It kind of is. If you see a country next to yours building up a massive army, and starting propaganda about your government being evil, that's a good reason to prepare. If we learned of alien life in the galaxy, we might want to prepare too.
And with diets and diseases, if something has a short-horizon effect, that's good evidence it might have a long time-horizon effect too.
The seriousness with which I respond to COVID19 is mostly due to short time-horizon effects giving strong implications of possible long time-horizon effects. I'm less concerned about the 3% CFR as I am about the larger portion of individuals who might have long-term disability, lower economic output, etc. If that passes, we'll be feeling that for many decades.
And with diets and diseases, if something has a short-horizon effect, that's good evidence it might have a long time-horizon effect too.
The seriousness with which I respond to COVID19 is mostly due to short time-horizon effects giving strong implications of possible long time-horizon effects. I'm less concerned about the 3% CFR as I am about the larger portion of individuals who might have long-term disability, lower economic output, etc. If that passes, we'll be feeling that for many decades.