[greendude29]

Disagree.

Amazon is doing pretty well due to the quarantine (as they deserve to given the services they provide). Them having to reduce their share of the profits from these extraordinary times is not particularly noble, but rather just average.

The United States hasn't even passed the first stage of Corona yet (in SF, daily number of deaths is still rising). It is too early to mandate come backs.

Here in SF, multiple employees at 3 Whole Foods locations have already contracted Covid. Amazon has not done nearly enough thus far. The fact that they are now providing masks and cleaning up door handles is again, a bare minimum.

They should let exigent time off policies rein for at least 2 more months, before going back to business as normal policies.

Please realize, that even despite all of the above, their profits will keep rising through this period; there is no reason to think of them as victims, when they very much so are winners in this situation. Foregoing just a little bit of your extra profits to ensure your workers stay healthy in unprecedented times of a pandemic is not asking for too much.

[usaar333]

> (in SF, daily number of deaths is still rising)

Huh? It's more or less flat. https://covid-19.direct/county/CA/San%20Francisco?tab=peakde...

In fact probably better than flat - 2 deaths in last 7 days is lower than any 7 day period in April.

[twomoretime]

>The United States hasn't even passed the first stage of Corona yet (in SF, daily number of deaths is still rising). It is too early to mandate come backs.

Considering multiple states are larger than many European countries, I don't think it's appropriate to treat the US as a monolithic entity with respect to virus containment. Even if all of the states reacted identically, time and space dictate that different regions will be in different stages at any given time.

[bhupy]

Right, you might as well say "The European Union hasn't even passed the first stage of Corona yet", and it would be equally non-actionable.

[greendude29]

I mean, I'm really not comparing anything to the EU or European countries?

It's simply a fact. Total death counts in the US are still going up.

Once the quarantine is relaxed and things "open up", we WILL go through a second wave. That is by design of shelter in place.

Why the defensiveness on part of the US? With or without the above, it's response has been terrible. Why defend bad practices?

[bhupy]

> Total death counts in the US are still going up.

It depends on the state, though. New deaths are decreasing in many States, including Washington, Texas, and California [1]. Looking at the US, as a whole, isn't really useful here.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/washington-coron...

[greendude29]

This is ridiculous. I don't understand the defensiveness.

The United States is a nation. It has a federal government and federal bodies which are responsible for preventing spread of disease.

People can travel freely within these bounds without passports or visas or checkpoints.

Of course states have their own rules, and this is good, and yes, some states are doing better than others, but why the fear of revealing the incompetence of one nation?

This is how nation-states work in 2020 on planet Earth.

[bhupy]

The European Union also has a federal government and federal bodies which pass policies. It has a directly elected lower house that represents the People with proportional representation[1], and an upper house that represents the Member States with equal representation[2], and an executive branch with a Chief Executive that signs bills into law[3].

People can travel freely within Member States without passports, visas, or checkpoints.

Of course, Member States have their own rules, and this is good, and yes, some Member States are doing better than others, but why the fear of revealing the incompetence of one Union?

This is how Unions work in 2020 on planet Earth.

I think we both agree that looking at the EU as a whole is totally meaningless in the context of the current discussion about Amazon workers. We are simply arguing the same about the United States. This isn’t some pro-US propaganda, the only agenda here is an insistence on ensuring that we are comparing apples to apples.

P.S. Speaking of "Nation-States", hilariously enough, Gavin Newsom recently referred to California as a "Nation State"[4].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_the_European_Union

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_European_Coun...

[4] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/04/coronav...

[greendude29]

:(

I'm still flabbergasted at the need to compare to the EU or European states.

No where in my original comments did I bring them up, or was thinking of them. Your snide metaphor also doesn't work since the EU does not override the nation-state model. The EU parliament only exerts some powers over EU nations. The Health department of Germany cannot made decisions on behalf of the health department of France. I understand you're going to compare this to two American states, but honestly, it doesn't work.

> This isn’t some pro-US propaganda, the only agenda here is an insistence on ensuring that we are comparing apples to apples.

Again, when did I compare anything to Europe? You brought up the comparison for no reason I can comprehend. Hence my questions about the defensiveness.

I don't think we're going to agree, so happy to leave this here.

[Izkata]

> It has a federal government and federal bodies which are responsible for preventing spread of disease.

The response is handled at the state level, not the federal level. The federal level can provide advice and help coordinate actions between states / provide backup resources, but isn't meant to take direct action.

[twomoretime]

This isn't about defensiveness. You state that, collectively, the US is still in stage one, and then go on to say that this is evidence for a poor response and that it's early to recommend returns to work.

This is invalid, because for example a couple of states could be bring the total number up. Further, again because of the scale of the US, policy appropriate for one state may not be appropriate for others.

Again, the issue here is treating the gigantic US, a mishmash of cultures in 50 states with semiautonomous governments, as a monolithic entity. If you evaluate response policy in this way you're not going to get a good signal.

[vinay427]

What do you expect one state is supposed to do if another is bringing the numbers up due to their autonomous choices? It's just not useful to consider the US as a single entity in matters where states maintain control over most relevant measures. No one is denying the numbers, but it seems rather strange to lump (with respect to the matter) largely independent entities together. If you're trying to make a point, then make that point directly where it applies.

[cco]

> The United States hasn't even passed the first stage of Corona yet (in SF, daily number of deaths is still rising). It is too early to mandate come backs.

That isn't true according to the numbers from https://coronavirus.1point3acres.com/en. Do you have a citation for that? Numbers for new deaths have been hovering between 0 and 5 for the last month in SF, SF has had a total of 22 people dead, due to successful lockdown measures it basically never hit SF.

[auiya]

CDC says it's still rising. 

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/case...

[dmoy]

Sorry I'm not seeing anything in there that's saying number of deaths per day is rising. Can you help me navigate to where that is shown?

[jachee]

Try here: https://public.tableau.com/views/COVID-19PublicDashboard/Cov...

[cco]

Gotcha, thanks. That matches the data I originally linked, i.e. new deaths per day has been flat for greater than a month and total deaths are at 21.

[dmoy]

Ok so deaths per day is actually not increasing

[viklove]

Deaths is not a metric that can determine which stage of this pandemic we are in. Immunity is the figure you're looking for, which will not increase under a shelter-in-place order. Deaths are down, but will immediately shoot back up if the shelter-in-place is lifted.

The only goal posts you should care about are herd immunity or vaccination. Nothing else matters when discussing how much longer this pandemic will last.

edit: Wow you guys are really mad at me judging by all these downvotes. You're right, the pandemic is over, lift the stay-at-home orders!

For a long time I thought HN had higher quality discussion than Reddit, but in reality it's just the same BS with slightly larger words.

[dabbledash]

I think people are hoping for a third option: driving the infection rate low enough that it can be contained going forward with testing and contact tracing. Whether it’s realistic to think that can be achieved in an acceptable timeframe, I don’t know.

[droidist2]

What about the option of slowing the spread or flattening the curve so it doesn't overwhelm the healthcare system?

[dabbledash]

My understanding is the end game for that is still a vaccine or herd immunity. It just slows the process down enough that you don’t have more people dying because of a lack of equipment.

[droidist2]

So then trying to drive the infection rate too low before reopening could actually be counterproductive because it also slows down the building of herd immunity?

[greendude29]

> Deaths is not a metric that can determine which stage of this pandemic we are in. Immunity is the figure you're looking for, which will not increase under a shelter-in-place order. Deaths are down, but will immediately shoot back up if the shelter-in-place is lifted.

Absolutely not. If you believe enough information is known about herd-immunity in relation to Corona, you are dangerously misinformed.

Please don't play the "I thought you people were smarter" card if you're being downvoted for spreading misinformation.

Number of deaths DO matter in relation to: 1. Human suffering (perhaps the most important metric) 2. Learning how we prevent further deaths (calculating hospital and materials dissemination needs)

We are VERY FAR from the few responsible re-opening scenarios that exist: https://www.niskanencenter.org/tired-of-the-covid-lockdown-h...

(It it recommended we run 2 million tests a day in the US alone; the current number is 150,000).

[viklove]

I'm spreading misinformation by saying deaths per week won't tell us what stage of the pandemic we're in?

> Number of deaths DO matter in relation to: 1. Human suffering (perhaps the most important metric) 2. Learning how we prevent further deaths (calculating hospital and materials dissemination needs)

Did I ever suggest otherwise? Literally all I said about "number of deaths" was that it does not tell us how close we are to the pandemic being over. You just brought up a bunch of other stuff to feel good about yourself.

I really did think you people were smarter though. Apparently you haven't even learned how to read something before you reply to it.

> If you believe enough information is known about herd-immunity in relation to Corona, you are dangerously misinformed.

Again, I never said anything about this. Please learn how to read. I'm not claiming to know how we reach the level of "herd immunity" we need to get out of this. I just said "herd immunity" or a vaccine would be the solution here. Am I wrong about that? Jesus fucking christ, the only thing HN does better than Reddit is self-righteousness and smug asshats.

[SpicyLemonZest]

I'm not so much mad, more sad. It's unfortunate to see commenters who go around trying to dunk on people instead of constructively contributing.

[mritun]

There is no evidence that getting infected with covid19 gives anyone immunity. There are already documented cases of People have been infected twice.

Herd immunity would be nice - but so far none of the known coronavirus infections grant immunity. Herd immunity cries will only kill innocent people.

Herd immunity is more a myth than a fact right now.

[zxcmx]

People not getting COVID-19 immunity after recovery seems an extraordinary claim that would require very strong evidence for me to take seriously.

How do you believe people recover from COVID-19?

The fact that you recover from it at all, and generate measurable antibodies in the process, and that humans generally gain some level of immunity to all the other coronaviruses we're plagued by weights my belief strongly towards at least short term immunity being very likely.

[striking]

I downvoted because I'm not currently aware of a current usable metric for immunity and because you didn't link to one. It's obvious to me too that the pandemic isn't over but deaths is (to my knowledge) the best proxy for all the other metrics that we currently have, due to lack of consistent testing.