The Multi-Trillion Dollar Question
Has the coronavirus infected you? Probably not. Can you name anyone you have been with last month or the month before who is infected? Probably not. According to Johns Hopkins’ data gathering, there have been 1,496,055 confirmed cases of coronavirus infection worldwide, 432,438 of those in the United States, about 1 out of 5000 and 1 out of 700 for the respective populations. Perhaps the untracked level of infection is an order of magnitude higher, but that would also mean that infection’s incidence of serious illness and lethality is an order of magnitude lower. In other words, coronavirus infection is highly lethal IF we only look at those who became so sick that they went to a hospital for care. There have been 89,435 deaths attributed to the virus worldwide, 14,808 in the U.S. Keep in mind that approximately 700,000 people in the U.S. died in the first three months of this year, 50 times the number who have been killed by coronavirus so far. The total of U.S. coronavirus deaths so far amounts to about the number of people who died from any cause during an average two-day span of the previous year.
An exasperating thing about this pandemic is that we are identifying those who could communicate it using methods that would have been at home among medieval people who had never heard of “viruses.” Is anyone you know sick? Have you traveled to a cursed land? Did you visit a city with bad air? Do you consort with Christians? Or Jews? The disease and the potential for spreading the disease are due to infection by a known virus. There are lab tests that can determine if someone is infected by that virus, but instead of being used as a widespread tool to clear the healthy to go on with work and normal life, the tests are rationed out to positively identify probable cases of infection. The other 99% of us are supposed to act as if we have been infected but don’t need medical attention.
What if the two trillion dollar aid package that the U.S. Congress authorized had all gone to $100 vouchers for coronavirus lab tests, twenty billion of them, 60 of them for each one of us? It would take some weeks for labs to gear up, but grabbing a share of a trillion dollar windfall sounds motivational. As with the aid package that was actually passed, some of those vouchers could have been distributed directly to the American population, and others could go to businesses wishing to clear their employees, or even their customers, clients, or others they wish to deal with. To go to a baseball game or a movie, you would show to the usher checking tickets your negative lab result from within the last two weeks or ten days or whatever interval works.
And why should that two trillion dollars have to come from the government? Getting back to work and normal pursuits should be motivational enough for individuals, businesses, and other entities to spend a fraction of what they are losing in order to escape this ridiculous Agatha Christie dodging of an entire population that could be killers but 99% are not. Mysteries are a popular genre, though, and maybe most people are enjoying being a participant in this one.
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Vader
April 9, 2020
A member of my ward has both his parents in the hospital with COVID-19, one of whom is on a respirator and looking pretty rocky at the moment.
Bookslinger
April 9, 2020
I know four people (two couples, in their 60’s and 70’s) by name, have been in their homes, in a neighboring ward, who have the virus. All four recovering. One was hospitalized for less than a day. One had it very mild.
Bookslinger
April 9, 2020
3 key factors seem to be in play:
1. How many infected people were “seeded” into a city. ( International travellers to NYC, Madi Gras celebrants to NOLA. Thousands of people from Wuhan to Lombardy.)
2. Population density and opportunity for spread. (Mardi Gras in NOLA. Density, mass transit and elevators in NYC. High density in Lombardy and Spain.)
3. General health of population. Smoking rate, obesity, diabetes. (Detroit, NYC, Lombardy, Spain.)
Healthy suburbia, and healthy rural just aren’t seeing it. So, yeah, a “one size fits all” response does not seem needed.
sute
April 9, 2020
Just pray that God doesn’t let other nasty viruses mutate to become spreadable through airborne transmission. HIV that’s transmitted via aerosol anyone? Our inadequate capability to respond wisely (or at all) to communicable viruses may be more of our social undoing than any nuclear armageddon worried about in years past.
Maybe we’ll make Morlocks of ourselves yet.
T. Greer
April 9, 2020
Yes. My aunt, and two friends in Washington DC.
Rozy
April 9, 2020
I’m with you John, I think there are much better ways to deal with this situation. And how can we get any “herd immunity” if we continue to be separate? And how many mild cases not requiring hospitalization or who even knew they had the virus have there been? And most importantly, where is the money for this $2T coming from? So many questions, not near enough answers. Perhaps only faith and fasting will take out this kind.
Cam N
April 10, 2020
Myself, my wife, my brother who for three hours last night couldn’t sleep or breathe while lying down. This is 15 days into the symptoms..
Zen
April 11, 2020
I have a friend who is in the ICU with it right now. His whole family has had it, but he is the sickest. He keeps on relapsing with it.
Bookslinger
April 13, 2020
From the graphs on Wiki, it looks like it has peaked in NYC, NY State, and the US overall.
Still new cases and new deaths every day, but the number per day is no longer growing, it’s staying the same — and for NYC the new cases/deaths per day is decreasing.
So if we are at the peak of the curve, what will the down-slope look like? Same as up-slope, faster decline, or slower decline?
If it is symmetric, then we could double the numbers. 22,000 fatalities now, doubled to 44,000?
Leo
April 13, 2020
Books,
I have been following the Danish experience very closely.
Denmark has a good healthcare system, locked down fairly early, and has seen good compliance with their restrictions by its citizens. They have passed their peak, and deaths are less than feared or predicted by some models. Denmark has handled the crisis better than many European countries. See https://www.france24.com/fr/20200413-le-danemark-exception-europ%C3%A9enne-face-au-covid-19
Their experience is that the down-slope is less steep than the up-slope. See https://nyheder.tv2.dk/samfund/2020-02-27-nyeste-corona-tal-fra-danmark-og-verden-saa-mange-er-smittede-doede-og-indlagte
You can use Google Translate or just look at the graphs.
The Danes are now looking at relaxing their restrictions slowly and by stages.
R
April 14, 2020
This virus thing has been illuminating. Even Rod Dreher, despite some token reservations, is learning to love Big Brother:
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/contact-tracing-coronavirus-political-religious-dissidents/
Leo
April 14, 2020
I hope Rod gets pushback.
Until there is a vaccine or an effective drug cocktail, we will move along three axes: health (distancing and lock down or not), wealth (lock down or open economy), and privacy (strict contact tracing or not). In the short run I don’t think we can implement draconian contact tracing, and I do not love Big Brother. I think we will slowly open the economy.
Vader
April 19, 2020
Coronavirus is now the leading cause of death in the United States.
https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-leading-cause-of-death.html