I stand by the comment. I didn't say that Nazis were invading the country. I said the same unquestioning deference to authority was at play then as it is now. There's nothing paranoid about a reflection on human nature.
2,266 karma · joined November 6, 2017
Intubating without anaesthesia sounds very not-fun though.
BTW New York followed a doctrine of early invasive ventilation which almost certainly caused iatrogenic harm. So perhaps an over-reliance on intubation contributed to your friends' hospital(s) running out (that's besides the point but just interesting to note)
["Neutralizing and binding antibody kinetics of COVID-19 patients during hospital and convalescent phases"](https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.18.20156810v...) - Published July 18 2020
- Based on these half-life data, we estimate that the median times for IgM, IgA and IgG to become seronegative are 4.59 (IQR 4.12-5.03), 7.78 (IQR 6.71-9.16) and 42.72 (IQR 33.75-47.96) months post disease onset.
- This study suggests that SARS-CoV-2 infection induces robust neutralizing and binding antibody responses in patients and that humoral immunity against SARS-CoV-2 acquired by infection may persist for a relatively long time.
["SARS-CoV-2 infection induces robust, neutralizing antibody responses that are stable for at least three months"](https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.14.20151126v...) - July 17, 2020
- Here we report that the vast majority of infected individuals with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 experience robust IgG antibody responses against the viral spike protein, based on a dataset of 19,860 individuals screened at Mount Sinai Health System in New York City.
- We also show that titers are stable for at least a period approximating three months, and that anti-spike binding titers significantly correlate with neutralization of authentic SARS-CoV-2. Our data suggests that more than 90% of seroconverters make detectible neutralizing antibody responses and that these titers are stable for at least the near-term future.
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BTW, there's something called immunological memory, your memory B/T cells persist for decades. So even if you, say, were only fully immune to reinfection for 1 week, you could still get to herd immunity by building up enough immunological memory since the presence of memory B/T cells will reduce transmission. Anyway, fortunately COVID-19 produces immunity of several months at least.
Great question. My reasoning would change, but my position would not. The issue is that the research I've done has convinced me that SARS-CoV-2 is literally the worst possible virus to lockdown over (and furthermore there's really not a virus out there where lockdown makes sense anyway).
BTW, the way we've done it in the USA is the worst of both worlds because we ate all the costs of containment, yet are actually practicing mitigation. It's like the opposite of the pareto principle.
Before I get into the health stuff, since we do have the 1A here, I will always argue the 1A over the health stuff, because arguing the merits of the policy on public health grounds means implicitly ceding the first amendment argument. Anyway, let's begin:
The reason I would still be against it if I were in, say, Europe, is because from a public health standpoint, I believe these measures worsen mortality over the long-term (and indeed the medium-term, and possibly even the short-term).
In short, this is because universal lockdown increases the proportion of at-risk people that must get sick before we hit herd immunity. Additionally, lockdown is going to reduce a population's sunlight exposure (Vitamin D is INCREDIBLY important for respiratory pathology, but nitric oxide is important too), it's going to reduce the amount people exercise/sleep, it's going to increase fear/anxiety, and it's going to decrease social interaction. Each of those individually are bad for the immune system, but taken together it's disastrous.
Severe COVID-19 seems to be an immunoregulatory disorder. You don't so much die from the virus as you do your immune response to the virus.
A virus like SARS-2, which is adapted to spread well (for example, it suppresses interferon in the early stages of infection which creates a ~2 day window of pre-symptomatic spread where viral load is high enough to transmit and yet there are no visible symptoms), but it is a very poor killer (even the CDC estimates a .65% IFR, and the CDC has a vested interest in using the worst numbers possible).
Furthermore the population targetted by SARS-2 is almost exclusively the very old or the very sick, which means the average years of life lost (YLL) per death is much lower than for Influenza, which actually does kill children in real amounts.
So in conclusion:
- the measures to slow spread don't seem to work to slow spread (this applies to universal masking btw)
- but insofar as those measures do slow spread, that's a bad thing, because it increases the number of high-risk individuals that will get sick over the long-run, and
- of those who do get sick, if they've spent the last 3 months locked down they are more likely to die
BTW, since pre-existing exposure to non-SARS human coronaviruses produces T-cell cross-reactivity [1], we could have produced a pseudo-vaccine already by just dosing people with live non-SARS human coronaviruses.
[1] ["SARS-CoV-2-specific T cell immunity in cases of COVID-19 and SARS, and uninfected controls"](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2550-z) - Published: 15 July 2020
- Here, we first studied T cell responses to structural (nucleocapsid protein, NP) and non-structural (NSP-7 and NSP13 of ORF1) regions of SARS-CoV-2 in COVID-19 convalescents (n=36). In all of them we demonstrated the presence of CD4 and CD8 T cells recognizing multiple regions of the NP protein. We then showed that SARS-recovered patients (n=23) still possess long-lasting memory T cells reactive to SARS-NP 17 years after the 2003 outbreak, which displayed robust cross-reactivity to SARS-CoV-2 NP.
- Surprisingly, we also frequently detected SARS-CoV-2 specific T cells in individuals with no history of SARS, COVID-19 or contact with SARS/COVID-19 patients (n=37)
ACB seems like the perfect candidate except for exactly what you mentioned. So I am very curious how much of that was her hands being tied versus her being unusually authoritarian. Because if it's the latter, I absolutely share your concern.
All I'm saying is the bill of rights describes rights that the government cannot infringe upon (with the exceptions established via judicial precedent, for example guns can be taken away from violent felons, etc)
I never said that the Constitution was an exhaustive list of our rights so your snarky dismissal doesn't strike me as fair.
Your position also implicitly relies on the notion that SARS-2 isn't spreading right now, but it is, so by the time we get a vaccine we will have a lot of exposure. Data from NY and Sweden implies somewhere around 20% seroprevalence is when we hit herd immunity.
Since you haven't given me much to work on, and I don't feel like digging into the vaccine side, let me give you some research on long-term damage:
["Follow-up Chest CT findings from discharged patients with severe COVID-19: an 83-day observational study"](https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-27359/v1) - First Submitted May 4, Published online May 12
> Radiological abnormalities in patients of severe COVID-19 could be completely absorbed with no residual lung injury in more than two months’ follow-up.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1046/j.1440-1843... (SARS-1 pathology)
> Preliminary evidence suggests that these lung function abnormalities will improve over time
and here's just one effect of lockdown: loneliness.
https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/110/15/5797.full.pdf
> mortality was higher among more socially isolated and more lonely participants. However, after adjusting statistically for demographic factors and baseline health, social isolation remained significantly associated with mortality (hazard ratio 1.26, 95% confidence interval, 1.08–1.48 for the top quintile of isolation), but loneliness did not (haz-ard ratio 0.92, 95% confidence interval, 0.78–1.09). The association of social isolation with mortality was unchanged when loneliness was included in the model.
With SARS-1, there can be lingering fatigue and minor cognitive deficits for a few months post infection, but radiological abnormalities of the lungs, etc clear away within months and are certainly gone at the 1 year mark.
The evidence in SARS-2 is incredibly weak and especially for those who are asymptomatic or paucisymptomatic the chance of lasting harm is essentially zero. Remember that the real damage occurs from the immune response, so if you have no symptoms you cannot have damage. The notion being promulgated of having totally asymptomatic COVID-19 and then randomly showing organ damage (heart, lungs etc) is absurd.
Finally for mathematical purposes we need to consider long-term damage - which again just doesn’t really happen - as not as bad as a death. So we can still work it into the math just fine, whether you want to call it a tenth of a death or half or whatever.
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Oh finally, quick point that vaccines are not without risk either. Go read the data on the Moderna trials. Or the history of rushed-out vaccines that caused paralysis (it was either for swine flu or avian flu, I forget which)
So, respectfully, I actually see your confusion as a non-American; most countries don’t treat the concept of a constitution with any seriousness.
> but I don't really see "because it was decided so a long time ago" as particularly good reason to ordain something as a sacred right.
That is, again, literally how it works. For example, that is why here in the United States it is not illegal to deny that the holocaust happened, whereas in Germany or France you will get fined and thrown in jail.
Specifically Supreme Court decisions rely on precedent from previous cases; this is called Stare Decisis. Precedent is only to be overturned when clearly the wrong call was made (for example the SCOTUS decision permitting Japanese internment camps)
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To summarize, the genesis of America lies in the notion that we have inalienable rights that are not granted by the government but rather given by God (I think of this metaphorically since I don’t believe in a god). Thus the constitution just makes it explicit to the government that we have these rights and always did; as opposed to the government graciously extending these rights.
So in conclusion, despite the implication of your “Quran” question...yes, it really is a sacred document. Not just bevause it is the source code for our country, but because the ideas contsined within it are revolutionary and beautiful. For evidence of how revolutionary they are, I submit your (good-faith) incredulity with the entire concept :P
My point is that this does fall under that reasoning.
I am genuinely perplexed here.
In any case, I take solace in the fact that pretty much all of my comments in this thread are more or less equally downvoted :P
I’ve had to stop browsing HN as much during covid because people here tend to be very rabid about this issue. I am shocked how normalized the idea of forcible business closures and total bans on population movement for years (“until the vaccine”) has become. All to avoid a virus that spreads so well that even literal islands (NZ) have been unable to contain it, which has per the CDC a .65% IFR (I personally think the real figure is .3%), and which unlike Influenza does not kill children.
But I digress.
Really shows you how far the overton window shifted.
Also doubly ironic that I got called paranoid for talking about what is literally happening right now, not what I fear might happen.
First of all, Anders Tegnell set Sweden’s policy and has been a brilliant voice of reason.
Check out Michael Levitt, Martin Kuelhoff, Jay Bhattachargee. There’s a lot more but I’m on mobile and need to get back to my computer first to dig through my notes.
Just be warned, if you actually research this issue - I’ve probably read 40 papers in the last 3 months, you might find it incredibly depressing, because it’s not even that we traded freedom for safety: we traded both away for nothing. Lockdown worsens COVID—19 mortality IMO, let alone the second order ramifications.
Herd immunity is a natural emergent phenomenon and is how ALL infectious diseases stop being a threat. Just remember herd immunity does not mean eradication, it just means no more exponential spread.
But tldr:
- Learn about immunological memory
- Learn about t cell cross reactivity: exposure to non-sars hcovs confers protection
- learn the simplistic herd immunity formula based off of the basic reproduction number, then learn how to think about heterogenity which makes the true HIT lower than the simplistic 1-1/R_0 implies
- learn that severe covid-19 kills vis pathological cytokine release syndrome and thus is an immunoregulatory disorder which logically would be worsened by lack of sunlight (vit d + nitric oxide), lack of sleep, lack of exercise, and excessive stress/fear, all results of lockdown
- read research literature on cloth masks published before the covid mass delusion ever happened; they are unanimous in showing that cloth masks make things worse
However as I commented as a sibling comment to yours, SCOTUS precedent would hold that this is almost certainly allowed, despite my utter disgust for these backwards policies.
If you can forcibly sterilize someone, why not prevent them from gathering? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_v._Bell
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobson_v._Massachusetts (forced vaccination despite history of adverse reaction)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_v._Bell (forced sterilization)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korematsu_v._United_States (forced detention based off of race)
(Many of my closest friends see through the narrative, partially because I wouldn’t shut up about it once I started reading the research and really realized how big of a mistake we’d made as a society)
It’s kind of like how everyone thinks that they would have opposed the Nazis because they grew up being taught that Nazis were bad. The truth is, this experiment in mass collective delusion has made it very clear which among us would have spoken out.
The ones reporting their neighbors for having a gathering or not wearing a mask while watering their lawn would have happily helped participate in genocide. Don’t doubt it.
Ironically, the hysteria is partially why New York’s IFR is the highest in the world; fears of hospital overrun scenarios that never materialized (and in retrospect never could have, but we didn’t have good data at the time) led to Cuomo sending infected into nursijg homes. And a doctrine of early invasive ventilation led to iatrogenic harm and therefore death. And deprivation of sunlight/exercise/sleep all serve to destroy the body’s natural immunoregulatory mechanisms.
Unfortunately, Jacobson v Massachusetts has given legal precedent for forced sterilization and forced detention based off of race, so I’m sure Jacobson can be used to justify these mortality-inducing lockdowns from a legal standpoint. That neither makes it ethical nor good for public health.
What arrogance to think that New York is not experiencing cases because of the interventions taken. Is it just a coincidence that Sweden, which never locked down nor mandates masks, is also done with COVID? No, it’s all just seroprevalence. Which so many of us have been trying to tell you guys for half a year now. Meanwhile the third world is about to experience an unprecedented mass starvation that will eclipse the COVID mortality by far.
They are undertaking this measure because of a spike in COVID “cases” (read: positive PCR test results). A spike in cases without a corresponding increase in deaths or hospitalizations should be a good thing, but we treat it the same as having an equivalent number of centenarians get sick. Completely absurd and it goes against everything we knew about public health before this mass global hysteria took root.
How kind of our benevolent overlords. We can still partake in the economic machinery! Just none of that pesky “living your life” stuff.
I’m surprised they haven’t banned laughter yet. It spreads SARS-CoV-2-laden respiratory droplets like nothing else.
(Compare South Dakota, right-leaning and NEVER locked down, to my home state of California, which is so democrat-leaning that we’re a de facto single party state)
BTW, this is what Sweden looks like now:
https://twitter.com/SeanCollins66/status/1309179008018513926
Facebook also regularly censors viral pro-trump content and project veritas has exposed this.
I wish it weren’t so, but it is. I’ve experienced it firsthand.