[gottareply2020]

The reason for staying at home in the US is to prevent overwhelming hospitals and more people dying. It was a drastic measure to make up for a delayed response and unpreparedness.

In a given town, X people will contract the virus. Y of those will die of complications. Z of those people will die without hospitalization. So if you keep the rate of people contracting the virus under a rate of Z people, you can avoid EXTRA deaths due to overwhelming the hospitals.

Had the response in the US been early and holistic, it’s possible we could have avoided national stay at home orders and instead used social distancing to avoid overwhelming the hospitals. But the nation didn’t. So to avoid MORE deaths, sty at home orders were issued.

Again, to repeat, the reason for staying home is to prevent overwhelming hospitals and more people dying. The same amount of people will die (roughly) whether we stay at home or not.

And it’s not just 80 year olds. I’ve seen more 30 year olds on ventilators than I ever need to see again.