MedEwok wrote:
German speaking countries are much more ready to give the state a say in these matters and have it regulate private life than Anglo-Saxon countries.
You know where Angles and Saxons come from, right? ;-)
MedEwok wrote:
And, despite several policy errors, our overall Covid-19 strategy has worked better at protecting the population from the pandemic.
I don’t think that can be said with certainty – there are too many variables and unknowns. Different countries have populations in different average states of health, wealth and all sorts of other things that make a difference when you look at any measure of ‘protection’, e.g. infections, hospitalisations or deaths. Not to mention the fact that each country tests differently, counts cases differently, hospitalises according to a different policy and uses different treatments, records deaths differently, etc. There’s just so much that doesn’t make sense, so many things have happened that don’t fit with the narrative that more lockdown and more restriction = better.
The worst thing the politicians can do now is to kid themselves that the decisions they made were the major factors in how their country fared.
Things will become clearer in the long term. For my own country I think we will eventually learn that the NHS was pretty average, perhaps even quite bad, and that we had a significant unhealthy elderly population – people with multiple co-morbidities kept alive by modern medicine – that was just ready to be ‘harvested’ by an aggressive respiratory infection like this. The NHS lesson will not be learned for a long time because of (a) the hero-worship that has gone on, and (b) they embedded themselves firmly into the vaccination success story when what they should have done is gone back to their day jobs and let the military / volunteers do the vaccinations.
I think that is accurate.
Any country which thinks they got some amazing policies are kidding themselves. It will take years for things to be worked out.
MedEwok wrote:
And, despite several policy errors, our overall Covid-19 strategy has worked better at protecting the population from the pandemic.
Absolutely. There is always people who quote some variant of “causation even in theory can never be proven” (and they are right), but if we do something different to create a certain result and this result is actually materializing one typically would think that the action was successfull.
Yes, it is impossible to prove that training actually helps to improve the time you need to run a mile. Might well be that people who train spend more time in the nature and therefore have a much happier life and the time you need to run a mile is actually purely driven by happiness. And by the way I know people that run a mile faster than I with much less training as well as people who train much more and can’t beat me anyways – therefore it is completely unclear if training does something at all.
Same with Covid: Keeping social distancing is without any reasonable doubt the second most effective way (behind vaccination) to avoid transmission and hence death. Some countries have managed to achieve social distancing without specific measures (by culture, nature or whatever), some countries only with measures that limited individual freedoms and some countries did not achieve social distancing at all even though they tried to implement such measures.
It might well be, that we do not yet fully understand what has driven the progression of the pandemic in Arkansas or Montana – but there is no reasonable doubt that social distancing (natural, voluntary or forced) is a key driver of survival.
Peter wrote:
Any country which thinks they got some amazing policies are kidding themselves. It will take years for things to be worked out.
I’d agree with that, and do in principle, except that I’m all too familiar with the use of the phrase “it will take years to work out” as a euphemism to mean “it will probably never be worked out” I think the latter is the case here.
What can actually be manipulated by people to achieve a useful effect within realistic constraints is technology, in this case vaccines, which transcends the need for complete understanding, uniform cultural values and the rest… and just works, reducing the problem to the point where people can resume their lives no matter what their culture etc. That should be the goal. Creating a world of compliant, non-creative mono-cultural human drones should not be the goal.
It’s interesting that Belgium has a fatality rate about double that of Germany. I’m sure it’s related to the massive cultural differences, population density differences and comparative unwillingness to sacrifice the Belgian economy or repress individual opportunity. Or alternately maybe nobody can explain it well. 
Also interesting that the cumulative death rate in Florida and California is close, despite diametrically opposite government approaches. That’s not a mystery at all 
vic wrote:
Come on, Silvaire, don´t say the Belgians were so different in culture to Austrians, Germans or Netherlandse , also population density is quite close in all of these.
Perhaps I shouldn’t have used irony… but obviously that was exactly my point and yet there is a factor or two difference between the fatality rate in Belgium and Germany. Arizona has a very low population density but is number six on the list of fifty US states. Washington has much of its population in a small geographic area but is number forty-five of fifty. Local politics does not align to results either. A lot of trends overlap and the net result is what it is, and not easy to explain. Throwing around theories about why one government, culture, social distancing, climate etc etc etc has created a different fatality rate in one place versus another is not a productive activity, does not produce a valid basis for action and it’s certainly the last thing laws should be based on. My intent was to provide examples of how it is useless, not to conduct my own version of amateur sociology
It’s also very possible that different nations report very differently, and that throws another wrench in the pseudo science.
The solution to all that nonsense has proven to be technology, 2020 vaccine development and 2021 production and distribution. The amateur sociology is a waste of time based on the comparative data, and has set a very dangerous precedent in relation to governments placing huge arbitrary limitations on basic behaviors and rights based on whatever rationalization they may dream up, to “protect” people.
That said, I am happy the real technology is causing the whole thing to slip into the past at a rate dependent on the degree to which populations are vaccinated, that people in my area seem to be regaining their confidence, individuality and sense of proportion as they take individual action in choosing to be effectively immunized. And that its worked.
Silvaire wrote:
but obviously that was exactly my point and yet there is a factor or two difference between the fatality rate in Belgium and Germany.
Yes it is – and it is very well understood! The difference between Belgium and e.g. Germany in cumulative fatality per mio. population almost entirely comes from fatalities in the first wave in Mar/Apr 2020. In Apr. 2020 alone they had more than 6.000 deaths (in a population of 11 Million) which is 25% of their total Covid deaths.
After that phase the fatality rates in both countries are very similar.
The reason for these deaths was a combination of being very late (and not very strict) with lockdown measures compared to Germany (e.g. the elderly care homes in Belgium have been open for public visits w/o any special precaution measures for the entire Mar 2020) and a resulting over utilization of ICU capacities.
No magic about that – and in contrast to what you want to indicate with your irony actually a great example that early and strict lockdown measures actually help!
(And to not blame the Belgiums: This is more than a year ago and has been in the first wave of the pandemic. They really could not know that a quick and much stricter lockdown would have saved so many lives. It was just bad luck…)
While the virus is obviously in retreat at least for now in the US and Europe, there’s renewed interest in its origins. The WaPo has published this timeline:
PS: WaPo is behind paywall, but you can read some articles for free or upon registration
MedEwok wrote:
And, despite several policy errors, our overall Covid-19 strategy has worked better at protecting the population from the pandemic.
I think the jury is out on that and will be for some years. But what is also clear is that perception and actual effect are often worlds in between.
How much of that is actual luck and how much is wisdom of decision remains to be seen. I.e. here in Switzerland there was huge criticism on the purchasing strategy for vaccinations, but in the end, it proved quite adequate. On the other hand, our minister of health has gained a lot of respect this week by openly admitting that he was given bad advice about masks and other things in the beginning of the pandemic and therefore allowed the people to be lied to, which he deeply regrets. Takes courage to do openly admit such things. Hopefully those responsible will get their just punishment for this.
I think the main question in this regard is why the pandemic was allowed to spread at all and no “no covid” strategy was implemented the moment Covid was discovered to have spread. Then it would have been possible, as some countries have shown. Now it is impossible and those countries who succeeded see that effort wasted by those who did not, the moment they open up their borders.
It is still remarkable how the Asian countries acted and re-acted and I strongly believe this is how future disease control needs to be implemented. The moment something turns up, isolate that country radically and all focal points.
Personally I find all the talk of personal freedom impaired tiring and off the point. Those countries who radically stamped out the infection with drastic measures regained that freedom mostly in early summer 2020, while the rest of the world had to wait for the vaccines for that to happen and will need measures for a long time to come. If we could get people to adopt the Asian habit to wear masks whenever they feel off, to protect the others from their germs, it would be a real improvement.
Plus, if we can get our spoilt and tantrum-prone society to stop confusing egoism with freedom, we might be more successful next time.
Silvaire wrote:
reducing the problem to the point where people can resume their lives no matter what their culture etc
I wonder. What does that actually mean, resume their lives that is. Both Norway and New Zealand and a few other “first world” countries have gone through this pandemic with the end result being an average death rate independent of the pandemic and even being less than before the pandemic. Why? What do these countries have in common? I think the “usual”, but also plain wrong explanation is low population density. It certainly is a factor, but not a main factor in itself. Sweden, particularly north of Stockholm has much lower population density than Norway, yet the pandemic has gone bananas there. Also, the population density in Norway is very high in the concentrated areas where people actually live, at least 90% of the population. It simply is not a factor in itself IMO.
What is common with all these “better off” countries is the general population is very keen on outdoor activities, and used to all sorts of weather. Some examples:
But also:
I think this is the main factor. We are used to adapt. Resuming life isn’t really an issue, because it was never put on hold. The exception is exclusively some city-dwellers in Oslo and other large cities that never travel beyond the city border in any case, and have had a “terrible time” in “total isolation” and with “closed bars and pubs”. A pandemic is here, what do we do? What has happened is that people simply spend more time outside. The prime example was the hammock crazyness last spring. The trips to Grand Canarias were cancelled, OK, this means more time spent doing stuff I have long wanted to do, but never found the time to do it. When things open up there will of course be full chaos of people going to Spain and all over the Mediterranean. The combination of warm weather, sunshine every day, good food and good wine simply isn’t available around here
Personally I haven’t met a single person that has put his/her life on hold. Things have been different – yes, and mainly because we have adapted to the situation. It really has not been bad in any sense of the word. On the contrary, the large majority has had a great time. It has put Grand Canarias at the very top on my “to do list” but that’s it really.
