What's better? Economy opening back up May 1st or stretching this out until no more new cases of covid-19?

dilbert firestorm's Avatar
Please vote yes or no and respectfully give your opinion.

Things to keep in mind-

*unemployment numbers
*election year
*total death toll and how it impacts healthcare system
*stock market
*missed mortgage and rent payments
*businesses closing
*increase/decrease crime rates
*mental health effects
*food shortages
*baby boom
*imports/exports
*school closures
*states rights
*airline travel
*elderly Originally Posted by Sienna91
*no CO2 for beer and soft drinks
dilbert firestorm's Avatar
dupe
burkalini's Avatar
If we don't open up pretty soon the country will go into a deep depression. We lost 80000 people to the flu last year and we are on target to lose about that many to the Covid. I know everyone is scared and this is a serious virus but it's my opinion we need to get things jump started at least or as they say the cure will be worse than the disease. This is just my opinion and not trying to down play anyone elses
What have you done with all the usual ECCIE posters? This is some of the most thoughtful, interesting and non-judgmental discussion I have seen on this topic. Probably because I'm watching too much TV and don't know who to trust/believe anymore.

The trouble with an open society, where the same information is available to everybody, is that the morons have just as many rights as everybody else!!
- widespread preventive use of HCQ (the left won't allow)
- widespread use of known treatments like HCQ-zpack-zinc and remdesovir (big pharma fighting low cost treatments)
- if we do these two, we can adopt the Swedish model which is precautions and distancing but nothing closed
- maintain until a proven vaccine is available (and several show promise)
Hey Chung Tran, why are you calling people ignorant fools? This is simple, protect those that it effects mostly, the old, out of shape, and that have preexisting conditions and let the rest keep running their lives. you can't shut down a country, force people to loose everything they have worked for, loose businesses, etc., over an unknown fear, that's ignorant and foolish!


Its googans like you that cant see that this will cost future generations and not you! I would rather die than make my grand-kids and great grand-kids pay for my ignorance. Sir, your the selfish, ignorant, probably a dem, that has our country in the shape its in!
This whole thing is ass backwards. Quarantine the infected not the healthy. Plus the numbers affected are small compared to population. Stop watching Fox, MSNBC and other cable news outlets. Texas has about 500 deaths for a population of 29 million. Who wouldn't take those odds.
Open now. Use HCQ as preventive prophylaxis "bridge" until enough vaccines are in place. Pull all plants out of China in the interim or tariff the hell out of them.
My understanding was that we self isolated so we wouldn’t overwhelm our hospitals, not to eradicate the disease. We’ve flattened the curve, and I’ve stayed home for almost 6 weeks. Those who are at a higher risk should continue to isolate, open up the economy for everyone else. Most of the models were based on incorrect data and many of these restrictions have been put into place out of fear, assumptions and control, not hard data. Every politician on both sides has been guilty of dragging their feet but again, even the health experts were wary to declare a major problem out of fear of being called an alarmist. Even Fauci said it wasnt that serious of a problem for the US through most of February. It’s a brand new virus and everyone was and is playing catch-up. Testing is paramount, both to see if you have the virus and to see if you had it. No point keeping the economy closed if it turns out half the people who had it were never diagnosed. Myself and multiple friends think we had very mild forms of it, as I was traveling in March and came into contact with many different people. Many of these restrictions have been taken with absolutely no regard for our Constitutional rights. Most Americans I believe are smart, heeding the warnings but these restrictions can only go on for so long. It’s not the federal or state governments that are sovereign, it’s us, the American people who are sovereign and all these politicians work for us. But they are treating us like little kids, unable to back up their current restrictions with hard facts, something the American people aren’t going to put up with for much longer. The virus will be around for awhile and we just have to be extra vigilant and smart. I’ve understood the reasons for the restrictions, and have taken heed. 6 weeks alone, with an occasional run to the market for fresh food. But to tell me I can’t go swimming at the beach if I’m the only one there or I can’t visit friends who have been isolating as well is an over reach of power and makes me feel like I’m being scolded like a teenager. Too many changes in policies, first face masks did nothin.good, now they do, etc make people wonder if the officials even know what they are talking about. I have a cousin who has been in the ICU for almost 4 months now, not a Covid 19 issue, and would die if he got Covid. Unless the government could guarantee that everyone self isolated either alone or within their family group, then the disease could be effectively eradicated, but that will never happen. So follow the reopening guidelines, a state like Wyoming doesn’t need the same restrictions as NYC, that’s why we have states and local governments, they know better what’s best for their local populations than the federal government could ever know. If this wasn’t the case, then our country would not have state governments, just the federal government. Let each state figure out what is best. And remember, if China had been honest, let us help and released accurate figures, then much more could have been done much sooner. The models suggested that 1-2 million would die even with the shutdowns taken into consideration, so obviously every model was wrong, which I’m very happy about, but the shutdown must be based on data. In the absence of accurate data then we must make testing one of the top priorities. Everyone has been talking about worst case scenarios, so think of a best case, that half the population was already infected but were asymptomatic. That would mean we’re shutting down for really no reason. That is why no major decisions should be made, especially keeping shutdowns in place unless they are based on concrete data and research.
Damn Goat. Where did you get all that incorrect information you’re putting out as fact. Anyone reading what’s above please ignore anything he states as a fact and understand those are just his opinions. Look to what actual experts say not some dude on the internet or a talking head on political tv.
KosherCowboy's Avatar
IMO opinion, they should have let the CV just work its way through the population. Originally Posted by gnadfly
Starting to agree, starting now...
I am starting to think there is no one shoe size fits all. Things get worse and worse and we can either try to save as many lives today and risk economic hardships for the world for decades to come or just turn the freaking switch ' on' , let the dice roll and the world gets back on track. We are just hiding from this virus now... I am at the point I think we should just open up, if people die and get sick so be it. As the hospitals reach capacity we close things up, let the medical word catch up and reopen again in a ' rinse and repeat' fashion... In time millions will die and many more will get sick most will recover. It is a war. Nothing is pretty in war. Call it World War III. Death is part of wars. I don't think hiding from the virus for eternity will work and a vaccine is no guarantee. Waiting 12-18 months could mean economic disaster for the world for many decades to come. The world just needs to open up; let a bunch get immunity and a bunch die, rinse and repeat over and over.

Darwinsism may determine who makes it and who doesn't; so be it. Either the majority of us make it and we sacrifice a few million or more or the billions of us around the world will all pay the price. If it really is as bad as folks say than adios millions of us. If it is overblown would be great than less of us perish. No one said war was pretty.

Either we sacrifice a few million lives today or we sacrifice billions of lives ruined in another way for generation(s) to come. If I bite the bullet so be it. I do not fear death. I am here today because others took the gas for me and tens of millions of others++ are here today because 5,999,996 others died too. . If I must take the gas and die in some hallway of a hospital since I am 51 and the ventilator goes to a 19 year old guy who just got in to Harvard and wants to be a doctor so be it! Kill me...

We need to take the risk. If we gamble and lose millions society wins long terms; we can build giant memorials for those who died; if this is all overblown shit than we all make it. Either way the only way to get busy living or get busy dying is actually to risk letting many die and perish etc. For the betterment of all.

and if I am one to go and get the virus sitting on my front porch or shopping in HEB and die but the 10 students from McNeil High School next to me who didn't get it survive and go on to have families so be it, maybe one of them will find the cure for cancer. Better they live than I.

The virus will randomly decides who stays and who goes as has been said the enemy is invisible so we can't pick and choose on our own; all of us stand an equal chance to be the sacrificial lamb... And if I am the lamb to go and my nieces get to live in a great world I ( and others) were slaughtered for it's a win. I have lived well. I will have no regrets if I die. If the virus gets me it does. My death would save the lives of thousands possibly for generations to come. And if for some reason I already have had it ( I was in Germany while it spread like rapid fire) and it turns out I have immunity if science dictates such than I will donate my plasma to the younger folks in my family who may need it...

So they can live, same thing others did for me..
So you believe the economy will he saved if we have 400,000 relatively random people die within a year or possibly 6 months depending on how quickly things escalate. That’s exclusive of people dying from other diseases and conditions and accidents that we already have.

You believe that stores and stadiums and workplaces will go on as normal if people are aware that 1 out of every 1000 people will get sick and die and possibly 1 in every 100 people will end up in hospital critical care.

So under your scenario everyone is just gonna roll the dice with their lives and health and go back to life as normal exposing themselves to someone who’s possibly ill that could kill them so they can go to the mall Or a movie theater or a restaurant or a football game.

I don’t see it. I see people being more afraid and not doing much of those things and the economy will be in a depression because most businesses will go under due to lack of customers and employees calling in sick or refusing to show up because Billy was coughing yesterday. The let it rip approach I suspect would have resulted in high casualties and people sheltering out of fear without govt intervention and lack of demand collapsing businesses we’re desperately trying to save.

Maybe the better approach would have been to allow Darwinian to determine which businesses will survive rather than spending trillions trying to save every company that may and may not have failed anyway.
KosherCowboy's Avatar

Maybe the better approach would have been to allow Darwinian to determine which businesses will survive rather than spending trillions trying to save every company that may and may not have failed anyway. Originally Posted by 1blackman1
I don't think any approach is easy. Perhaps economic Darwinsim is a better approach. The one approach that won't work is sitting in and hiding.. ' let the dice roll/switch on' perhaps in stages is better than filling up a stadium tomorrow in fact a stadium can leave vacant play the games but the stores and businesses need to be open.. or perhaps some kind of a Darwinism for them as you suggest would work just as well.

The one thing that won't work is sitting at home watching the world economy go to ruins..

I am all for mitigating the number of deaths at the same time we may need to let some go for the betterment of all; or something in between
Unique_Carpenter's Avatar
You are all missing the concept of the "new normal".
Basic herd psych is that folks are gonna avoid crowds regardless into the future.

This c19 crap is here to stay forever, just as other stuff is. Anyone who has gone to mid/south Africa, or southern Central America can attest to getting vaccine shots for stuff thats a lot of folks think eradicated.

It will take years for economy to recover. Regardless of hiw fast the stay at home thing is lifted.
If we don't open up pretty soon the country will go into a deep depression. We lost 80000 people to the flu last year and we are on target to lose about that many to the Covid. I know everyone is scared and this is a serious virus but it's my opinion we need to get things jump started at least or as they say the cure will be worse than the disease. This is just my opinion and not trying to down play anyone elses Originally Posted by burkalini
We've lost 45k in one month. 374 deaths March 21; 45,318 April 21. This isn't stopping at 80k this year.

A depression is inevitable no matter what we do. The depth of the depression is the question. Our only hope is to thread the needle like S. Korea, marrying public health and economic health interests as best we can until we have a vaccine.