Caution vs. Hysteria

Wuhan Flu 38 Comments

Stay careful out there, everyone, but please don’t panic! In the past few days I’ve observed some very bizarre comments from people that is quite opposite from common sense. It now seems the new normal for some is to tell others precisely how they should conduct every last aspect of their lives during this pandemic. I realize their own fears are driving such hysterical chastising but such comments mostly just amp up panic in others.

Please grab a beverage and carefully read this thoughtful article.

More from the author here.

38 Replies to “Caution vs. Hysteria”

  1. What they have:
    “It now seems the new normal for some is to tell others precisely how they should conduct every last aspect of their lives during this pandemic.”
    What they really want:
    “It now seems the new normal for some is to tell others precisely how they should conduct every last aspect of their lives.”

    1. Yes, it appears that the question has always been who shall dictate how everyone shall live. This aberation of free thought of some rabble declaring themselves free will not last, their betters shall rule them in due time.

    1. This clown is STILL pretending the Chinese communists got the virus under control in Hubei. They have not.

      Wuhan is still in lockdown. Wuhanese under house arrest are beginning to starve, as “volunteers” charged with bringing them food are not doing so, out of fear or sensing a golden opportunity to make a fortune selling the food at outrageous prices.

      The hospitals are still overwhelmed. Confirmed cases have fallen to zero because reliable testing has ceased. No doctor wants to go the way of Dr. Li. Victims are dying behind closed doors, out of sight of gullible western journalists.

      Factories have not resumed production. Canny managers have turned the lights and machinery on to push up energy consumption and provide the illusion of activity. Few humans have returned to work.

      Don’t believe a word you read about the virus being under control in China unless and until:

      1. Schools re-open nationwide.

      2. Russia re-opens its border to Chinese visitors.

      3. The rubber-stamp legislature of Red China schedules and holds its annual meeting.

      Ten million will die in the US alone? Yes. That will not be the fault of President Trump. It will be the fault of the Chinese communists who have signed the death warrants of 50 million of their own.

      When this is over, Chairman Xi can look forward to a body count of 200 million—more than that of all previous communist leaders combined.

      In hell, Chairman Mao must be toasting him with baijiu distilled from the tears of the damned.

      (Hysteria? I’ll leave that to the Russophobes and anti-Semites of the pro-China and pro-Iran media, thank you.)

      1. I guess where I live I should be considered lucky. 67 tested for Corona Virus test shows NOT Corona Virus they all had colds, so I feel blessed that my Province has a low count NONE but all business but essential are closed, schools closed all gatherings of any kind is NOT aloud….but safe than sorry I guess!!

    2. Good read. The computer model with knobs and dials though is an example of. what shall we call it, statistical arrrogance, the same problem that infests the global warming industry. A plausible mathematical model has variables filled with data that we just don’t know and we accept the result as gospel without understanding , or deliberately ignoring, the models’ limitation

  4. Bavaria will have to declare breweries an essential service.

    Beverage…roger that BEER !

    Bravo Echo Echo Romeo…tall chilled glass incoming 🙂

    Cheers

    Hans Rupprecht – Commander in Chief
    Army Group “True North”
    1st Saint Nicolaas Army

  5. Irony. Actually inconvenient reality.

    I would guess, educated or otherwise most people who recognize CAGW junk science are on board with the COVID-19 mitigation.

    Many of those who criticize every measure, being of Trump, have lost grip with the precautionary principle they so adored as they offered homage to the Gored Church of Our Watermelon Faithful. Not funny, actually, but like I said, reality.

    According to the self-glorified DeMarxist media, unless we tell people to panic, or be fearful, we’re spreading false hope.

    Which is wrong even if that hope is later warranted with results.

    It wouldn’t matter. As usual, reality is foreign to them because it does not conform to them in power.

    1. Ten million people are NOT going to die in America. That is utterly preposterous hysteria. And yes, when 10M actually do die … if I am alive … I will say mea culpa. But we are falling victim to the same CAGW data “projection” game. Sorry … I refuse to live like a refugee … in a Calais migrant camp … waiting to get into my local CVS … during “old people hours”

      https://youtu.be/vKQ8_yUiIMc

      I know the people who are “reveling in their abandon” … it’s the Preppers! It’s the gawwd damnnned Preppers! They just love this shit.

      1. it’s a lot like Extinction Rebellion. “Do what we say, or the future gets it.” It’s not what will happen in the future, it’s what you’re willing to give up to prevent that future. That wasn’t likely to happen in the first place.

        Trust me, I work with mathematical models. (just like “trust me, I’m an engineer!” on youtube, very entertaining if a little rude.) They’re all wrong, but some are right enough to be useful. That’s why they can’t pass standard geological modelling audit questions, because they’ve never had to pass tests with the rigor of the stock market guardians “how does this work?”. I’d like to see what atmospheric conditions those models call for if you let them run for a million years. If they break the laws of physics at that point, then they’re too wrong to use for mid (aka less than 1000 years) range forecasting.

      2. A post I made on Wattsupwiththat:

        Here is an on-line epidemic caluculator; it has all sorts of knobs and dials. These have been developed over the years and I have praise for those attempting this.

        I think, though, it is an example of, what shall we call it, statistical arrrogance? The same problem that infests the global warming industry.

        A plausible mathematical model is developed and has variables filled with data that we just don’t know; and we accept the result as gospel without understanding , or deliberately ignoring, the model’s limitations and quality of the input data.

        http://gabgoh.github.io/COVID/index.html

  8. Reality check says that the Canadian government’s proposed economic response can only be sustained for about one month, at the very most two, before economic collapse is inevitable. Therefore the social response has to work within the time frame of now to end of April (which is still way too long), or we will be forced to go to some plan B that probably should have been plan A. That would be a more specific targetted response, isolating both those at high risk and those treating the sick, for a time period of 60-90 days, and having a very strict testing interface between the health care providers and the general population. While I trust most medical professionals to observe the protocols, some of the care home attendants are possibly of a lower order of self-discipline and organization, and it would make sense to be testing them routinely on exit from high risk areas.

    Otherwise I think we should be trying to plan a return to normalcy before the economy tanks completely.

    To some extent, I still think this is over-hyped, the comparison to any recent year’s flu epidemics and death counts is not so vastly different. I was reading that 70,000 people had a premature end to their lives as a result of the ordinary flu in the U.S. in winter of 2017-18 which was one of the higher death tolls in the past forty years. Some years have been as low as 10,000. But that tells you that the Kung flu comparison has to be against that metric, not absolute zero, otherwise we should have been doing the present responses every year.

    I also have to wonder with such reduced volumes of traffic and travel, is it not likely that traffic accident deaths and injuries will be greatly reduced for the time when this virus is supposed to be stressing the emergency health care systems? I wonder if that is already being observed or can be predicted as a partial offset to the demand for emergency beds and treatment?

    1. And nobody ever suggested shuttering the world economy despite 60k dead. Nobody.

      Media and left are now fully invested in disaster porn.

      By next Friday we should have some data on those given chloroquine.

      My bet is it’s going to be very positive.

    2. … otherwise we should have been doing the present responses every year.

      Quite so. Remembering that helps keep this in perspective.

      One reason why the ICUs are overflowing is they are already full of influenza patients? Discuss. 🙂

  9. To some extent, I still think this is over-hyped, the comparison to any recent year’s flu epidemics and death counts is not so vastly different.

    For comparison, for the last 3-4 years, Italy has been averaging a death count from influenza of ~ 20,000.

    1. #s out of Italy today as reported on Fox Report.
      Over 900 cured
      700+ (just under 800) died today officially from coronavirus.
      It doesn’t include those who die at home or in hospice. Those people are not tested. Their death certificates list another cause of death.

    2. At like 700 dead per day from wuflu they’ll exceed that sometime next week but it’s just a flu bro don’t panic. The lockdown is a huge success with exponential growth through the roof.

  10. Alone among Canadians, Chief Big Screen—or his proxy the Northwest Territories government—is closing the 60th parallel to visitors from southern Canada.

    Can he do that? That would have been useful for Alberta and Saskatchewan to know many years ago.

  11. What panic?

    Just make sure you wear a hockey helmet, shoulder pads, and carry a good stick when you go to Costco tomorrow and your well covered if anyone cuts your line.

    1. Our local Costco was a ghost town this afternoon; no hockey gear was required. The parking lot was half empty and there were rows and rows of carts. There were signs posted throughout the store reminding shoppers to practice distancing and stay 6 feet away from each other. That wasn’t difficult to do. Only every other cash register was open to keep space and cashiers weren’t touching membership cards. No toilet paper or chest freezers but that’s not what we went for.

  12. I warned about the panic back in the beginning which meant I wasn’t taking it seriously enough. When you’re 91 and alone panic itself could be a killer. As it is, being online every day for several hours is preventing me from falling asleep after taking my sleeping pills. The non-stop negativity drains away any good from the medication.
    If any of you would like to see and hear my GP explain it all to you, catch him here. Glad I found this last night.
    https://youtu.be/WnF6K3zAcvM

  13. Those graphs in the article are way out of date. the lockdown in Italy is not working. Like at all. By next week that’ll be discussed quite a bit in media. This flattening the curve theory is bunk and is not possible.

    So now we’ll have to decide what to do. I personally will keep social distance no matter what.

    1. James, the lock down does not work in a society like italy, or iran. those 2 example are unique, and not representative of American and Canadian responses to a lock down

  14. “COVID-19 is spreading, but probably not accelerating”

    The author clearly does not understand the definition of “accelerating”. The disease is absolutely accelerating. If the “velocity” of the spread of disease was constant (no acceleration), it would mean the new cases per day was constant. Any increase in the new cases per day means acceleration, it can be slower or faster, but it is still accelerating. And percent is the incorrect way to refer to “acceleration” in this instance. If on day 1 you have 1 new case and day 2 you have 2 new cases the percent increase is 100%, but that’s the wrong metric. The correct metric is “new cases per day per day”, just like we define the acceleration of gravity, not by percent, but by the rate, i.e. 9.8 metres per second per second. In the above instance the acceleration is defined as 1 new case per day per day, not 100%.

  15. The government of Manitoba has announced prescription drugs can only be bought thirty days at a time. They want to avoid stockpiling. Does that qualify as rationing?

  19. “He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security.” ~ Benjamin Franklin

    There is really nothing else to be said. it’s all been said before, in every century, every era. People trading liberty, for the illusion of security.

  20. Medium pulled the article which is a good reminder that they are probably editorially compromised to some extent.

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