The Coronavirus, not the beer

NBC News reported that US spy agencies are reviewing the document - a private analysis obtained by the news company's London-based verification unit - which claims that there was no cellphone activity in a high-security area of China's Wuhan Institute of Virology between October 7 and October 24, 2019.
The report, which was based on commercially-available cellphone location data - indicates that there might've been a 'hazardous event' in that area between October 6 and October 11.


This should be concerning
 
Krgrecw said:
NBC News reported that US spy agencies are reviewing the document - a private analysis obtained by the news company's London-based verification unit - which claims that there was no cellphone activity in a high-security area of China's Wuhan Institute of Virology between October 7 and October 24, 2019.
The report, which was based on commercially-available cellphone location data - indicates that there might've been a 'hazardous event' in that area between October 6 and October 11.


This should be concerning
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But Dalyn will say there is no reason to speculate even though its obvious.

May have originally been a lab mistake but China used it as a weapon to achieve their goals.
 
thethe said:
Does little in comparison to helping at risk directly.
Just reeks of not understanding the real issue.
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Yes

Testing to find out who has the virus isn’t the real issue

Obviously the real issue is

Obama


You’re so far down an acid trip, you ain’t ever coming back to reality.
 
goldfly said:
Yes

Testing to find out who has the virus isn’t the real issue

Obviously the real issue is

Obama


You’re so far down an acid trip, you ain’t ever coming back to reality.
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I think you'll be surprised to know that eventually an overwhelming percentage of the population will contract the virus.

The point is not to stop it. Its to make sure the right people get infected.

Its such a basic concept its alarming you guys aren't grasping it.
 
nsacpi said:
Can You Be a Libertarian in a Pandemic?

Interesting essay by Keith Whittington in Reason.

https://reason.com/2020/03/16/can-you-be-a-libertarian-in-a-pandemic/

The answer is yes, but Whittington also argues for some flexibility and common sense.

Libertarians should recognize that classical liberal principles rest on certain assumptions. Libertarians are not (generally) anarchists. They recognize that there is a need for the state to secure rights and address the wrongs that individuals can inflict on others. Where the government is needed to adequately secure rights and prevent harms, it should be competent and empowered to perform the task with which it has been entrusted. No one is well served by having a hulking but ineffectual state or an interventionist but incompetent government. Moreover, the control of the spread of infectious diseases is one of the classic things that we expect the state to do. It is in our long-term collective interest to accept restrictions on individual liberty that are necessary to contain the spread of a deadly disease and remedy its ill effects. Some limits on individual freedom are both necessary and proper in these circumstances that would emphatically not be necessary nor proper in more normal circumstances.

It is useful and necessary to question government action. There are bound to be reasonable disagreements on the best government action to take in particular circumstances. Some mistakes will be made along the way, and we should insist that those mistakes be identified and corrected whenever possible. But it neither a knock against libertarianism nor a sacrifice of libertarian principles to accept the fact that sometimes government action is needed, and a pandemic is one of times.
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bumping this...the section I bolded is important...but i think my bolding it took attention from another point that is also of importance in our current situation, namely that:

"Where the government is needed to adequately secure rights and prevent harms, it should be competent and empowered to perform the task with which it has been entrusted. No one is well served by having a hulking but ineffectual state or an interventionist but incompetent government."

It has become quite common in conservative circles to be so anti-government as to be pro incompetent government. There is a fear, sometimes explicitly expressed, that competent government is dangerous in some sense. There may be a grain of truth in that. But I think many people who have held this idea will revise their views after this pandemic. I want government small and efficient. I recognize there is a lot of room among reasonable people to debate its scope. But we should all want a good return on tax payer money.

Keith Whittington's essay is a refreshing corrective to what passes for libertarian thinking around here. I think the last paragraph is useful to keep in mind. There have been mistakes made by experts and by government over the course of this pandemic. More will be made. Those mistakes need to be scrutinized and debated. With the idea of replacing them with better models and a better government response. Not with the idea that we have NO NEED for ANY expertise, models or government response.
 
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nsacpi said:
Ramping up testing is in fact the way to accelerate a return to a semblance of normal life
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I'm still trying to understand how we practically accomplish this.

Do I have to make doctor appointments to get tested? Does everyone?

Is it mandatory?

How long does my positive test "clear" me for. If I'm negative on Monday when do I need to get tested again?

Do I have to carry around papers saying I'm clean?
 
Why is it always a question of how can we do something in this country

When every other modern country has already figured out how to do it and implemented it?

These questions always come from the same people btw
 
From what I can tell only Estonia and maybe Italy are testing more per capital than the US? And those are basically the same as US, just slightly higher
 
sturg33 said:
I'm still trying to understand how we practically accomplish this.

Do I have to make doctor appointments to get tested? Does everyone?

Is it mandatory?

How long does my positive test "clear" me for. If I'm negative on Monday when do I need to get tested again?

Do I have to carry around papers saying I'm clean?
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The questions you raise deserve a serious answer. I'll limit myself to a Cliff Notes version of an answer to each. Otherwise I could go on and on.

1) Doctor's offices, clinics and pharmacies would be the delivery points for tests. Go in to CVS or Walgreens once every two weeks or four weeks and get a test. The bigger logistical issue is manufacturing and processing the tests on a larger scale at lower costs. My understanding is it costs $100 per test right now. Roughly. We need to bring that down to $10-20 per test. Many labs have cutting edge technology but not scale. To ramp up scale requires a big investment. To make that happen there has to be a pot of gold for the labs. A plan would involve dangling a $10 billion contract to the first ten labs that can test at $20 per test. A bigger contract if they can get it down to $10 per test. The federal government needs to incentivize this. This should have been done a couple months ago, but there is still an urgent need to make it happen.

2) On philosophical and practical grounds, I think it should be voluntary. There should not be a broad government requirement. But some individual workplaces will have to make their own decisions. People around the president and vice president (secret service, reporters) are being tested at high frequency, as they should be. That is effectively a job requirement for them. Restaurants and some other businesses will have to look at this. They may conclude frequent testing is the best way to regain customer confidence. Every school district and university will have to look at this. Not because the students are at risk of dying, but because the idea is identify who is infected and quarantine them in order to contain the spread.

3) Get tested once or twice a month. People with antibodies no longer have to be tested, unless evidence emerges that they can get infected again.

4) No broad government mandate for "papers." It doesn't sound like you have the kind of job where your employer would require it. So someone in your situation I think this should be left to your own best judgment. But if you want to you should be able to go to your pharmacy for a regular test.
 
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nsacpi said:
The questions you raise deserve a serious answer. I'll limit myself to a Cliff Notes version of an answer to each. Otherwise I could go on and on.

1) Doctor's offices, clinics and pharmacies would be the delivery points for tests. Go in to CVS or Walgreens once every two weeks or four weeks and get a test. The bigger logistical issue is manufacturing the tests on a larger scale at lower costs. My understanding is it costs $100 per test right now. Roughly. We need to bring that down to $10-20 per test. Many labs have cutting edge technology but not scale. To ramp up scale requires a big investment. To make that happen there has to be a pot of gold for the labs. A plan would involve dangling a $10 billion contract to the first ten labs that can test at $20 per test. A bigger contract if they can get it down to $10 per test. The federal government needs to incentivize this. This should have been done a couple months ago, but there is still an urgent need to make it happen.

2) On philosophical and practical grounds, I think it should be voluntary. There should not be a broad government requirement. But some individual workplaces will have to make their own decisions. People around the president and vice president (secret service, reporters) are being tested at high frequency, as they should be. That is effectively a job requirement for them. Restaurants and some other businesses will have to look at this. They may conclude frequent testing is the best way to regain customer confidence. Every school district and university will have to look at this. Not because the students are at risk of dying, but because the idea is identify who is infected and quarantine them in order to contain the spread.

3) Get tested once or twice a month. People with antibodies no longer have to be tested, unless evidence emerges that they can get infected again.

4) No broad government mandate for "papers." It doesn't sound like you have the kind of job where your employer would require it. So someone in your situation I think this should be left to your own best judgment. But if you want to you should be able to go to your pharmacy for a regular test.
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I appreciate the response and that is not as draconian as I suspected your requirements to be
 
sturg33 said:
I appreciate the response and that is not as draconian as I suspected your requirements to be
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As I said on philosophical and practical grounds it should be voluntary. Americans do not respond well when told they MUST do something. They will respond better if the message is we are all in this together and lets do it for each other.
 
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