save every last life, hoping it works. It just can't be done without completely overhauling the system, which couldn't be done 'overnight' even if attempted. Which will also lead to other indirect suffering and loss of life anyway, as the current situation already has. Even the states/cities that locked down hard, still had significant spread and spikes afterwards regardless. It's a pickle, no doubt about it. In this situation, you're damned if you do and damned if you don't.
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