Why do elected officials dismiss positive information about Coronavirus?

Washington Times ^ | 03/29/2020 | By Everett Piper

[angry elephant]

Washington state closed all the schools on March 13. All large gatherings were already banned and restaurants and bars all closed.

Most people were social distancing at that time but it was just this last Monday that there had to be more formal directive.

The people crowded together in huge Costco lines to buy TP were obviously not social distancing.

[Grimmy]

The political poison of the leftists can’t get hammered through by holding everyone hostage to their wants if everyone isn’t in a massive panic.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Because Orange Man Bad.

[NobleFree]

It’s been clear for a long time that the WSJ loves America far less than it loves a buck.

[RainMan]

Actually, the first US death was Feb 26, and there were 2 of them.

Known details on King County deaths: 136
A man in his 50s who was admitted to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle on Feb. 24 and died Feb. 26 tested positive for coronavirus, a hospital spokesperson confirmed Tuesday. The patient had underlying medical conditions and had been transferred from Life Care Center in Kirkland. This is now the first person in the country to die of coronavirus.
A woman in her 80s who was a resident of Life Care died at her family home on Feb. 26. She was never hospitalized.
A man in his 50s was a patient at EvergreenHealth Medical Center in Kirkland. He had underlying health conditions, Duchin said. The man had no history of travel outside of the U.S. or known contact with anyone who had COVID-19. This man was originally the first reported person to die of coronavirus.
A man in his 70s was hospitalized at EvergreenHealth. He had underlying health conditions and died on Feb. 29.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

I’m not a flu bro, and I’m still glad to hear this. Levin went over it on his show tonight, also. Nobody sane who touts this estimate is actually dismissing the seriousness of this pandemic; some hospitals are still getting slammed. However, .2 to .4 percent is way better than 2 to 4 percent.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

If you really want to see life without quarantine, just look at New Orleans Mardi Gras, Clearwater Beach Spring Break, etc.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

If you really want to see life without quarantine, just look at New Orleans Mardi Gras, Clearwater Beach Spring Break, etc.

Some people simply do not give a damn.

[TheConservativeTejano]

Because they will do and say anything to hurt Trump, no matter who else it hurts in the process.

Partner, we know the DemonRat party and the MSM want to just shut down the Trump train on Nov. 3rd, 2020.

[avenir]

The “spirit that is now at work” in them wants to kill, steal and destroy. That’s why.

(Ephesians 2:2)

[lepton]

After summarizing all presently available data from China, Italy, Iceland, and the United States, the authors conclude:

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Interesting selection. That alone is going to drastically affect the results.

“Fear of Covid-19 is based on an estimated mortality rate of 2% to 4% … We believe this estimate is deeply flawed.”

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With South Koreas numbers - the only place with a major outbreak aside from China with reportedly less than 50% still sick - that puts the mortality rate very decidedly within that range if current rates of lingering death continue.

China’s raw fatality% numbers are at about 4.0%, likely to be 4.1% when the remaining are resolved, with reasonable models for unknown infected bringing it down to about 3.4%-3.6%.

[lepton]

“An epidemic seed on January 1 implies that by March 9, about six million people in the U.S. would have been infected.

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Under what conditions? Have the current conditions matched assumptions?

Hopefully it is in the paper.

[lepton]

Nice post.

[lepton]

The problem is the FLUBROs who argue that we should have done nothing and we would be fine.
**
I don’t think the FLUBROS are saying that. What they are saying is if a family has a high risk member the onus should be on them to find an isolation solution for that person and not on society as a whole to figure it out.

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Some of them allowed that much. That’s pretty much what we do for the flu.

[lepton]

Anyone who doesn’t think this virus was here by December doesn’t understand that we are connected to China with nonstop flights and huge amounts of Chinese Americans going back and forth all the time.

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And anyone that makes the argument you are making here doesn’t understand either the principles of dilution, nor all of the ways we would have discovered the disease on our own.

Look, if the Wuhan coronavirus virus had infected 100 people in Wuhan by the end of November, then if 10,000 people flew to the US. The chances *none* of them would be infected is still over 90%. If it were 10 infected random people in Wuhan, the chances that *none* would be on the flights is 99.0%. You can change assumptions, but the chances are still pretty low that it would have been transferred before a lot more spreading.

This was here all winter but was just thought to be the flu.

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As for thinking what went around is just the flu? The severe symptoms are distinctive, and occur much more often than with the flu. Even if YOU couldn’t tell the difference, radiologists, and even ordinary doctors can with a chest x-ray or CT-scan when they do pneumonia checks, or other tests by chance. The academics don’t recommend using those tests as a first-line check because they only present on about 80% of symptomatic cases, and they don’t allow you to discern between COVID and SARS/MERS. That is plenty sufficient to disprove your theory.

[AndyJackson]

Under what conditions? Have the current conditions matched assumptions?

Under the assumption that you had unmitigated exponential growth at the already demonstrated rate - i.e. that no mitigating actions would be taken - the position advocated by the extreme wing of the FLUBROS.

Mitigating actions were taken - social distancing, quarantines and lockdowns, real law enforcement against hooligans, and so current conditions don't match the assumptions that were made assuming exponential growth until you saturated the population.

The other problem is that there was no "epidemic seed" on January 1. The epidemic only got started in the US in late February, which you can tell by when cases started to follow an exponential trend upwards.

The problem is the circular reasoning of those who are trying to argue that this was all overblown and nothing need have been done and we know this because the crypto-epidemic started in October or some such nonsense and by the time we noticed from the odd death here and there, this epidemic was already over.

[hadaclueonce]

Why?
$$

[trebb]

Those FFReepers (Fearful Freepers the short way), have been brainwashed as much as the rest of the Left into wanting to be enslaved, whether it be by the PC crowd or those who wish 100% government dominance over their loves...

The question is, has it happened so subtly they don't realize it, or have they just been faking it when they mocked the Left or supported the Constitution...

[brookwood]

I wish I didn’t have to crush this stupid WSJ article multiple times every day. The authors should have their licenses revoked.
This was not a research study, it was an editorial in a newspaper. The authors think it is rational to extrapolate the incidence of the Covid19 virus in Vo, Padua, Italy, population about 3,000, to the entire province of Padua, Italy, population 990,000. They do not mention that the reason the entire population of Vo was tested is because that is the town where the FIRST PERSON DIED IN ITALY from the disease. You could extrapolate the .9% infection rate of Vo to Greenland and find a theoretical mortality rate of zero since no one has died in Greenland of the disease. It is unreasonable to expect that the incidence of the disease in the “hotspot” where the first person died is not much higher than in areas where no one has died.