Martin Y wrote: Tue Jul 21, 2020 10:41 am
All the clamour about how mask-wearing is politicised and grown adults are having hilarious toddler tantrum meltdowns over being required to wear them centres on the US, but in an item about the phenomenon something unexpected pops up:
A chart of the percentage of people in various countries who say they wear a mask. US: 73% UK: 36%
It's not helped by this kind of thing (from the link above):
Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said recently in a webcast that if everyone in the US started wearing masks "right away", the epidemic would be brought under control within two months.
The evidence on masks is not so strong as to support such an extreme position. While masks are almost certain to help, the extent of their effect is very unclear as it is easily confounded by other factors. If you tell people to wear a mask, the ones who do will differ in other ways - they'll be much more likely to follow other instructions such as social distancing and handwashing. I think it would be much more persuasive to be honest and tell people that we have good grounds to believe it will help, but that we cannot be certain that the effect is large enough to be worthwhile.
dyqik wrote: Sat Jul 25, 2020 12:06 pm
Local TV stations that have been bought up by a far right Republican Party donor are airing Plandemic across the country.
dyqik wrote: Sat Jul 25, 2020 12:06 pm
Local TV stations that have been bought up by a far right Republican Party donor are airing Plandemic across the country.
This is one of the issues that Carol Cadwalladr highlighted about the way Facebook was used in the referendum campaign.
In this instance, because people know about it, there is outcry and protests, but on Facebook it's possible to quietly target material to specific areas (whether geographic, social, political, demographic) without the wider community having any knowledge of what's being presented and this having no way of knowing where a counter argument is needed.
My avatar was a scientific result that was later found to be 'mistaken' - I rarely claim to be 100% correct
ETA 5/8/20: I've been advised that the result was correct, it was the initial interpretation that needed to be withdrawn
Meta? I'd say so!
For once, Trump's not wrong. Unclear of he was meaning cases or deaths, but for both the US totals are lower than the world's. I checked all data sources carefully and they agree on this.
lpm wrote: Tue Aug 04, 2020 7:38 am
"Lower than the world".
For once, Trump's not wrong. Unclear of he was meaning cases or deaths, but for both the US totals are lower than the world's. I checked all data sources carefully and they agree on this.
ETA: He really does have the air of a man who is constantly fed positive 'facts' by his aides and can't deal with anything else. It is striking how similar his outlook is to the leadership in the later period of the Soviet Union.
lpm wrote: Tue Aug 04, 2020 7:38 am
"Lower than the world".
For once, Trump's not wrong. Unclear of he was meaning cases or deaths, but for both the US totals are lower than the world's. I checked all data sources carefully and they agree on this.
ETA: He really does have the air of a man who is constantly fed positive 'facts' by his aides and can't deal with anything else. It is striking how similar his outlook is to the leadership in the later period of the Soviet Union.
By analyzing the parts of the country that had the highest number of Sturgis attendees and changes in coronavirus trends after its conclusion, (researchers) estimated 266,796 cases could be linked to the rally. That’s about 19 percent of the number reported nationally between Aug. 2 and Sept. 2, and significantly higher than the number state health officials have linked through contact tracing. Based on a covid-19 case statistically costing about $46,000, the researchers said, that would mean the rally carried a public health price tag of $12.2 billion.
Some USians sure are willing to sacrifice for some kinds of liberty ...
By analyzing the parts of the country that had the highest number of Sturgis attendees and changes in coronavirus trends after its conclusion, (researchers) estimated 266,796 cases could be linked to the rally. That’s about 19 percent of the number reported nationally between Aug. 2 and Sept. 2, and significantly higher than the number state health officials have linked through contact tracing. Based on a covid-19 case statistically costing about $46,000, the researchers said, that would mean the rally carried a public health price tag of $12.2 billion.
Some USians sure are willing to sacrifice for some kinds of liberty ...
To be honest, I don't think it's much good. They tracked where people went after the rally assumed that cases in those places were due to the rally attendee when this may not be the case. America has been really bad at this in many ways that aren't motorbike rallies, so deciding the cause of local increases is going to be much harder than is made out by the study.
I am not suggesting that the rally was a good idea, or that it didn't contribute to the spread of The Covids, just that the estimate of 266k might be over egging it.
I was wondering how a non-fatal covid case costs $46k - they cite this paper https://www.iza.org/publications/dp/136 ... valuations which in turn gets the figure from the Department of Transport's "value per statistical life", whatever that means.
Their estimate of 47 million cases in the US by July seems a bit high, too, I think?
We have the right to a clean, healthy, sustainable environment.
Bird on a Fire wrote: Wed Sep 09, 2020 3:56 pm
I was wondering how a non-fatal covid case costs $46k - they cite this paper https://www.iza.org/publications/dp/136 ... valuations which in turn gets the figure from the Department of Transport's "value per statistical life", whatever that means.
Their estimate of 47 million cases in the US by July seems a bit high, too, I think?
The value per statistical life is a calculation used to decide government spending priorities.
Let’s say that your modelers conclude that if you build a bypass costing £20 million round a town you’ll cause a reduction of 3 serious injuries per year, and one death every five years. The value of a statistical life helps you decide whether in economic terms it’s worth spending the money. There will be an estimate of the ‘value’ a death and of, say, a year of disability spent recovering from an injury. That way government planners can decide which projects should be funded.
Trump has said that covid will go away because of 'herd mentality'.
With time it goes away. And you’ll develop like a herd mentality. It’s going to be herd developed, and that’s going to happen. That will all happen.
And he also thinks we'll have a vaccine in
three weeks, four weeks
having that swing is a necessary but not sufficient condition for it meaning a thing
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FlammableFlower wrote: Thu Nov 26, 2020 11:08 pm
With the SCOTUS ruling on religious freedoms and the various holidays, the US is in a really bad place as far as I can see.
This post could probably have been made at any point in the last gajillion years, to be fair.
We have the right to a clean, healthy, sustainable environment.
