China's fuck-up was the original fuck up. The big one.
First their regulation and enforcement facilitated this happening. For years the WHO and CDC have been watching strains of Coronaviruses and Influenza in animals, in China, be only a few mutations away from jumping to the human race, or becoming virulently infectious. And this time it happened. It doesn't happen other places. It happens in China. It's not the natural environment. It's the artificial environment - both physical and regulatory - that allows these super-viruses to keep appearing there. China's government has created the conditions for this catastrophe.
Secondly, when it became clear how severe this could be, they did what authoritarian regimes always do and viewed it purely as a threat to their grip on power, and not as the public health crisis it is. So they silenced people. They downplayed the threat. In the great tradition of Chinese governance, regional officials lied up the ladder to their superiors at the central government about its severity. The same kind of shit that has facilitated China's BS economic numbers of years (that nobody really believes) facilitated the spreading of a virus. China let this get out of containment and robbed the world of two precious months.
Has the rest of the world made mistakes? Monumental ones, no doubt. But they pale in comparison to the original failure. They aren't close to the same level. The mistakes of the US and Europe are only mistakes in response to something that ALREADY was occurring, that the Chinese government, and the Chinese government alone, could have nipped in the bud. But they didn't because they did not want to look bad.
Just to drive the point home, this very day the Chinese government is promoting the bullshit that is Chinese Traditional Medicine as a "Chinese solution "to Coronavirus. FOr those who don't know, Chinese Tradiitional Medicine is (1) Not authentically Chinese (2) not traditional and (3) not medicine. CTM as we know it was concocted by the Communist Party and promoted by Mao in the 1950s and 1960s as a Chinese alternative to Western Medicine. Nominally, it's based on ancient practices, but really it was an attempt by an authoritarian regime to extend it's totalitarian control and cultural hegemony within China even to medicine.
That is how serious the Chinese government is taking things.
Make no mistake, when this is over there _will_ be a severe reckoning with China that is long over due. It _will_ lose its place as the world's factory floor as countries reassess is place in the global logistics chain not to its benefit and it's ability to influence global events due to its deceptive authoritarian nature _will_ be curtained.
Westerners looked to growth in China when growth slowed down in the Western world. That proved ill advised. Now we're living through the roll back. Better late than never. Maybe we'll return to face what China truly is: a modestly more open North Korea with a lot more people and a bigger bank account. But at it's core, all authoritarian regimes have the same motivation. And this time the world will get sick off it.
And yet, you still have no evidence other than your feelings....
This is what it comes down to
1 Person, no longer affiliated with the Public Heath Authority, says "they're trying to infect the whole country to build up Herd Immunity"
2 People, Directly involved with the Coronavirus strategy, say "No, we're not. We're trying to slow down the spread of the virus as much as we can" (which, btw, is the strategy that every sane country is working with)
Once again:
He said she is "Partially correct". You are cherry picking the parts of what he said that you like and ignoring everything that you don't.But is it your strategy that people should be infected and build an immunity to protect the weak?
- No, not basically, but the basis of our strategy is to try to get the infection going as slowly as possible. We do not really know what a herd immunity would look like for this type of disease, so it is very strange to say that this is the strategy when we do not know what the target is. But we know what the goal is to reduce the spread of infection and we know how to achieve it. It's all about staying home when they're sick. It's the ground bolt.
And every country wants to slow the virus as much as possible. That's what Social Distancing is for. Stopping the virus completely in its tracks right now is not an option...now the best course is to stagger the infections as much as possible so that the hospitals don't get overrun.
Last edited by Egomaniac; 2020-03-15 at 10:57 PM.
They've been saying this for a decade. All their threats, all their espionage and the rest of it - they are too attractive with their flexible regulations and frankly, corruption.
We've seen how many countries in Europe are openly flirting with their totally-not-a-spynet-5G offers. Some might even take it. The Chinese have billions up their asses they are willing to throw at takers.
success comes in the form of technical solutions to problems, not appeals to our emotional side
Almost, but in most countries the need to stagger isn't exactly now, but when the number of infections likely increase in a few weeks.
At least the UK also plans to protect the most at risk during that time, and seems to have that as their plan.
And then herd immunity will work.
However, it might be that the official plan in Sweden is that the current social distancing hopefully works, and the above is just the fall-back strategy when it fails.
The other possibility would be have even stricter social distancing, and keep that up until we have a vaccine (next summer?) or until we have tracked down every infected individual to avoid new outbreaks. Possibly with a break during summer, and then back for 6 months again next winter.
Ah yes, he did... not. First, he said it was just a flu, then blamed democrats.
Now you can compare his administration's response in airports (nice, another virus hotspot) or if the news are actually true - attempt to make only USA have access to vaccine at first.
What he did is panic. Understandable, though, he is in the actual risk group and he could die, no matter the care he would receive. xD
No one outside of the most hardcore Trump supporters are going to believe he or the republicans have done a good job. There's plenty of reasons why, but what makes it even worse is that some republicans and Trump supporters are still spreading disinformation about the virus right now. Make no mistake, Trump, his administration, and his supporters (particularly those in congress) have caused the upcoming deaths of thousands of people that did not have to die.
There's no better proof of this than comparing Italy to South Korea right now.
Longtime lurker first time poster. 6500 deaths worldwide from this thing. (Googled it)
I don't subscribe to conspiracy theories about this virus. I do say that idiots are overreacting. Google how many are killed by flu/malaria/etc.
Don't accept the line fed by traditional media. Look for yourself
It ignores such insignificant forces as time, entropy, and death
Unrelated, but I just had to thank you for your signature link.
I've wanted such a feature for years, and now I finally, FINALLY, can browse the site without seeing the names (and white banners) of ignored people!
Thank you!
- - - Updated - - -
... Wait... what?
Please tell me that's a rumor...
Remind me, when and where did you get your law degree? They may not prevail, I may not feel it is a meritorious claim, but neither of those things mean that a decently skillful attorney is going to be unable to make a colorable case to get into court. Into court means probably into the news, and that's enough to open the door to being paid to go away. Into the news also means more publicity, since they have already gotten their faces out there it seems reasonable to guess they might want to continue that.Originally Posted by TrollHunter3000
With COVID-19 making its impact on our lives, I have decided that I shall hang in there for my remaining days, skip some meals, try to get children to experiment with making henna patterns on their skin, and plant some trees. You know -- live, fast, dye young, and leave a pretty copse. I feel like I may not have that quite right.