Comment by GuB-42 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by GuB-42 | Hacker News Reader

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I often see "copy this country" but often, it is simply not possible, policies are usually a result of each country specificities more than the other way around. For Taiwan.

- It is an island

- It has an effective, well centralized surveillance network

- It has (presumably) an obedient population, or at least, one that don't think personal freedom includes the right to spread the disease

- They were well prepared thanks to the their experience with SARS

- A good enough welfare system to allow people to quarantine without starving or getting ruined

- A good enough police force to make sure they stay quarantined

- Enough masks and hand sanitizer, with domestic production

This is pretty much the opposite of the US. Which is highly connected, with a loosely connected government that has little control over the private sector that runs the country and a highly individualistic population.

Also, maybe there are some populations that just do better for a mix of reasons: climate, race (genetics), culture, average age, health and population density,...

Final note: closing borders is only effective if you contained the epidemic and others didn't.

I live in Taiwan.. I’m grateful to be living here during Covid.

Taiwanese people aren’t obedient. You should see how they drive.

They wear masks without flaking out about it as slavery or being against their will or whatever nonsense you guys are on about back home in the west.

Taiwanese people are couch potatoes and extremely reserved. They don’t really want to meet new people or hang out with strangers.

Also the government here didn’t play games in the early weeks. No wait and see business as usual lazy bullshit like in the US. They check tour temperature everywhere, mall entrances, restaurants, government buildings.

The us most certainly should copy Taiwan.

> Taiwanese people aren’t obedient. You should see how they drive.

...

> They wear masks without flaking out about it as slavery or being against their will or whatever nonsense you guys are on about back home in the west.

The 2nd part is what the GP was talking about with regards to 'obedience'. In some western countries like the US and UK, even the simple request for individuals to wear a mask is seen by some as an infringement on their human rights. There are literally documents floating around social media in the UK citing the Magna Carta[1] as a legal document for why they are entitled not to have their temperature checked!

Granted these people are idiots. But unfortunately the UK and US has also fostered a culture where everyone's voice is deemed equal, even the idiots. A classic example of this was during the EU referendum with the oft quoted phrase "why should we trust those so call experts?" as a retort against financial analysts voicing their concerns.

The problem is when you have research demoted to the same level as hearsay, a general distrust of the government and mix in a large does of fear due to economical, political and/or social unrest, you end up in an environment where those aforementioned idiots end up recruiting more idiots into their cause.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta

> UK and US has also fostered a culture where everyone's voice is deemed equal, even the idiots

I've thought about this a lot as the pandemic and reaction unfolded. My feeling is that it's a little more nuanced.

From my perspective, it goes like this: (a) politics co-opts science, and (some) scientists become political (for career reasons), (b) political news media puts narrative-supporting "experts" on a pedestal (to reinforce their credibility), (c) people are told they lack the intelligence / knowledge / ability to ever be an expert, (d) people feel internal, unrealized shame at their ignorance, (e) people attempt to cover that shame by posing as experts for their peers, in fact just parroting whatever sound-bites they heard without critical thought, (f) rational debate drastically decreases, as critical thinking skills and underlying understanding have atrophied.

The net result: removal of critical thinking in the public, increased partisanship and anger, and a decreased ability of the public to dismiss crackpots posing as experts.

Recommended response: learn about the actual underlying issues, then (gently, remember (d)!) turn conversations to apolitical explorations of the underlying issues and truths.

I think far it's simpler than that: people just generally don't like to have their ideals challenged. Worse still is that politicians and the press back research when it suits their narrative and dismiss it when it contradicts their narrative. Which creates a precedence for "free thinkers" to also accept or reject any evidence that falls outside of their own chosen narrative.

Social media compounds things here because it allows people do get swallowed into this world of like minded people (aka the "echo chamber").

There's a fair amount on Wikipedia about the psychology at play which causes this. There's names for it all, all of which I can't recall because I've hit the Christmas spirits. Hopefully someone sober can be more helpful than I.

Nah, Taiwanese people view the masks as protection against germs and pollution. I understand the context of suggesting they are obedient but I still disagree with that. Chalking it up to obedience in a way takes agency from them- they choose to wear masks because they know that they work and the government is enforcing their use as well. They don’t wear them because they are merely told to. It’s plain to everyone here that America is handling the virus poorly because most Americans are miseducated or retarded and refuse to take simple precautions because they are uncomfortable or inconvenient. Also there are severe leadership issues in America and no healthcare. It’s the perfect storm of fucking up. Taiwanese people have zero interest in modelling any policies in place in America. Most people here think the country is fundamentally broken.

The point I was making is that many Americans and English folk intentionally don't wear masks because the government told them to.

I'm not suggesting that Taiwanese people blindly do as their told but rather that some of the US and UK population intentionally do the opposite to what they're told simply as an act of defiance....sorry "freedom".

All of the things you've noted are true, but the flip side is that that there seems to be a "we've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas" (or worse, flat out pandemic denialism) mentality that takes hold instead of thinking about whether it would be possible to push for some of the most obvious policies that have been shown to be the most effective (eg, enforcing testing and quarantine for all travelers, improved science communication around a respiratory pandemic). Also, it's been 10+ months, so to the degree that developed countries like the US lack sufficient PPE manufacturing, it's certainly not down to resources or capabilities (or anything besides political will in the US considering the DPA could be invoked at any time).

Also, most countries still seem to be ignoring the best/cheapest way to control spread via rapid testing and isolation. This has been not only modeled extensively at this point [1][2], but also proven to be effective by sports leagues (NBA, MLB) and Universities (look at where UIUC has kept their numbers vs the state: https://go.illinois.edu/COVIDTestingData )

[1] Larremore, Daniel B, Bryan Wilder, Evan Lester, Soraya Shehata, James M Burke, James A Hay, Milind Tambe, Michael J Mina, and Roy Parker. “Test Sensitivity Is Secondary to Frequency and Turnaround Time for COVID-19 Surveillance.” Preprint. Infectious Diseases (except HIV/AIDS), June 25, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.06.22.20136309.

[2] Atkeson, Andrew, Michael C. Droste, Michael Mina, and James H. Stock. “Economic Benefits of COVID-19 Screening Tests.” National Bureau of Economic Research, November 2, 2020. https://doi.org/10.3386/w28031.

Consider the countries like Japan that do not actually have excess mortality despite COVID-19. Suppose they just stopped testing for it. You would not be able to tell the difference. You could then come up with any reason for this “huge success”.

> Consider the countries like Japan that do not actually have excess mortality despite COVID-19. Suppose they just stopped testing for it. You would not be able to tell the difference.

That assumes that testing-dependent interventions (whether contact tracing and quarantines of the exposed, appropriate treatment of systematic infections, etc.) have nothing to do with the absence of excess deaths.

Which seems improbable.

My point is that you wouldn't be able to tell the difference whether any of these interventions work or not. That's the issue. It's of course improbable that none of these interventions work, but it's probable that some do not work.

At the same time, there are a lot of factors that are purely circumstantial, such as weather/climate, age/health of the population, elderly care system. These may have a lot of influence at the tail ends (deaths).

We must not fall into the trap of making post-hoc rationalizations that confirm what we want to believe. We're paying a heavy price with severe measures, if some data turned up that showed that it didn't make much of a difference, that would be a tough pill to swallow.

Sure, then copy Vietnam or Australia.

How do you copy being an Island?

How do you go back in time and get your population used to wearing masks (and having supply) at the beginning of the pandemic when it really matters?

For start by telling then they should wear it at the beginning, cos you seem to forget WHO suggested not to.... Then you lose confidence and that's it...

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