General ramblings. I will not be posting any links. I am willing to discuss my thoughts, civilly.
- The experts didn’t know. Not all their fault, they got caught up in novel. The mitigations were based on assumptions, suppositions and previous experience, not “data”. They didn’t have any data. They weren’t bad guesses, they mostly made sense. But they didn’t work nearly as well as “hoped” - scientists don’t hope.
Example: social distance 6’. Where did that number come from? There’s no science behind it. There are studies which clearly show a cough or sneeze can contaminate over twice that distance.
Example: wash your hands for 20 seconds. Not science. Quality much more important than quantity. I can wash my hands for 40 seconds improperly.
I’ve noticed that every single one of the mitigations is operator dependent. Every single one of them. They gave us a bunch of stuff to do because they can’t do anything. I can almost taste their frustration.
The results in the areas with the most stringently restricted areas is not materially better than those with less. It wasn’t the difference.
I agree with targeted testing. With the advantage of hindsight, I can think of several things in that area we should have done. Taiwan tested based on travel and possible symptoms. You had 1 degree of fever - test. No symptoms - no test unless you had traveled to a hot spot. They shut down public transportation for a few days, NYC can’t. Some things the same, others different.
The experts told us early on ventilators were critical, then the data told us not so much. I don’t blame them, they’re human. But we also spent some chasing something that wasn’t critical.
I notice we’re giving up on some of the drugs being helpful pretty quick. They may or may not be a help. I will remind you of this; Tamiflu can be helpful with the flu: if you take it within the first 48 hours (probably too big a window) of becoming symptomatic. How many people know when they first became symptomatic (operator dependent)? How many can get it within that time frame? And if it does work, it may shorten the symptomatic period by a day. Does that mean it’s not worth using? Not in my opinion. These other drugs may not work until we find the right combination of criteria, or they may not work at all.
What this first point tells me is that we blindly believed a bunch of people trying to guide us through a dark tunnel without a flashlight of their own. Everyone of them had opinions and contexts, which are not the same as mine.
I respect expertise, I also know it is not infallible by any stretch of the imagination. And that’s what we expected of everyone of them. We put all our faith in government, a government of people, despite knowing damn good and well we don’t even put the best of the best in government.
I respect Drs. Fauci and Birx for their dedication and efforts, for their expertise. All the others as well. Everyone one of them. Cuomo for example. But while in some cases they, if they all work together as a team can perhaps make a bad situation a bit better, government cannot save us. It is designed to protect itself first.
This problem is not resolved by a long shot and already it is back to doing what it does. And we will be expected to put the country back together for them when we get through dying.
Example: Because of what we did, I would imagine that a whole lot of people that were within a year or five of retiring are not going to be able to now. They are going to have to keep working in the heat and cold. And some will die because of it.
There’s been a lot of talk about “wasting time, lost months, etc.” Well, sometimes when you rush the “experts”, you get errors. Costly errors. And a lot of times, less is more.
I’ll be back with more thoughts as they pop into my crazy head. Or not.
