It’s time to reopen our country. Not tomorrow, not next week, right now. Nothing justifies waiting any longer. Let’s get back to work as responsible adults, today.
Doers Builders and Positive People
It’s time to reopen our country. Not tomorrow, not next week, right now. Nothing justifies waiting any longer. Let’s get back to work as responsible adults, today.
Russ says
Without a vaccine for COVID-19 how are you going to prevent catching the virus when you start mixing with people again? The virus is out there just waiting to find new victims.
Paul Crowe says
It may be a very long time before there is a vaccine, you can’t keep the country locked down until we do or we’ll never recover, but the virus has already widely spread and though highly contagious, the fatality rate is dramatically lower than originally thought, and almost always affects those with one or more underlying issues. A huge number of individuals have had the virus and never knew it.
We are more than capable of reopening and following common sense behaviors. Those concerned about their own health can stay home if they wish, but it’s time to get back to work.
Eugene R says
Everyone wants the lockdown to end, all over the world. But it’s not enough to just say right I’ve had enough. When you can find healthcare professionals, doctors and nurses, who agree with ending it, then it makes sense and has some validity, because those people are the ones who have to deal with this mess directly. I haven’t seen any hospital staff say, sure, let’s get back to normal.
Paul Crowe says
Actually, healthcare professionals ARE saying this.
And here, too. by Scott W. Atlas, MD, who is the David and Joan Traitel Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and the former chief of neuroradiology at Stanford University Medical Center.
Many health professionals have little understanding of the economics of shutting down entire countries and tend to look at issues like these from a one dimensional, “what’s best for my patient” perspective, not realizing that if the economy collapses, the entire health care system will collapse along with it.
In my area and many others, hospitals are closing due to lack of patients since “non-essential” elective surgeries have been stopped. Non-essential means heart surgeries, brain surgeries, cancer surgeries and radiation treatment, joint replacements and a whole lot more. Those doctors and nurses are definitely in favor of opening up to take care of their patients. Patients with the virus are not the only patient lives that matter.
Not every location is a New York City and not every country is Italy or Spain.
toufic says
I’m tired of people quoting Atlas… he doesn’t understand the numbers
1) the Stanford rate shows 0.2% fatality rate, so more than 3800 deaths in Santa Clara County alone, 1000 more people than died on 9/11 in just 1 county and their sample was over-representative of 19-64 y/o white non-poor women, so by their own admission likely underestimates the infection rate and fatality rate for other populations that are at higher risk
2) The death rate in NY for 18-44 is 434(deaths)/52380(cases) or just under 1%, calculated from obviously less than 100,000 people would (small sample size is always an issue for extrapolation) yield a rate of 828 deaths/100,000
3) 73% of fatal cases were 65 and older, their calculation of 50 and older is not possible given the data so no idea where they got the 95% figure but it still leaves 2769 deaths under 65, again comparable to 9/11
4) yes most deaths had underlying conditions, but these include Diabetes, Lung Disease, Cancer, Immunodeficiency, Heart Disease, Hypertension, Asthma, Kidney Disease, GI/Liver Disease, and Obesity. That last one alone is 40% of the US population 20 and older, 12% with Heart Disease,45% of adults in the US with hypertension (CDC) so don’t dismiss underlying as it with high probability includes you or someone very close to you
5) of all cases age < 17 the hospitalization rate is 8% (234 out of 2961), 18-44 is 10% (5179 out of 52380), 65-74 (8336 out of 17846)
and those are the issues in the first couple of paragraphs from Atlas' claims from the data he is citing.
I work as a statistician, his errors are obscene, narrow-minded, ignorant, and/or purposeful for a particular agenda. He isn't the only Stanford academic I take issue with, I used to work at SRI years ago, lots of bright people but for many reasons stats throws people for a loop. I would not use Atlas' numbers as a basis for argument, and even The Hill leaves the standard disclaimer for opinion pieces on his work instead of allowing it to be published as an endorsed article
Paul Crowe says
To begin at the end of your comment, you seem to discredit the article from The Hill as an opinion piece, but then, so is your comment.
You made a couple of references to 9/11, a bit of semantics often thrown into an argument for effect when it may not stand on its own merit. How many 9/11s do deaths from the seasonal flu compare to, annual numbers can be upwards of 60,000. Should we shut down the country for the flu? Many other causes of death far exceed 9/11 as well, it isn’t relevant to the discussion.
You list many of the underlying conditions that affect outcomes in a negative fashion for those with the virus, implying at the end that even I may be included in the list of obese or hypertensive, which I’m not, nor am I afflicted by the other factors on the list. That is not by chance, but primarily by choice. Obesity, Type 2 diabetes, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, heart disease, and some would say the rest of your list as well, fall under the consequences of metabolic syndrome, which is itself a result of what you eat and what you do, or more broadly, personal choice. If individuals suffer from medical conditions they brought on themselves, that is truly unfortunate and they need to be treated, but they are not victims except of their own behavior, and not something the entire country must be shut down to remedy. When tens of millions are out of work and small businesses across the country are shut down, potentially never to reopen, the immense long-term damage to all of those lives needs to be considered in any calculation of whether to reopen the country.
And last, but definitely not least, your characterizations of what you consider his errors are unnecessary if your argument is sufficient, and not appreciated here if you wish to be taken seriously. I am not defending his conclusions, but presenting them for consideration.
And one more thing, if you’re going to mention where you used to work and what you now do, and use that as a basis for your credibility in assessing someone else’s work, you would help your cause a great deal by not using a pseudonym on your comment. Atlas put his name on his work, my name is on my comment, you choose anonymity. That says a lot.
toufic says
1) I appreciate that you allowed my comment to go through moderation to continue this conversation, so thank you
2) my name is actually Toufic, not a pseudonym, and I think you can see my email address as I submit and see that it matches. Also I will link to a stats research report I was a part of that includes my name: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA466832.pdf
3) I do not characterize the piece as an opinion piece myself, The Hill themselves does: “BY DR. SCOTT W. ATLAS, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — 04/22/20 12:30 PM EDT 15,387 THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL”
4) Yes of course my comments here are an opinion, just as your own for wanting to reopen the country is, each an opinion but one I happen to disagree with. But I try to back up my thoughts with research of some sort, I do not like just tossing out numbers without consideration of where they came from or what they imply
5) The comparison to 9/11 is made not as a gotcha, but as a comparison point to an event that included a response that curtailed rights for some time, ~3000 deaths resulting in tremendous spending and legislative action on the part of the federal government. As of yesterday (5/1) we are up to 59,500 recorded deaths and most consider that somewhat of an under-count, and while there is no specific villain to attack in this scenario it still warrants an appropriate response such as social distancing and curtailing activities of people that may encourage groups forming
6) Actual recorded flu deaths by the CDC (counted in the same way as COVID-19 deaths) in the US range between 3,448 to 15,620 over the last 6 flu seasons, the 60k number is an estimate/model made by the CDC. COVID-19 kills between 9.5-44 times more people than the flu, with respect to the actual numbers, in 2017 the CDC estimated 61,099 deaths, but recorded deaths were 6,515. As I mentioned as of yesterday we had 59,500 RECORDED deaths, with no clear estimates of total deaths as of yet, so yes I think it warrants a different response
estimated: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm
recorded: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/flu.htm
7) you listed elective surgeries being shut down as a reason to re-open, and I list some of those same underlying conditions related to those (cancer and heart surgeries) as a concern for infection rate. Let’s use Cancer as an example, while it is difficult to pin down how many people have cancer each year (because some have much longer prognosis than others, remission, return, etc) but in 2016 2,744,248 died in the U.S. (CDC) and of those 598,031 had cancer (CDC), slightly more than 1 in 5 deaths in the U.S. (which is better, it used to be 1 in 4). By re-opening now the death rate for cancer would not likely decrease but increase, and the deaths from COVID-19 overall as well. Then start tallying in all the people with the issues that lead to heart issues and you start growing the number quickly.
I did not mean to imply you or someone you know/loved were absolutely in one of those categories only that the probability is really high
8) I agree the economic impact should be weighed, using stats I now research econometrics and economic concerns (primarily now in education but previously in bank analysis, including during the 2008 crisis, with a company called Highline Financial, now owned by Thompson Reuters) so it is not lightly that I consider that we are in a recession now and likely will be for a while (economists I read say anywhere from 12-24 months recover time at minimum). The impact from COVID-19 will be felt for a long time, in some ways and for a significant portion of the US they had just barely recovered in the last year or two. However at the end of the day most Americans agree with social distancing in spite of the economic impact, I’ll insert a link to a The Hill article (not opinion piece) from 4/15: https://thehill.com/homenews/news/492886-poll-81-percent-say-keep-social-distancing-despite-damage-to-economy Which is to say that I would guess that the numbers out using the re-opened facilities will be significantly depressed compared to normal
9) I originally responded with my consideration of Dr. Atlas’ data, and I think the numbers and sources he highlights are mis-characterized by him. Hence why I went to those same sources and took them apart, that is my consideration of his data, I think it is woefully mis-represented or mis-characterized to fit his narrative, and so I used the same sources to show that
10) I mention working at SRIC-BI (a Stanford research group) because Dr. Atlas works at Stanford as well, and use my personal experience with people working there having difficulty with interpreting statistics to show that even at the highest levels of academia people us interpretation of statistics (lies, damned lies, and statistics is a common phrase). In my field Dr. Hanushek of Stanford is well regarded but also known for mis-characterizations of statistics to fit his narrative, that was my point in highlighting the first few citations Dr. Atlas linked to, it got tiresome to fact check and have to clarify mis-characterizations so I stopped where I did. Professionals can use stats to fit their narrative if they ignore details, and I feel this is precisely what is being done
those are my answers to what you brought up, the rest is a deeper dive on what I’ve taken away from all of this:
1) One of the bigger proponents for re-opening is Georgia, but the weight of what is required to do so for business owners is huge, for example for a salon the board required safety includes the employee to be wearing a face mask, Splash shield and gloves that must be changed after every client. They also require each client wear masks to cover the clients’ mouth, nose and eyes with a towel while getting a shampoo, and plastic over any cloth seating, close all waiting areas, wrap the shampoo bowl with plastic after each client, and take the temperature of each and every client who have to verbally respond to a health questionnaire as well. All in a time when we’re still struggling to get toilet paper on the shelves, let alone appropriate PPE
And that’s to get a hair cut…
2) So what is the point of reopening? Well, given my work I always follow the money, and in this case I think it leads back to states and federal funds. Back to Georgia, for a restaurant owner there since the governor mandates that restaurants reopen, whether they reopen dining rooms or not if a restaurant owner attempts to file for business interruption Insurance, it does not go through since they are technically allowed to operate at full capacity. The landlord can demand all their money since they are allowed to fully operate, furloughed staff that is collecting unemployment insurance have to come back to work or they have to be fired, the unemployment insurance then goes on the restaurant owners tab, and if things go up again with the virus, they are still on the restaurant owner’s tab and not on the states’, since they are no longer employed.
My conclusions:
the $2 trillion stimulus bill had very little to do with helping the public so much as insuring liquidity for and keeping the banks in business (granted an important part of the economy, but definitely not the most important part, small business generates the greatest share of wealth in this country, ~44% of the GDP)
Given the large number of people who are in agreement with social-distancing measures, I would hazard a guess that the number of people out and about shopping and using all these services will definitely be depressed for a long while
The push to re-open the states from the Federal and State level has nothing to do with helping the economy overall as pushing the liability off of their payroll and down to the businesses that are the lifeblood of this country. I know the financial impact hurts, no question of that, but I do not think until we have sufficient testing in place it will come back and bite us in the butt if we re-open now
Paul Crowe says
Your name is unusual, so I stand corrected.
What’s obvious at this point is that we’re heading into ever longer replies, but neither of us is likely to change our view of how soon the country should be reopened. Honest people can disagree.
Since things are beginning to open up anyway, the question will soon be moot and what happens next will be apparent to everyone. Let’s hope for the best.
However, I’m puzzled by what you label “My conclusions.,” You make 3 statements, but only the first could be considered a conclusion based on the data you presented. The second is, as you state, a guess about shopping and use of services being depressed for a long time due to an opinion poll where 81 percent say to keep social distancing, etc., but opinions formed on the basis of a constant barrage of negative news media coverage can change quickly if restrictions are lifted and they see their friends and neighbors out and about, but as I mentioned, with states now reopening, we’ll soon see.
The last point is more troubling, your conclusion seems to be a purely speculative opinion implying the motivation for opening the states isn’t aimed at helping the economy, but only to shift liability. How can you know that? How can data reveal motivation? Isn’t that using stats to fit your narrative, the same thing you’ve accused Dr. Atlas of doing?
There is one other item, I noticed the paper you cite above of your work is from the University of Texas at Austin and I see there’s an investigation under way about the university’s possible ties to the Wuhan biolab rumored to be the source of the virus. That must be disappointing.
Domnan says
Nigerian here so I don’t really have say however I feel (based on what’s been happening here) that the case may get worse if the US economy opens now because a lot of people who were shielded by staying home will be exposed to it especially those with immunity issues. This could cause the present number of infections and deaths to rise upto and possible exceed the projected numbers. Of cause it it may not but are you willing to take that risk? For money?
I do not have any solution but I don’t think you have to swing between two extremes.
The price on human life is cheap here. I hope it isn’t where you are.
Paul Crowe says
Reopening the economy “for money,” is a narrative being pushed by those who want everything to remain closed, because the small businesses and those most affected by it are not their concern, however, even larger businesses are in trouble now and some, sad to say, are happy to see it. Some of us value all human lives, not just the ones affected by the virus and we also value the country itself and everything that makes it what it is. Our economy was leading the entire world before this virus hit, it still does, but it’s becoming increasingly apparent that some would like to see that change and what better way to accomplish that than to say we have to destroy it for our own good. Well, I strongly disagree.
anders eliasson says
Glad to see there is still activity here. It’s been a favorite site of mine for quite a while (although I rarely comment). I’m in the ‘let’s get back to it’ camp. And I’m sick of the ‘we’re in this together’, and the ‘new normal’ phrases.
Having lived thru the Asian flu pandemic of ’57/’58 (rather young then), the Hong Kong flu pandemic of ’68/’69, as well as the global SARS/MERS/Bird/Swine flu outbreaks, I don’t understand the fear/hype around this bug. Maybe the fear was there for all the others and I just didn’t pay attention.
In any case, remain optimistic and carry on,
ACE
Paul Crowe says
The fear and panic this time is due to an unending stream of media hype, that was missing in those previous outbreaks. It feeds on itself and is great for ratings.
Glad to see you back on board.
todd says
We have only tested 2% of the population. There are 328,000,000 people in the US. 37,000 people have died while infected with Covid-19. We have a 2% certainty on the number of cases. In roughly the same time, there have been 40-60,000 deaths from the regular flu during Shelter in Place – and we already had the vaccine. Not everyone bothers to get vaccinated either. My numbers are from reading comments or looking at the CDC web site. I am not a scientist or even a statistician, take that for what it’s worth.
I did lose my job designing stuff that is made in the USA (due to national security, not convenience or national pride). Because of Covid-19, we lost contracts which led to our investors backing out. Either the entire company shuts down at the end of May or we lay off a significant number of employees to hopefully last until everything is normal again. The Department of Defense considers the company an essential asset of national security, unfortunately, that doesn’t protect the employees, only the company!
-todd