[nicc]

I don't understand why people keep wasting time with this.

Governments are both not doing widespread testing to see how many people have the virus, and taking draconian measures to contain its spread.

From what we know, 90% of the population already could already have it. Every time I read of somebody testing a big group of people a huge percentage has it, but the virus is so mild that they didn't even know—since it caused no symptoms.

Looks like there are many other diseases and problems that cause dozen of times more deaths, so either there's a reason why this is getting special treatment, or it's just a complete loss of common sense here, in my opinion.

[rumanator]

> From what we know, 90% of the population already could already have it.

Bullshit. Spain, which was hit quite hard, already did widespread antibody studies and the result was that only about 5% of the population might have contracted it.

https://english.elpais.com/society/2020-05-14/antibody-study...

Educate yourself and please don't spread lies and ignorance.

[nicc]

What about this: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/nyregion/coronavirus-anti...

Also, you picked 5%, but in your article they also say it's almost 15% in some areas. You're not spreading lies now, right?

[rumanator]

> What about this:

What? 1 in 5 in a city is quite far from 90%, isn't it?

If you spew the "90% might have it" bullshit claim when you were fully aware that at best you know of a city which might have 20% then it looks like you are intentionally and knowingly spreading lies and false information. Don't do that.

> Also, you picked 5%, but in your article they also say it's almost 15% in some areas. You're not spreading lies now, right?

We were making global claims about how 90% might already contracted covid19. I presented a country-wide study, which as of today is the best and most extensive one done at a country-level.

The study points out a 5% infection rate in one of the countries which so far has been hit the hardest.

Do you have a problem with that study?

Moreover, the hotspot you cherry-picked refer to specific cities and municipalities. Soria, For example, barely has a population of 90k. Madrid comes second with 11%, which is 6% higher than the national average and still lower than 90%.

So even your cherry picking doesn't deflect the fact that your claim that 90% might have it is clearly bullshit and that you are knowingly and intentionally lying and spreading false information.

[mattmanser]

I also wonder how effective these anti body tests are, and their false negative rate.

In actual trials, has a single one actually been shown to work reliably?

Here in the UK there's a new story every week about how yet another antibody test has been withdrawn or rejected by PHE because it wasn't accurate.

[lbeltrame]

Most studies I've seen did their own validation because of this. Of course this doesn't mean the tests were accurate (or not).

[arcturus17]

Your original point was:

> From what we know, 90% of the population already could already have it.

Well, no, from what we know, 5% of the population in Spain - one of the hardest-hit countries in the world, I might add - had it.

Whether the seroprevalence is up to 15% in some areas is of no consequence to your original point.

[raverbashing]

Since when 1 in 5 means 90% now?

> Also, you picked 5%

You mean, the actual title of the article and the average of the whole country?

> Antibody study shows just 5% of Spaniards have contracted the coronavirus

[logicchains]

By pure coincidence our plutocracy is also a gerontocracy. Imagine you're an overweight rich old man who owns a news media company or runs a country, and you hear about a disease coming along that is most dangerous for overweight old men: basic human nature means there's a good chance you'll be eager to take steps to preserve yourself, regardless of the wider cost.

[andybak]

I'm slightly overweight and I'm pushing 50. The risk of death is fairly low but the risk of having a really horrible few weeks (or potentially longer) is fairly high.

And there's plenty of unpleasant stories about long term effects. All in all I'm pretty scared of catching it.

I'm glad you're young and fit and happy to accept the lower risk.

I'm not so happy about your lack of concern for others.

[ben_w]

Taking a more positive interpretation of what @logichains wrote: given that many governments do have a history of letting lots of people die because it’s to expensive to keep them alive, the only reason this isn’t happening now is because it will affect those leaders personally.

[logicchains]

>given that many governments do have a history of letting lots of people die because it’s to expensive to keep them alive, the only reason this isn’t happening now is because it will affect those leaders personally.

AIDS is a good example of this. It's more deadly than coronavirus, but because it was seen as a disease of gay people, governments initially invested extremely little in treatment or stopping the spread. According to WHO, 32 million people have died of AIDS since it appeared, and most of those deaths would have been prevented with easy access to and faster development of the antivirals now used to treat it in rich countries.

Malaria is another one. It kills hundreds of thousands of people each year (mostly in Africa), and is largely preventable by relatively simply approaches like mosquito nets. For a small fraction of the trillions of dollars involved in trying to stop covid19, most of these fatalities could be prevented.

[logicchains]

>I'm not so happy about your lack of concern for others.

Are you concerned about the tens of millions of people who lost their jobs and businesses? Losing your job is a pretty horrible experience too, especially for the low-income groups who are most affected by the lockdown. What about the people whose mental health has been shattered by forced social isolation; "A year's worth of suicide attempts in the last four weeks": https://abc7news.com/suicide-covid-19-coronavirus-rates-duri...

[andybak]

Yes and those are part of the cost/benefit equation which needs to be carefully (and continuously) considered.

In fairness I guess I was reacting less to your specific comment and more to the chunk of this community that seems to think anyone under 60 should be running through the streets with joyous abandon.

[logicchains]

> Yes and those are part of the cost/benefit equation which needs to be carefully (and continuously) considered.

This I agree with. I'd argue however that most countries have done a terrible job of it, e.g. nobody has published a cost-benefit analysis expressed in some kind of comparable unit like QALY (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality-adjusted_life_year). Seems most analysis either only looks at the cost or only looks at the benefits, or makes no attempt to quantify them. Maybe it's not politically appealing to put a number on human lives, but that's what public health officials routinely do when dealing with other issues, because otherwise it's impossible to make consistent comparisons and judgements.

>more to the chunk of this community that seems to think anyone under 60 should be running through the streets with joyous abandon.

This is a consequence of the lockdowns that some people anticipated. I.e. much like making drugs illegal isn't necessarily the most scientifically effective way to reduce drug usage, forcing everybody to stay at home isn't necesssarily the best way to keep everyone at home. People forced into something are less likely to comply for a long time than people who decided to do something of their own free will, or were otherwise persuaded to.

[machinehermit]

The problem though is that people under 60 running through streets with joyous abandon could be what actually causes the least amount of total death in the long run.

Keeping most of the population who is not at risk from developing herd immunity is lengthening the time of exposure for the people who are at risk.

Just the fact we haven't updated our strategy at all after getting data on the age distributions is pretty bad.

[andybak]

All the outcomes I've seen that reach herd immunity involve an unacceptable amount of harm - both in deaths to at risk groups and in terms of suffering across the board.

While we may have to face this outcome I think it's too early to do so until we have more data and a deeper understanding of the disease.

In the UK I get the impression that the population is more cautious about loosening the lock down than the government is. I think other countries are the same. The US might be the outlier here.

[giantDinosaur]

Is it not generally the rich sharply criticising lockdowns? My impression has been mostly the capitalist class + workers who need to work to not starve are in favour of opening up as quickly as possible. Is my impression wrong?

[econcon]

In India tho, rich people demanded lookdown. Specially Bollywood celebrities.

[082349872349872]

In Switzerland, on one side we had unions who said "OK, no May Day parades this year", and on the other side we had bank CEOs who collected donations from their entire management team and took part in videos whose message was "all for one, and one for all".

eg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPLx4cVJW10

(Koch may be retired now, but don't think we're out of the woods yet — we're still in double digits)

[panpanna]

> From what we know, 90% of the population already could already have it.

So we are going to base our global health strategy on your "hunch"?

[nicc]

That was my plan, yes. World leaders constantly monitor my HN comments for ideas on how to handle this.

[namelosw]

> From what we know, 90% of the population already could already have it.

Any source on this?

[Izkata]

A month and a half ago New York may have already been at 20%: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/nyregion/coronavirus-anti...

[marvin]

Okay. So let's press a magic button to make every place in the whole world hit equally hard as NYC, one of the worst-hit cities in the world, with all the death and suffering that entails. Then repeat the process four times. Now we're at 80%, still short of GP's claim.

GP knows that their argument is wrong, and is deliberately lying.

[redis_mlc]

The official testing result is 3.6% positive rate in the SF Bay Area, but we have so many flights from China weekly that it could easily be 50% or more. (fairly unique region)

[m_mueller]

All available data indicates that China is by now among the safer countries for travel in regards to COVID19.

[redis_mlc]

Not from Dec. to March.

[namelosw]

I doubt it, since provinces other than Hubei province had significantly lower cases.

It is a huge country and it was "so many flights" from China, instead of "so many flights" from Hubei province.

If it's hard to wrap this try swap China and the US.

[redis_mlc]

Actually you're totally wrong for several reasons, not the least of which is your symmetric handling of travel:

- there are direct flights from Wuhan (and Shanghai, #8 in the world) to SFO (Trump stopped the Chinese flights Jan. 31, but Chinese travellers were detouring through Africa and Europe in Feb.)

- but local travel outside Wuhan was restricted (latest Jan. 23, Disneyworld Shanghai was closed Jan. 24)

- the Cambridge and Washington corona models are overly pessimistic and start late - the first Wuhan hospitalization was Dec. 1, and with the direct flights to SFO, corona was in the US in mid-Dec.

What's hard for you and other HNers to wrap your head around is that all the reported information is completely wrong.

The best source I've seen so far is this:

The Failure of Expert Predictions and Models | The Coronavirus and Public Policy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mG2vdyfLv7U

Dr. Victor Davis Hanson also has about 3 interviews that add to that. Search Youtube for "covid-19 victor davis hanson"

(We independently came to the identical analysis of corona for California, literally word-for-word, which is the opposite of the sensationalist news media. The Santa Clara hospital dashboard confirms this, being flat for months.)

[amf12]

> Governments are both not doing widespread testing to see how many people have the virus, and taking draconian measures to contain its spread.

I don't have any sources for this, but living in Switzerland, and from what I am hearing from local sources - nobody is being turned away from being tested. I don't believe your statement being true for Switzerland. Early measures, people generally following guidelines has helped reduce the spread of the virus here in Switzerland.

[kgwgk]

> Every time I read of somebody testing a big group of people a huge percentage has it

Really? Any examples?

[daenz]

Not OP, but NYC estimates 20% have had it based on N=3000[0]. This was back in April.

0. https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/494324-27m-new-yorkers...

[wereHamster]

NYC is a drastically different city than even the largest city in Switzerland. NYC has six times higher population density than Zurich. People behave differently, in Switzerland they are far more accepting the social distancing measures than people in the US. You can't compare two cities (or countries) just like that.

[kgwgk]

Is 20% a huge percentage?

Definitely it's not from-what-we-know-90%-of-the-population-had-it huge.

And those are the numbers from one of the most affected places in the world.

[ekianjo]

NYC is peak COVID, and 20% is pretty far from 90%.

[disgruntledphd2]

And even in the worst affected European countries, the rates of positive antibody tests are less than 20%, which means we have a long way to go to herd immunity.

[pwr22]

Wasn't NYC hit particularly hard though?

[sveme]

Preliminary results of representative sampling in Munich indicates that a low single digit percentage of thw population had it so far. Nothing close to 90%.