The Coronavirus

[Bob Butler 54]

(04-17-2020, 05:45 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(04-17-2020, 03:48 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Shutting down everything is a one size fits all solution.  When the problem first occurs you reach for the quick and dirty solution.  We have now a chance to get far more nuanced.  But you have to reduce contact enough to not overwhelm the medical system.  You have to have exponential decay rather than exponential growth.  Given the lack of testing, it is hard to customize.  You end up throwing away a lot of babies with the bathwater.

There's definitely room for fine tuning.  Masks reduce transmission by a factor of 3.4 if everyone wears them.  Having everyone wear masks where possible, including in essential businesses not currently required to use masks, and continuing telecommuting and school closures, would likely more than make up for reopening all businesses.  Where masks don't work, such as in restaurants, you could make other adjustments, such as taking out every other table.

The way I am figuring it, the more you test, the more you find. The more you find, the worse Trump looks in ignoring the problem early. Thus, the less the White House wants folks to test. To him, it is about the election rather than the lives at risk. Alas for Trump, the timing of the Coronavirus is such that the states will get their testing without federal help in order to restart the economy… long before the election.

But I agree there is lots of room for fine tuning.