Ask HN: What happens next after a successful lockdown?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22595415

by martokus • 6 years ago

189 191 6 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Optimistic scenario - lockdown everywhere is a success and after a month there're single cases here and there, maybe even 0 cases. Would countries resume travel and ease gathering restriction before a vaccine has been invented? Or we can expect to be in a lockdown for 12-14 months until a vaccine comes to market, if it comes to market?

jamesdmiller• 6 years ago

The endgame is to figure out the least cost sustainable measures of getting R0<1 until we have a vaccine or treatment safe enough for people in high risk groups to take.

pdonis2• 6 years ago

The endgame is to figure out the least cost sustainable measures of getting R0<1

The question assumes this has already been done: "single cases here and there, maybe even 0 cases".

It seems to me that the key question at that point is, if there are no active cases--everyone exposed to the virus who is still alive has either never developed symptoms in the first place, or has recovered from whatever symptoms they had and is now asymptomatic--is there still a risk of spreading the virus further?

PeterisP• 6 years ago

It does not assume that - Wuhan currently has R0<1 and it did not and still does not have "single cases here and there, maybe even 0 cases"; R0<1 through a lockdown is a tested (in Wuhan) way to get from tens of thousands of cases to just tens of new cases per day and probably eventually to single isolated cases here and there. But we'd really like to find a less invasive, more sustainable set measures than what was done in Wuhan.

blamarvt• 6 years ago

Isn't it about flattening the curve instead of eliminating the curve?

Leary2• 6 years ago

Resume work after countries have the capacity to test everyone who has a fever. Maintain strong hygiene and social distance if possible. Firefight clusters of outbreaks where they occur. Wait for treatment and vaccine.

baytrailcat• 6 years ago

This is my line of thinking too. Let's face it, the entire economy can't be shutdown till vaccines are available. Use this borrowed time (when we can afford total lockdown) to mass produce tests, medicines, ventilators, build hospitals, train staff etc. Relax restrictions slowly. Test everyone. Lock down specific areas where outbreak occurs. I really hope our leaders have experts in their staff who can model this.

notyourday7• 6 years ago

Wait for treatment and vaccine.

Isn't this a virus? There's not a single virus that we have a treatment for - we know how to deal with bacteria but not viruses.

Leary2• 6 years ago

Treatment won't be completely effective but can reduce death rate. There are hundreds of trials ongoing, 1 or 2 or 3 may work well enough to give to people.

lultimouomo5• 6 years ago

You mean like aciclovir for herpes, or the various antivirals for HIV, or the monoclonal antibodies for ebola?

jredwards• 6 years ago

I anticipate that sooner or later the economic costs of staying on lockdown will overwhelm the benefits. We will probably begin to loosen restrictions and we will probably see periodic outbreaks in various places.

I don't know if that simply continues until a vaccine is viable or some other factor intervenes.

But this new reality won't be short-lived.

hfufigivknog4• 6 years ago

No actually it will be. It will be gone from the planet more or less within months. Corona viruses don’t mutate in a way that invalidates immunity gained from exposure to its ancestors. The flu does that but corona viruses do not. And there is no evidence that this one is an exception. Herd immunity will be achieved and it will stop spreading.

Zaskoda• 6 years ago

If tensions ease too quickly and we release everyone into the wild, it could cause another outbreak. I don't personally know the parameters of that risk, I just know it is a risk.

But on the bold assumption that we somehow contain the virus, we have a global economic collapse to tend to.

zaptheimpaler• 6 years ago

I would hope the lockdown gives us enough time to do thorough testing & tracing of the virus. Also a lockdown + messaging should convince people to take this thing seriously and follow the precautions.

If we know who has it well enough then we can focus care on them, wait until they can fight off the virus and go back to normal after. That is assuming people don't transmit the virus after recovering from it.

aqme282• 6 years ago

I thought this interview was illuminating for post-lockdown life in China https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac/status/1238604080571772928?s=2...

It shows just how far behind we are.

TLDW: Temperature checks everywhere. Fever clinics optimized for quarantining the potentially infected.

China is trying to actually contain the virus. The only way out for us unless we significantly ramp up testing and lockdown is to admit defeat and simply optimize for slowing down the onslaught.

haunter• 6 years ago

Or just watch this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfsdJGj3-jM

ekidd• 6 years ago

This is a really interesting video. I'm not sure how accurately it represents the situation on the ground in China, of course. But the video shows a society with temperature checks at every place of business, a location-tracking system, an isolation system, and a number of other precautions.

It's a picture of a society on a war footing, certainly. But people aren't locked in their apartments, and the hospital system isn't collapsing under its own weight.

So far, this is the most optimistic answer I've seen to "What comes after total lockdown but before a vaccine?"

physicles• 6 years ago

I live in Beijing and came back early Feb after the new year holiday. We’re doing all that stuff too, even the single use tissue in the elevators.

The day after I got back we found out we had a case of covid-19 in our apartment block, so we were one of the first to get restricted entry/exit — each unit gets 2 cards and you have to present it when you enter or leave through the single open gate. I did 2 weeks going outside just twice to buy food, then slowly relaxed a bit. Many of my chinese friends are still basically not going out at all.

Now’s an exciting time for China because we’re at basically zero new cases in the country (had 4 new ones in Hubei yesterday, the rest were all retournees from outside the country). So since yesterday, it’s mandatory hotel quarantine for everyone who enters the country.

Really getting worried for my family and friends in the states though. Gonna have some long talks about how to prepare.

smacktoward• 6 years ago

The only way out for us unless we significantly ramp up testing and lockdown is to admit defeat and simply optimize for slowing down the onslaught.

This has already happened. “Flatten the curve” takes it as written that most people will be exposed to the virus, and thus aims instead to just spread those exposures over a long enough period to avoid overwhelming the health care system.

smoyer3• 6 years ago

I saw a statistical analysis of the flatten the curve idea but assuming we couldn't ramp up the number of intensive care beds, it took 3600 days to fit everyone in under the "available health care" line.

It's still a good strategy for right now because it gives us some extra time to ramp testing and healthcare up.

simonh• 6 years ago

The UK government is revising its plan. A new simulation estimates that if we allow enough transmission to achieve herd immunity, it would cost about 260,000 lives. That’s not acceptable and would massively overwhelm health services. So it looks like we’re going to go for a strict lockdown strategy, but the problem with that is without a vaccine there’s no way out. If you relax the lockdown, you just get another outbreak. The best you can do is dynamic lockdowns per city or region.

agumonkey2• 6 years ago

a globalized MOOC on over-capacitated system DDoS

Bombthecat• 6 years ago

So, the uk approach? Let god sort them out?

kordlessagain• 6 years ago

Sorry, I have to go get tea.

duxup• 6 years ago

The total lockdown system seems almost untenable as it is.

Let's say China has managed to isolate the virus to some pockets... that means the rest of China is not exposed and vulnerable for who knows how long.

The sheer amount of effort to prevent what seems like the inevitable might be wasted effort.

That's not to dismiss the casualties or the impact of a widespread outbreak or the desire to SLOW it. But man do you spend forever and all that effort isolating A from B & C ... and then B from A ... until there are huge amounts of vaccine available (late fall?)

lokedhs• 6 years ago

Singapore is doing the same. At first I thought their response was a bit excessive with the temperature checks in every office building, etc

However, even though the borders are now heavily restricted, inside the country most things goes on as normal. There are fewer people out, but I'm still having trouble finding parking at the mall for example.

Of course this may not last, and at some point we might see a huge increase in the number of cases, but the total daily new cases has been low until now.

I'd take that an indicator that the strategy works, at least as a tool to slow down the spread.

cperciva2• 6 years ago

If social distancing can bring the number of cases down to a manageable level, you can switch to a traditional public health approach: Test anyone showing symptoms, and aggressively trace and test any contacts of known cases.

martokus• 6 years ago

Wouldn't they be afraid that if the rules are relaxed the single cases would spiral up and start it all over again?

cperciva2• 6 years ago

If you can identify the remaining cases and isolate them, you're fine. The danger is that some cases slip through the contact tracing procedure (e.g. the identified patient forgot about someone they were in contact with) which is why you also want to aggressively test anyone presenting with symptoms.

fspeech3• 6 years ago

You also need universal mask wearing. South Korea had a huge cluster, but mask wearing practice saved it from spiraling out of control.

shartshooter• 6 years ago

The primary goal right now is to flatten the curve so the growth doesn't stay exponential for any longer than it has to.

Once that flattens out and the growth rate slows or decreases a concerns is that folks will head back out, assuming the coast is clear.

That could cause a second wave of infections that restarts this whole thing.

Folks not taking this seriously is a problem, imagine what happens when folks who don't take this seriously think that it's finally over, when it really isn't.

danenania• 6 years ago

Subsequent waves should be a lot easier to contain if we’re prepared for them and act immediately at the first signs of renewed spread. Apart from contact tracing, judicious use of targeted, local lockdowns in areas where community spread pops up again can prevent the need for country-wide lockdowns.

gbersac• 6 years ago

Health worker will be exhausted, so it will be harder

kstenerud2• 6 years ago

It's your typical pandemic response:

- denial

- placating measures

- minor lockdowns

- major lockdowns and panic (running to the store to stockpile toilet paper, for some reason)

- total quarantine

- life slowly returns to normal

China is now on the final stage (restaurants and stores reopening, etc), with the rest of the world between 2 and 3 months behind.

Most people are unable to comprehend exponential growth, so this is the pattern that gets followed.

drstewart2• 6 years ago

Total quarantine isn't happening in any western country

kstenerud2• 6 years ago

... except Italy

deviantfero• 6 years ago

It is close to happening in El Salvador

tmpz22• 6 years ago

Rumors are it's about to happen in France

m4rtink2• 6 years ago

Well, here in Czech Republic (in between Germany, Austria, Poland and Slovakia):

- state wide quarantine from Monday morning, people can go only to work, to get groceries or to hospital/doctor

- all puliblic gathering over 30 people banned, but probably moot due to the above

- borders closed, foreigners can't go in and citizens can't travel travel out

- cross border trains/buses shut down, flights stopped

- schools closed for ~week already

- only food, medicine and drug stores are open, all other shops are closed

- there is a new exception for stores selling fabrics and clothes, as people are using clothes/fabric to manufacture their own protective masks

- all restaurants closed, only food takeout is allowed

- public transport is generally running, but the driver is extra-protected to not be in contact with riders (no selling of tickets, etc.), in some cities public transport is free to avoid any contact with riders and personnel at all

- everyone who arrived from the outside from an at risk country needs to do 14 day quarantine or else get crazy fines and possibly jail time

- a couple towns and villages (around 20k people) have got extra quarantined due to of-nominal number of cases, people can't leave the are for at least 14 days

- the army is helping out the police with patrolling the border crossings and to distribute medical supplies, army aircraft also just went to a round trip to China for more medical materials from Shenzen

- hospitals are clearing of any non essential surgeries and patients who can go home

- medical school students have been drafted to help in hospitals

There is a nice Wikipedia page summarizing many of the restrictions and overall progress (case numbers, etc.):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_t...

Pretty tough and so far surprisingly well executed measures I would say. People are generally respecting the special rules and there is a rather low amount of grumbling, considering this is Czech Republic.

Also a lot of solidarity - theaters sewing face masks, universities enrolling computer labs to Folding@Home, teaching student taking care of children of medical personnel, middle school student doing grocery shopping for old people who are most at risk, etc.

Now let's hope this all works and we can get this over with in a reasonably time in good shape.

drclau• 6 years ago

That is not correct for some days now. Many other countries in EU have entered a state of emergency with various levels of quarantine at national level: Italy (but that's old news), Spain, France, Belgium, Estonia etc. None as extreme as China, but measures are intensifying gradually.

In Czech Republic, only essential businesses are allowed to function, although the measures are not as extreme as they were in China. Restaurants are closed, or serve food only for takeaway, shopping centers are pretty much deserted, gatherings in large numbers are banned. Although, the quarantine is far from total: people still go outside, and parks are very crowded (some look like superspreaders congresses - that is, lots of kids playing), and surprisingly we are allowed to go to work, regardless of the type of business. In my opinion, this is allowed because doing otherwise would have significant economic costs, and so far it's hard to justify it: there are just 300+ confirmed cases in CZ. Of course, there will be plenty more unidentified cases, and the sh*t will hit the fan. It's just a matter of time.

geverett• 6 years ago

Total quarantine in Puerto Rico as well since 9pm on March 15th.

asix66• 6 years ago

And those who don't understand, or need a refresher on, exponential growth should watch this great video by 3Blue1Brown.

Exponential growth and epidemics:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kas0tIxDvrg

voxadam• 6 years ago

While not specifically about the exponential growth of pandemics I've always liked the lecture "Exponential Growth, Population and Energy" by Dr. Albert Bartlett.

https://youtu.be/kZA9Hnp3aV4

cmurf• 6 years ago

It's not clear anyone avoids a second wave. Nor do we know how significant it could be.

We don't know about natural immunity duration, or if and when there's a vaccine, and for how long it will be effective. We don't know about mutations.

I think a lot of the questions are only answered 2 years from now.

grawprog• 6 years ago

It's your typical pandemic response: - denial

- placating measures

- minor lockdowns

- major lockdowns and panic (running to the store to stockpile toilet paper, for some reason)

- total quarantine

- life slowly returns to normal

When in the last 100 years has this happened that you're basing your 'typical pandemic response' examples on?

It certainly hasn't happened in my lifetime...

dijit2• 6 years ago

Depends where you are in the world.

H1N1, SARS and Ebola are in recent memory, but they didn't reach my neck of the woods.

mirimir4• 6 years ago

- major lockdowns and panic (running to the store to stockpile toilet paper, for some reason)

Americans use lots of toilet paper.

falcor84• 6 years ago

To save others like myself the time, here are some figures corroborating this on statista: https://www.statista.com/chart/15676/cmo-toilet-paper-consum...

pmoriarty4• 6 years ago

I've heard an epidemiologist say that if a vaccine becomes available in 18 months it'll be a record.

Experimental treatments are being researched, but with only very small numbers of patients. It'll take quite some time for those treatments to become widely available.

It's unlikely that we're going to even begin to see things return to normal in a month or even three of isolation, especially if that isolation isn't as effectively and universally enforced as in China.

Afterwards there has to be extremely aggressive testing, tracking, and monitoring, or the outbreak has a very good chance of starting all over again.

In addition, the health care system itself has to have time to recover and replenish its equipment, ICU capacity, and healthy and able medical personnel.

scottlocklin2• 6 years ago

I've heard an epidemiologist say that if a vaccine becomes available in 18 months it'll be a record.

Your epidemiologist should talk to a chemist or look at a wikipedia entry. In 1957, the H2N2 pandemic vaccine was available in 3 months. Still managed to kill a few million people.

https://www.globalsecurity.org/security/ops/hsc-scen-3_pande...

https://www.city-journal.org/1957-asian-flu-pandemic

etrabroline• 6 years ago

I think you are nitpicking this doctor's words instead of listening to what he's saying. 18 years and no SARS vaccine. 18 months for SARS 2 would be miraculous.

ChuckMcM• 6 years ago

It's a good question. I've been thinking of it this way;

If we have an "unlimited" (by which I mean we manufacture them faster than we consume them) number of test kits with a turnaround time of < 24 hrs, then everyone on lock down for 14 days. Medical/Drive through facilities set up to process everyone for a test. Get a test, and then within 24 hours get a text on what their status is (infected, uninfected, immune (post infection)).

People who test positive go into quarantine to be re-tested weekly until they are immune.

People who test immune are allowed to resume work movement while keeping good practice (washing hands, coughing into elbow, Etc.)

People who test as non-infected are required to come back for re-testing every week, can move around with social distancing.

I don't know if it would work (I'm not a public health professional) but from a systems perspective surveillance of the infection seems to be the best strategy for staying on top of outbreaks.

Once a vaccine is available it becomes one of the things you get every year like a flu shot.

pmoriarty4• 6 years ago

Regarding immunity, there is evidence that such immunity (if it exists) is short-lived, and after a little while recovered individuals are susceptible to being infected again.

tonyedgecombe• 6 years ago

Do you have a reference for that as I keep hearing it repeated but I'm yet to see any real evidence for it.

aaron6952• 6 years ago

How long did the HIV vaccine take?

Use that as a yard stuck.

A lockdown isn't 'successful' it does little, except drag society into the dirt while a little time is bought to work things out.

Time China bought us but we squandered.

If you're lucky it's a winter desease so it'll become summer and it'll die off. But that's coin flipping a little.

Treatments might be found but it's hard to know how fast, especially while everyone is on lockdown.

dgb23• 6 years ago

A lockdown isn't 'successful' it does little, except drag society into the dirt while a little time is bought to work things out.

Slowing down the spread is useful to soften the blow on medicinal infrastructure.

aaron6952• 6 years ago

The flatten the curve meme has become toxic. Maybe it always was.

Have a look at a flatten the curve with actual numbers not cartoons.

Make sure the hospital capacity is seasonal and accounts for the fact nurses and doctors will wear out and supply's will dwindle.

Then say it softens the blow.

gus_massa• 6 years ago

Each virus is different, and apparently it is easier to find a vaccine against covid19 than HIV. Covid19 is similar to SARS and other cororavirus, so virologist have a good guess about how much time it will take. Probably not less than a year, don't expect to see it next month magically as other people. Here says 18 months approximately https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/16/when-will-a-co... I guess it will take longer, like 2 years.

hackermailman• 6 years ago

There's vids all over YouTube from WuHan what to expect. First the jubilant singing and party slogans, then screaming for help all night https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Zp3jH6iYrnw

Then each block is allowed movement after 2 months with community punishment if they hide cases and monetary incentive to follow rules, such as keeping contaminated clothing outside. Workers in critical industry will live at work and not allowed home to prevent contamination https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yyucJekT87E

tuna-piano• 6 years ago

The economic loss of a lockdown is just extraordinary. Just think about how many people and resources are idle... Literally trillions of dollars in lost economic potential (let alone the harder to quantify human+health consequences).

So it's crazy to me how little, relative to the hard economic costs of the virus, is being spent on mitigation.

I'm a totally uninformed lay-person, but the below seems reasonable:

Huge testing effort, something like 5% of the country's population gets tested every day (once every 20 days per person). Manage electronically. If positive, quarantine that person and known contacts.

Huge contact tracing and small lockdown strategy (found 10 cases in Omaha, Omaha lockdown for 2 weeks).

Seems that would be doable, cost billions and billions, but enable economic activity and minimize health+human consequences. Would be a great RoI.

zamfi2• 6 years ago

I’m surprised that no one here is mentioning the example of South Korea. [1]

They are not in total lockdown, but they are doing extensive testing and contact tracing, and substantial isolation of anyone who might be contagious.

Once we get testing infrastructure ramped up, this is not an unreasonable plan in the United States.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-51836898

bcrosby95• 6 years ago

Because it's too late. The time for that in the US was at least two weeks ago. This is why the US response to this has been driving so many of us crazy. The later you respond the fewer options you have.

zamfi2• 6 years ago

The original question was what to do post-lockdown.

To be clear, lockdown is the only option for the US right now. But then what?

vinay4272• 6 years ago

To be fair, every western country has missed this boat as far as I can tell. People are similarly confused and angry in the country (in Europe) I live in even though the testing rate is far higher here.

mdavidn• 6 years ago

One other consideration: The population of the United States is six times larger than South Korea's. Keep this in mind when comparing the total number of cases in each country.

totaldude87• 6 years ago

One word...

Summer..

once the summer starts and we see 30c or above , i think the spread will be limited and the quarantine might end.

But, worrying part is what comes next, without a Vaccine, coming Winter might be lethal, and we may end up with same cycle..

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3074131/coro...

m4rtink2• 6 years ago

Summer might help, but there have been cases in the tropics, so it's not completely killed by higher temperature.

dhosek3• 6 years ago

It's summer in Australia and South Africa. They're still seeing spread. I wouldn't count on that.

adventured• 6 years ago

Is there any information on how many of the ~377 Australian cases originated outside versus inside their borders? I can't find much on that figure.

South Africa only has 62 cases and New Zealand only has 8 cases. Not much there yet.

jlgaddis• 6 years ago

The President of the U.S. has said this, but pretty much any medical expert I've seen on television has said there's zero evidence to support that assertion at this point.

In other words, don't count on it (additionally, ignoring any "medical information" that comes out of POTUS' mouth is likely a good idea, too).

adaisadais• 6 years ago

I remember all of the statistical problems centered around virality that we would have to do in college. The problems always seemed so make-believe and dystopian.

Now my company is close to going out of business and I have just been laid off. Partly due to high-ranking officials not believing in the virality of nCov-19.

I can't get W.B. Yeats "The Second Coming" from 1919 out of my head:

"Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand; A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?"

naushniki• 6 years ago

Thank you for quoting poetry in a context. And good luck with employment!

diN0bot• 6 years ago

i like your comments. send me a note if you're looking for support in your job search. details in profile.

8bitsrule• 6 years ago

Yeats, hunh? No; give me Omar

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,

Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it

kidsil• 6 years ago

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

fspeech3• 6 years ago

The South Korean model:

1. Build up testing and contact tracing capabilities.

2. Massive mask making, everyone required to wear a mask in public.

3. Hospitals reconfigured to deal with covid patients.

People can then go outside and mingle again.

agumonkey2• 6 years ago

it seems obv that mask wearing would have slowed the spread immensely

they also have large distribution of sanitizer so you can shrink the contact vector too..

I wish europe went this way

superpermutat0r• 6 years ago

What kind of masks are effective? The one I have seems weird, I just feel the water vapour touching my eyes when I exhale. I guess the mask would block the sneeze/cough projectiles and small spits while talking but if I were sitting in the public transit the water vapour would float around.

DanBC2• 6 years ago

Masks are not effective unless you combine them with all the other PPE and have training in how to use them.

Without those masks increase your risk.

Don't wear masks.

Listen to literally all the medical advice telling you not to wear masks, unless you've been advised by people treating you to wear a mask. (eg one person in a family is infected and the family is self isolating).

Aweorih• 6 years ago

I don't know the names just that there are 2 variants. One which is cheap and one which is expensive. The cheap one does not protect you but shall protect others if you've got the virus. The expensive one shall protect you but you cannot wear it for long because it's hard to breath with it. That's what was said in germany from official site a week ago or so. May be outdated now. I Think they also said that you can get infected through eyes.. So a mask MAY not be enough at all

fspeech3• 6 years ago

Wearing a mask is to protect others from your own droplets. This is CDC protocol: if a doctor suspects covid, the patient is given a mask to put on. If that is enough to protect the doctor in close proximity, it is good enough to protect the general public. Like herd immunity if we all wear masks in public, the chance of droplet exchange is greatly reduced. The quality of mask and the manner of mask wearing become irrelevant. This is why we need universal mask wearing. It is the fastest and cheapest way to get the economy back on its foot again.

hfufigivknog4• 6 years ago

The virus isn’t serious enough to warrant or motivate total quarantine so a ton of people are going to get it. Then we’ll have collective immunity and things will go back to normal. 3 to 6 months from now.

ztjio• 6 years ago

It's not that simple. First of all, most people do not develop permanent immunity to the cold which is usually one of the first 4 known human transmissible corona viruses. So there is no reason to think we'll develop long term immunity to this one either.

Second, our reaction has be abysmal which, similar to the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, massively increases the chance of a second or even third wave of massive infection spread. That will be on many peoples's minds.

And one more thing I want to touch on so people here can get it through their thick heads: just because the death rate is supposedly "low" and "only" impacts old people mostly, that doesn't mean it doesn't impact YOU. If YOU have an emergency and the hospital is packed with COVID-19 patients, it doesn't really matter what you have, you are affected.

Even ignoring the ethical implications of just letting people die from this, I think most people who would do that are unlikely to ignore implications to themselves so figure out where you land or not, it doesn't matter, the goal of keeping hospitals from being overloaded affects everyone.

hfufigivknog4• 6 years ago

Corona viruses are not “the cold.” Rhinovirus causes the common cold and corona viruses cause 10% of cold cases. Just like other corona viruses, they make a recurring appearance. But this is not because they mutate in the way the flu does. No corona viruses mutate in the way that the flu does. If you have some evidence to prove me wrong then produce it.

You definitely develop immunity to viruses that sicken you. For the average person who is healthy.

If there is a second wave it will only be because of overly aggressive quarantining. This is why I said it won’t happen. For it to work, it would have to be air tight. All these young kids staying home are just saving fuel for a second wave. Old people ought to stay home and let younger people gain herd immunity as quickly as possible.

chrisked• 6 years ago

Do you assume full recovery?

olliej• 6 years ago

The purpose of the lockdown is solely to prevent emergency services from being completely overwhelmed. Not make it go away.

scotty792• 6 years ago

I think you just gradually make lockdown less strict to throttle number of cases so that it's on the level your healthcare can handle and do that till most of your population already had the virus. And hope for new treatments, vaccines and that immunity from already having the virus lasts at least a year or two.

RickJWagner• 6 years ago

Is anybody else wondering about authoritarian power grabs?

It's all so surreal, I can just imagine it. (In the US, I think some primary elections are under discussion for delays.)

I'm not worried, just wondering how to best disarm it from a distance.

forkexec• 6 years ago

A rational move would be to lock everyone down until a vaccine is proven safe and efficacious can be delivered to enough people. Since no one other than indigenous people living near bats have any immunity to beta-coronaviruses, it doesn't make sense to expose billions of people to unnecessary risks when we can pause nearly all social- economic activity until immune defense is possible or supplies run low.

The vaccine, once developed, should be free for everyone to encourage high uptake herd immunity.

kelseydh• 6 years ago

Do you think the world could handle two years of two supply chains being disrupted and shut down?

projektfu2• 6 years ago

A country like Colombia could implement a lockdown and stop transmission entirely. The virus would naturally die out there in a few weeks. All foreign travel would have to be quarantined but life could go on after that internally without disruption. Eventually vaccination could bring herd immunity.

zw123456• 6 years ago

I don't know if anyone is still following this post but does anyone know if there are studies around the cost in lives of the shutdown itself? I recall reading somewhere that every 1% of unemployment equaled some number of additional deaths per year. Does anyone know of a study of the human cost of a shutdown vs. the virus itself ?

SpinyNormal61• 6 years ago

The commonly stated goal of lockdowns is to slow the spread, flatten the (new cases vs time) curve, and thereby try to manage the rate of new cases so hospital resources (ICU beds, respirators, nursing staff) arn't overwhelmed.

Once (whenever that may be) the curve is shown to be flattening and hostpitals are in control, it'd be logical to see some gradual loosening of the restrictions that are currently being ramped up.

I personally doubt that loosening of restrictions, once above conditions are met, will be contingent on a proven and widely available vaccine having been developed (not least because there's no guarantee that one ever will be).

At this point it's anyone's guess how long it'll be in any given country until things appear to be more under control... Even in South Korea, who seem to have done best job in containing this, I've yet to see any estimates of how long it'll take at current rates on infection for the majority of the population to get it and/or get to "herd immunity" point.

In the US all bets are off.. it seems we were (and still are) extraordinarily slow to recognize the severity of this and take appropriate actions (severe lockdowns, widespread testing and resulting case tracking), so a reasonable expectation is that we may be following the case trajectories of the harder hit countries, with similar measures as they have in place coming to the US.

Ask HN: What happens next after a successful lockdown?

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