There should be a national dialogue in getting back to work

[SoCal Deek]

24 minutes ago, B-Man said:

 

Perhaps she is a physician who needs new tires ?

 

I am in complete agreement with keeping everyone on as absolute a quarantine as we can.

 

But that doesn't preclude everyone from discussion on how we can gradually get people back to work.

 

Save your dying for wall street hashtags, we can see right through your false face.

 

 

.

Dude

get over yourself 

very little of this has anything to do with Wall Street 

[B-Man]

9 minutes ago, Alphadawg7 said:

If we don't slow the spread down, the death toll can be in the millions, not 12,000.  That is the issue.  No one wants to see the economy crumble, but at the end of the day, life matters more than the Dow and we need to prioritize slowing this down above all else

 

 

I appreciate that, but the economy "crumbling" is not something that can be dismissed as the lesser of two evils.

 

Talk about millions being affected, you are talking about hundreds of millions lives being changed..............not "the Dow"

 

That is why the subject of this thread is so important.

 

 

.

[3rdnlng]

24 minutes ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

 No one wants to see the economy crumble, but at the end of the day, life matters more than the Dow 

 

It's not the Dow per se, it's the economy.

[Alphadawg7]

2 minutes ago, B-Man said:

 

 

I appreciate that, but the economy "crumbling" is not something that can be dismissed as the lesser of two evils.

 

Talk about millions being affected, you are talking about hundreds of millions lives being changed..............not "the Dow"

 

That is why the subject of this thread is so important.

 

 

.

 

I hear you, and listen I dont want to see my friends and family lose jobs or businesses either.  But the truth remains, the demise of the economy is greatly exaggerated.  It will recover and quickly once things get back to normal.  The vast majority of the jobs people are not at work for will resume.  Teachers go back to work, restaurants reopen, travel resumes, sports will come back, etc etc.  Measures are being put in place to prevent people from being evicted as a businesses or from their homes.  There is money being distributed to help those industries stay afloat so there is a place for our workforce to return to.  

 

Will it be perfect?  No.  Will there be no business casualties?  No.  But business and the economy are repairable, death is forever.  

 

And if people are TRULY worried about the economy and the workforce, then the most disastrous thing you can wish for is to return too soon which would undo everything being sacrificed and being done now and make things catastrophically worse and for much much longer.  And that would be something that would NOT be very easy to rebound from and could set us back years and years economically as a country.  

 

No one wants to see this go on for longer than necessary, its just imperative we listen to the worlds experts on controlling this virus and not be impulsive and disregard it...again.  Lets be honest here, Trump and his administration, along with Fox News, did not help the matter by downplaying this and spreading misleading and false facts in direct defiance of all the worlds health experts up until about 10 days ago.  Had we been more deliberate and more prepared sooner, possibly it wouldn't have gotten to these extremes.  The worst thing we can do right now would be to REPEAT that same mistake AGAIN and see them go against the wishes of the people with knowledge and medical degrees who know better.

[Alphadawg7]

1 minute ago, 3rdnlng said:

It's not the Dow per se, it's the economy.

 

I was just using the Dow as a generic term.  The economical downfall is being sensationalized in terms of permanent damage.  Every devastated economy recovered and rather quickly.  Not downplaying the severity of this in the short term, just saying this isn't a permanent economical situation.  

 

George W. Bush and corrupt financial practices combined to lead us into the worst economical disaster since the crash in the early 1900's.  The last 11 years have been a Bull market, literally from the first year of Obama's administration to when the Coronavirus hit, 11 year Bull run and dow finished higher every year for 11 straight years as well.  

[jrober38]

The die is cast.

 

The economy isn't going back to normal until this virus is under control.

 

Consumer confidence will be shot, the travel industry will be annihilated, restaurants destroyed, car companies in trouble, etc. Every service industry will be affected as people tighten the purse strings. 

[Magox]

12 hours ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

I hear you, and listen I dont want to see my friends and family lose jobs or businesses either.  But the truth remains, the demise of the economy is greatly exaggerated.  It will recover and quickly once things get back to normal.  The vast majority of the jobs people are not at work for will resume.  Teachers go back to work, restaurants reopen, travel resumes, sports will come back, etc etc.  Measures are being put in place to prevent people from being evicted as a businesses or from their homes.  There is money being distributed to help those industries stay afloat so there is a place for our workforce to return to.  

 

Will it be perfect?  No.  Will there be no business casualties?  No.  But business and the economy are repairable, death is forever.  

 

And if people are TRULY worried about the economy and the workforce, then the most disastrous thing you can wish for is to return too soon which would undo everything being sacrificed and being done now and make things catastrophically worse and for much much longer.  And that would be something that would NOT be very easy to rebound from and could set us back years and years economically as a country.  

 

No one wants to see this go on for longer than necessary, its just imperative we listen to the worlds experts on controlling this virus and not be impulsive and disregard it...again.  Lets be honest here, Trump and his administration, along with Fox News, did not help the matter by downplaying this and spreading misleading and false facts in direct defiance of all the worlds health experts up until about 10 days ago.  Had we been more deliberate and more prepared sooner, possibly it wouldn't have gotten to these extremes.  The worst thing we can do right now would be to REPEAT that same mistake AGAIN and see them go against the wishes of the people with knowledge and medical degrees who know better.

 

 

Hi Alpha, Don't recall you visiting here too often in the past, good to see you here. 

 

I don't want this to devolve into a blame game sort of issue but despite Trump's verbal downplaying of it all didn't affect the CDC's and governmental responses.  The CDC was in close coordination the whole time with state governors specially NY, California and Washington.  I mean if we are going to be fair, then we have to give credit where credit is due.  If as you say we are going to listen to the Dr's and what they say then we cannot be selective about it.  Dr. Fauci said "Travel ban absolutely made a difference"   and he has said this on numerous occasions.  Thankfully Biden wasn't in charge at that time or else he wouldn't have done that travel ban and we'd been worse off.  And let's be honest about all of this, even though I approve of the way Cuomo has handled this but him and Deblasio were very late to the social distancing.  They just shut down the schools 10 days ago and the subway services are still up and the city didn't really go down on lock down until just recently.

 

I don't bring that up to caste blame on them, I bring that up because the situation on the ground dramatically shifted at warp speed.  So it's not that it just caught Trump off guard, it caught Cuomo, Deblasio and many others off guard as well.  For crying out loud, this was just 9 days ago, where his health aides threaten to quit and teachers threatened to walk out.  

Quote

 

For most of last week, as Mayor Bill de Blasio continued to urge New Yorkers to mostly go about their daily lives — sending their children to school, frequenting the city’s businesses — some of his top aides were furiously trying to change the mayor’s approach to the coronavirus outbreak.

There had been arguments and shouting matches between the mayor and some of his advisers; some top health officials had even threatened to resign if he refused to accept the need to close schools and businesses, according to several people familiar with the internal discussions.

Teachers were threatening not to show up to school on Monday. A growing number of public health experts and politicians were calling for much of the city to be shut down to curb the spread of the virus.

On Sunday, the mayor was shown a graph depicting the sharp upward trajectory of the coronavirus epidemic curve, and another showing the capacity of the city’s health systems to handle the influx.

 

 

 

And I know there is this thing about - Well, they should have had the testing ready and more tests should have been conducted.   Dr. Fauci has made it clear, which unfortunately the media doesn't like to report it that the system that was in place was not setup for this sort of pandemic.  That there are so many logistical hurdles that it made it nearly impossible to get the testing out as quickly as they'd like. 

 

When Dr. Fauci said that the testing was "failing" it was blasted everywhere.  But you have to dig deep to find what he actually meant by that, which he clarified the following day.  

 

Quote

"So just to reiterate what I said to many of you multiple times, it's the descent (PH) of a system," Fauci said. "The system was not designed--for what it was designed for it worked very well. The CDC designed a good system."

"When I said that, I meant the system was not designed for what we need. Now looking forward, the system will take care of it," Fauci added.

 

 

The point that I'm making Alpha is that this is not a blame game situation here, this was something that even WHO downplayed early on.   WHO was even very late to the game

 

Quote

Jan. 14: WHO announces Chinese authorities have seen "no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel coronavirus."

 

 

I just want to be clear and that we understand the facts and add some context to all this because I do think that is very important.  Keep in mind, I am by no means any sort of Trump Humper, this board can tell you that I was vehemently against him and I to this day do not like the way he communicates things.  With that said, I believe in data, facts, context, reason and logic.  

 

12 hours ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

If we don't slow the spread down, the death toll can be in the millions, not 12,000.  That is the issue.  No one wants to see the economy crumble, but at the end of the day, life matters more than the Dow and we need to prioritize slowing this down above all else.  People keep talking about the death numbers NOW versus later when discussing these things, and thats just not what this is about.  Death rate is over 4% compared to 0.16% of the flu.  Even if that comes down to 2%, based on the expected amount of infected over the rest of 2020 if not slowed would put the US death toll as high as 2 million people or more.  I assure you there will not be anywhere near those amounts of suicides. 

 

Hopefully, the initiatives work and lowering the curve to a manageable level within our health care system.  And if so, easing back into normal life will begin.  But until that point, going back early isn't going to accomplish anything but make it worse.  Its imperative we do NOT go back too early or this will all have been for nothing and things will only get worse for longer.  

 

And the other thing is, if we go back to early and this gets way worse...the suicide numbers would be a lot higher than just waiting this out the appropriate time given the damage would be substantially worse as this would catastrophic for much much longer.  

 

I don't think that we are that far apart.  I think.    If you are advocating that we wait until virtually the whole population is safe and we wait until after a vaccine, then we are far apart.  But if you saying that we wait until the health experts approve of a phase in strategy well before that vaccine then we are basically on the same page.

 

Also, it's not about just suicides.  I'm not sure if you read that study that I linked but the 2008 downturn they believed caused Tens of thousands of deaths possibly over 100k deaths due to stress induced health issues that lower people's immune systems that affect people with heart and cancer afflictions.   And this downturn, depending on how long we are shut down has the potential to be more devastating than that one because of the vast amount of people who are losing their jobs.  More so than the 2008 downturn.  Of course the 2008 downturn was more structural and most economists believe that as long as we can get back to work in not too distant  future and strong government assistance that it will be easier to bounce back.   

 

In regards to the mortality rates, i saw that you cited 4% as the mortality rate.  I understand where you get those numbers but I'm sure as you know that those numbers aren't the actual mortality rate.  That's based off the number of proven positive test kits vs deaths.  Throughout most of the world they are only wanting to test people who are at most risk and/or showing symptoms.  Experts say that 80% of people who contract the disease either show no symptoms or show mild symptoms.  Recent studies show that 86% of people who have contracted the VIRUS have gone undetected.

 

Quote

A new study calculates just how many people are probably getting infected from someone who doesn’t even know they have it yet—and the number isn’t small. Approximately 86% of total infections during the time period studied came from somebody who didn’t know they were infected yet

.

 

Here in the U.S the mortality rate is at about 1.25%, even though I"m sure that will rise over the next few weeks and then substantially fall after that.  Germany the mortality rate is .4%.  Many of the Nordic countries it's about the same.  You can get more of that data here.

 

There are so many variables to consider, and they are still learning from the disease.  They are trying to figure out why Italy is being so hard hit where their neighbors Germany isn't being hit nearly as hard.  I have been obsessed with this topic and for another post I can delve into those theories, which I'm sure I'll do.  

 

The bottom line for me, which I believe the health experts will approve is that there will have to be a balance that is had and the phasing in process will not have to be on an arbitrarily set timeline.  It will have to be dependent on data.  

 

The things that I will want to see and hear will be:

 

1) What is the believed ACTUAL mortality rate here in the U.S (which means that more testing will need to be done with random sampling throughout the country)

2) Within the mortality rates - I'd like to see subsector groupings of mortality rates.  Females, Males, Over 60, over 70, over 80.  Pre Existing medical conditions, which pre existing medical conditions.  Which records in Italy show that 99% of those who have perished had pre existing medical conditions and most of them had 3 different conditions...You can read that here.

3) What does a phasing in of the workforce strategy look like?   My guess is that it will be regional with a number of social distancing policies still in place.

 

 

The federal government can only provide federal guidelines.  I mean, without doubt that carries a lot of weight.  But at the end of the day, it will truly be up to the governors and businesses following state based guidelines.

 

 

Edited March 25, 2020 by Magox

[KRC]

7 minutes ago, Magox said:

 

 

Hi Alpha, Don't recall you visiting here too often in the past, good to see you here. 

 

I don't want this to devolve into a blame game sort of issue but despite Trump's verbal downplaying of it all didn't affect the CDC's and governmental responses.  The CDC was in close coordination the whole time with state governors specially NY, California and Washington.  I mean if we are going to be fair, then we have to give credit where credit is due.  If as you say we are going to listen to the Dr's and what they say then we cannot be selective about it.  Dr. Fauci said "Travel ban absolutely made a difference"   and he has said this on numerous occasions.  Thankfully Biden wasn't in charge at that time or else he wouldn't have done that travel ban and we'd been worse off.  And let's be honest about all of this, even though I approve of the way Cuomo has handled this but him and Deblasio were very late to the social distancing.  They just shut down the schools 10 days ago and the subway services are still up and the city didn't really go down on lock down until just recently.

 

I don't bring that up to caste blame on them, I bring that up because the situation on the ground dramatically shifted at warp speed.  So it's not that it just caught Trump off guard, it caught Cuomo, Deblasio and many others off guard as well.  For crying out loud, this was just 9 days ago, where his health aides threaten to quit and teachers threatened to walk out.  

 

 

And I know there is this thing about - Well, they should have had the testing ready and more tests should have been conducted.   Dr. Fauci has made it clear, which unfortunately the media doesn't like to report it that the system that was in place was not setup for this sort of pandemic.  That there are so many logistical hurdles that it made it nearly impossible to get the testing out as quickly as they'd like. 

 

When Dr. Fauci said that the testing was "failing" it was blasted everywhere.  But you have to dig deep to find what he actually meant by that, which he clarified the following day.  

 

 

 

The point that I'm making Alpha is that this is not a blame game situation here, this was something that even WHO downplayed early on.   WHO was even very late to the game

 

 

 

I just want to be clear and that we understand the facts and add some context to all this because I do think that is very important.  Keep in mind, I am by no means any sort of Trump Humper, this board can tell you that I was vehemently against him and I to this day do not like the way he communicates things.  With that said, I believe in data, facts, context, reason and logic.  

 

 

I don't think that we are that far apart.  I think.    If you are advocating that we wait until virtually the whole population is safe and we wait until after a vaccine, then we are far apart.  But if you saying that we wait until the health experts approve of a phase in strategy well before that vaccine then we are basically on the same page.

 

Also, it's not about just suicides.  I'm not sure if you read that study that I linked but the 2008 downturn they believed caused Tens of thousands of deaths possibly over 100k deaths due to stress induced health issues that lower people's immune systems that affect people with heart and cancer afflictions.   And this downturn, depending on how long we are shut down has the potential to be more devastating than that one because of the vast amount of people who are losing their jobs.  More so than the 2008 downturn.  Of course the 2008 downturn was more structural and most economists believe that as long as we can get back to work in not too distant  future and strong government assistance that it will be easier to bounce back.   

 

In regards to the mortality rates, i saw that you cited 4% as the mortality rate.  I understand where you get those numbers but I'm sure as you know that those numbers aren't the actual mortality rate.  That's based off the number of proven positive test kits vs deaths.  Throughout most of the world they are only wanting to test people who are at most risk and/or showing symptoms.  Experts say that 80% of people who contract the disease either show no symptoms or show mild symptoms.  Recent studies show that 86% of people who have contracted the VIRUS have gone undetected.

 

.

 

Here in the U.S the mortality rate is at about 1.25%, even though I"m sure that will rise over the next few weeks and then substantially fall after that.  Germany the mortality rate is .4%.  Many of the Nordic countries it's about the same.  You can get more of that data here.

 

There are so many variables to consider, and they are still learning from the disease.  They are trying to figure out why Italy is being so hard hit where their neighbors Germany isn't being hit nearly as hard.  I have been obsessed with this topic and for another post I can delve into those theories, which I'm sure I'll do.  

 

The bottom line for me, which I believe the health experts will approve is that there will have to be a balance that is had and the phasing in process will not have to be on an arbitrarily set timeline.  It will have to be dependent on data.  

 

The things that I will want to see and hear will be:

 

1) What is the believed ACTUAL mortality rate here in the U.S (which means that more testing will need to be done with random sampling throughout the country)

2) Within the mortality rates - I'd like to see subsector groupings of mortality rates.  Females, Males, Over 60, over 70, over 80.  Pre Existing medical conditions, which pre existing medical conditions.  Which records in Italy show that 99% of those who have perished had pre existing medical conditions and most of them had 3 different conditions...You can read that here.

3) What does a phasing in of the workforce strategy look like?   My guess is that it will be regional with a number of social distancing policies still in place.

 

 

The federal government can only provide federal guidelines.  I mean, without doubt that carries a lot of weight.  But at the end of the day, it will truly be up to the governors and businesses following state based guidelines.

 

 

 

Excellent post.

[Gary M]

16 hours ago, Deranged Rhino said:

You're all the way wrong. 

 

The ones being hurt right now aren't the big corporations -- it's the small businesses who employ most Americans. 

 

Correct, but how many of them count on work from the larger corps, diners and cafes count lunch crowds from companies.

 

It's not one or the other. Everything is tied together.

[RochesterRob]

  Sadly, many do not see that the economy is more than stats, formulas, and theories in this situation.  There is no predicting from a formula the reduced business of a home improvement contractor because their clients simply will not have the money when the job was to be performed, want to conserve cash for the time being, or need to financially help out a relative.

[dubs]

I have been saying this for over a week now.  The reaction to this by the media, which drive much of the perceived discussion, is just straight up bizarre.  Any mention of an overreaction is met with swift ridicule and dismissal.  

 

It's not irresponsible to take a risk management approach to this, trying to assess the costs of total shut down versus some form of continued activity.  It's also not a binary, where we have to either completely shut down or take absolutely zero precautions.

I think taking a week or so to figure out where we are at was/is a smart move, but to the OP's point, we need to also start discussing if/how we move to the next phase of dealing with this, which includes some form of returning to activity.

 

[B-Man]

 

 

RON BAILEY: Massive Coronavirus Testing Is the Way to Help Save the Economy: No time to waste; do it sooner rather than later.

 

By massively scaling up two types of tests—PCR tests that detect the active presence of virus and serology tests that detect immune system responses to being infected by the virus—population screening could identify those who are currently infected and those who have recovered and are likely not to pass along the virus to others.

 

Those who are currently infected could be isolated and their contacts traced so that they could quarantine themselves. Frequent large-scale testing of the uninfected would also help keep the epidemic in check by enabling them to withdraw if they subsequently contract the virus for a period of self-isolation in a timely fashion. Frontline health care providers and especially hard-hit regions should be given first priority as the testing regime begins its rapid expansion.

 

Those who had recovered from infection (possibly numbering ten times more than those whose symptoms drive them to seek out medical care) could help on the frontlines of the fight against COVID-19, return to work, and enjoy the pleasures of social life, e.g., dining out, meeting friends at bars, traveling, and attending performances at entertainment venues. “To make this strategy work, governments would need to involve employers, social organizations, schools and large retailers to conduct tests and provide time-stamped certifications,” propose the three researchers.

 

To ramp up both kinds of testing, the researchers urge that every laboratory capable of running PCR tests be pressed into service recruiting technicians, graduate students, and scientists to run the machines. Even better, Mesa Biotech just announced today that it has received Emergency Use Authorization from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to roll out its point-of-use 30-minute PCR test for the virus. Other companies should be encouraged to provide such tests.

 

As I also argued last week, the researchers argue that widespread deployment of serology tests for the presence of antibodies to coronavirus needs to be prioritized. This would identify people who had recovered and could safely go back to life outside of lockdown.

 

Over at the Wall Street Journal, the perspicacious former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb also recommends massively scaling up serological surveillance. When population screening reveals that “a sizable portion of a local community has some protection, authorities can be more confident in relying on less invasive measures. Once deployed, serological tests are cheap, straightforward, and easy to scale.”

 

Several companies have already developed such tests.

 

 

Faster, please.

 

 

 

 

 

 

..

[Magox]

14 minutes ago, B-Man said:

 

 

RON BAILEY: Massive Coronavirus Testing Is the Way to Help Save the Economy: No time to waste; do it sooner rather than later.

 

By massively scaling up two types of tests—PCR tests that detect the active presence of virus and serology tests that detect immune system responses to being infected by the virus—population screening could identify those who are currently infected and those who have recovered and are likely not to pass along the virus to others.

 

Those who are currently infected could be isolated and their contacts traced so that they could quarantine themselves. Frequent large-scale testing of the uninfected would also help keep the epidemic in check by enabling them to withdraw if they subsequently contract the virus for a period of self-isolation in a timely fashion. Frontline health care providers and especially hard-hit regions should be given first priority as the testing regime begins its rapid expansion.

 

Those who had recovered from infection (possibly numbering ten times more than those whose symptoms drive them to seek out medical care) could help on the frontlines of the fight against COVID-19, return to work, and enjoy the pleasures of social life, e.g., dining out, meeting friends at bars, traveling, and attending performances at entertainment venues. “To make this strategy work, governments would need to involve employers, social organizations, schools and large retailers to conduct tests and provide time-stamped certifications,” propose the three researchers.

 

To ramp up both kinds of testing, the researchers urge that every laboratory capable of running PCR tests be pressed into service recruiting technicians, graduate students, and scientists to run the machines. Even better, Mesa Biotech just announced today that it has received Emergency Use Authorization from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to roll out its point-of-use 30-minute PCR test for the virus. Other companies should be encouraged to provide such tests.

 

As I also argued last week, the researchers argue that widespread deployment of serology tests for the presence of antibodies to coronavirus needs to be prioritized. This would identify people who had recovered and could safely go back to life outside of lockdown.

 

Over at the Wall Street Journal, the perspicacious former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb also recommends massively scaling up serological surveillance. When population screening reveals that “a sizable portion of a local community has some protection, authorities can be more confident in relying on less invasive measures. Once deployed, serological tests are cheap, straightforward, and easy to scale.”

 

Several companies have already developed such tests.

 

 

Faster, please.

 

 

 

 

 

 

..

 

This will HAVE TO HAPPEN in order for the phasing in of the workforce to begin.  If you read-in-between the lines from Dr. Fauci and Dr. Burks that they always go back to "we need more data and testing" to make any sort of determination.  I agree with that, without it you cannot provide the public any sense of assurance.

[B-Man]

 

There are differing viewpoints ?

 

 

 

 

.

[Bockeye]

15 hours ago, B-Man said:

 

Perhaps she is a physician who needs new tires ?

 

I am in complete agreement with keeping everyone on as absolute a quarantine as we can.

 

But that doesn't preclude everyone from discussion on how we can gradually get people back to work.

 

Save your dying for wall street hashtags, we can see right through your false face.

 

 

.

The Dying for Wall Street hashtags crack me up.  It will catch on with people who have no sense of how the economy works.

 

"We want billions of dollars for unemployment and healthcare and we need completely shut down the economy for the next two months or longer"

 

That would be a great idea if the Government just had a money tree to pick cash from, but unfortunately, they do not. This is a wild concept but, in order to pay for unemployment, healthcare, and free checks to all, they get their money from BUSINESSES AND THE EMPLOYEES THAT WORK FOR THOSE BUSINESSES THROUGH SOMETHING CALLED TAXES.  Here's what 2015 looked like.

 

In 2015, total federal revenues in fiscal year 2015 are expected to be $3.18 trillion.² These revenues come from three major sources:

1. Income taxes paid by individuals: $1.48 trillion, or 47% of all tax revenues.
2. Payroll taxes paid jointly by workers and employers: $1.07 trillion, 34% of all tax revenues.
3. Corporate income taxes paid by businesses: $341.7 billion, or 11% of all tax revenues

Source: https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/revenues/

 

If we don't open the economy soon, there will be less businesses to pay those taxes and less employees to pay those taxes which feed into all the wonderful things we want to do with the trillions of dollars America just wrote a check for. 

 

So yes - If we do not act soon, those payments will stop, and as some pointed out, lawlessness will follow and humorously, we will be reduced back into a hunting and gathering society.   I don't not expect this to happen, but it appears some people would like to follow this route.

Edited March 25, 2020 by Bockeye

[B-Man]

 We’re Not Going to Re-Open the Country All at Once

Joe Cunningham

 

On Tuesday, Donald Trump said he would like to see the country opened back up by Easter. Many people freaked out, waving their arms and running around screaming that the President is going to kill us all (again). He didn’t establish a hard date here. He simply said that is what he would like to see.

 

It is not his policy to just return the country to normal on a whim. Clearly, there is a goal and the government is looking into how to meet that goal. There is, contrary to what many in the media and on the Left might tell you, an actual plan here. Those whose hatred of the President is so great that they would blame him for someone drinking fish tank cleaner are not going to let you know that the White House has actually announced its plan. Instead, they’ll continue to question whether or not the country will be ready to be open for business at a hard date the President never actually set.

So, what is that plan?

 

 

According to the President’s own remarks, it’s to approach the problem on a region-by-region basis.

From the beginning, we have been working closely with our nation’s best scientists and medical professionals, and we will continue to do so until we have defeated the virus.  Our public health experts, who are terrific, are studying the variation in the disease across the country, and we will be using data to recommend new protocols to allow local economies to cautiously resume their activity at the appropriate time.

 

We also have a large team working on what the next steps will be once the medical community gives a region the okay — meaning the okay to get going, to get back; let’s go to work.

 

Our country wasn’t built to be shut down.  This is not a country that was built for this.  It was not built to be shut down.

Trump is carefully trying to balance the medical and economic approach here, and based on what we’ve seen coming out of Washington D.C., it looks like the public health experts are going to break the country down by region – anywhere from Congressional-district-sized to zip code to possibly even the county level.

 

What this suggests is that if the federal government were to lift guidelines/recommendations, it would start by targeting the areas of the country that are clear of COVID-19 or are not showing any spread. As public health agencies report in, new areas of full containment or designated as all clear would be next up to see restrictions lifted.

 

This is ultimately the right approach because the entire point of our system of government is based on the idea that one size doesn’t fit all when it comes to setting policy. It is frankly ridiculous for some places of the country – particularly rural areas with absolutely no infections and very little chance of anyone infected even visiting those places – to be shut down because a shut down in those areas would kill off the entire town’s business community. Whereas bigger cities could take a shutdown and survive because many of the businesses there are larger, the smaller communities simply could not handle it.

 

That’s where it appears the Trump administration is headed, and it is the right direction. It is actually refreshing to see a chief executive in government get handed all the power and, in this case, not use it, instead letting the system work it out.

 

 

 

.

[Tiberius]

21 hours ago, Magox said:

 

I am sure that is what Trump's team's suggestions will look like as well.  A gradual phasing approach.  Trump doesn't do nuance, he talks about things with a sledgehammer and since the country has been told ad nauseum to continue social distancing and then he comes out with his Two by Four that the U.S will be back in Biz soon it sends shock waves.

 

But in reality, he and Cuomo are most likely not that far apart, just that Cuomo's approach comes one from a bit more of empathy and factual data to make his case.  But again, they really are not that far apart because if you can get past the bluster which I understand is hard to do, Trump has excellent instincts and decision making and he is someone who listens to his advisers.  His job is not to go along with what his advisers say but to listen to them all and as commander in chief to make the best decision possible.  

 

I certainly hope he makes a good decision here and doesn't steer the country in the wrong direction.   This without doubt will be his most consequential decision.

 

With that said, all Trump can do is provide Federal guidance.  Ultimately it will be the governors and businesses that make the decision.  Don't get me wrong, federal guidance will be a powerful tool but it is the governors and businesses decision.

 

 

I haven't even read any of the other threads.  I can just imagine, I can generally understand what is going on in the threads and get similar information in the comments section from news outlets on social media.  Just a bunch of vapid back-and-forth.  

 

Don't get me wrong, we have some very good posters here but lots of it is just ughh.....

 

 

I disagree about Cuomo and Trump being fairly close in response and outlook of its severity. Cuomo is taking this much more seriously and Trump is already acting like he wants the workers to take the chance and go out and work. Trump is acting more like Florida Governor Desantis who is letting the beaches stay open. 

 

As to when this will end, I see China as being back to normal around the end of April and they were a few months ahead of us at least. So we might have three or four months ahead of us. I’d imagine it moves into the country after it leaves the coastal states. Hopefully better treatments come forward quickly. 

 

I found your point about suicides very interesting. But this virus could kill millions and that would be far more than the number of people that would kill themselves. 

 

 

[TPS]

3 hours ago, B-Man said:

 

 

RON BAILEY: Massive Coronavirus Testing Is the Way to Help Save the Economy: No time to waste; do it sooner rather than later.

 

By massively scaling up two types of tests—PCR tests that detect the active presence of virus and serology tests that detect immune system responses to being infected by the virus—population screening could identify those who are currently infected and those who have recovered and are likely not to pass along the virus to others.

 

Those who are currently infected could be isolated and their contacts traced so that they could quarantine themselves. Frequent large-scale testing of the uninfected would also help keep the epidemic in check by enabling them to withdraw if they subsequently contract the virus for a period of self-isolation in a timely fashion. Frontline health care providers and especially hard-hit regions should be given first priority as the testing regime begins its rapid expansion.

 

Those who had recovered from infection (possibly numbering ten times more than those whose symptoms drive them to seek out medical care) could help on the frontlines of the fight against COVID-19, return to work, and enjoy the pleasures of social life, e.g., dining out, meeting friends at bars, traveling, and attending performances at entertainment venues. “To make this strategy work, governments would need to involve employers, social organizations, schools and large retailers to conduct tests and provide time-stamped certifications,” propose the three researchers.

 

To ramp up both kinds of testing, the researchers urge that every laboratory capable of running PCR tests be pressed into service recruiting technicians, graduate students, and scientists to run the machines. Even better, Mesa Biotech just announced today that it has received Emergency Use Authorization from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to roll out its point-of-use 30-minute PCR test for the virus. Other companies should be encouraged to provide such tests.

 

As I also argued last week, the researchers argue that widespread deployment of serology tests for the presence of antibodies to coronavirus needs to be prioritized. This would identify people who had recovered and could safely go back to life outside of lockdown.

 

Over at the Wall Street Journal, the perspicacious former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb also recommends massively scaling up serological surveillance. When population screening reveals that “a sizable portion of a local community has some protection, authorities can be more confident in relying on less invasive measures. Once deployed, serological tests are cheap, straightforward, and easy to scale.”

 

Several companies have already developed such tests.

 

 

Faster, please.

 

 

 

 

 

 

..

No *****.  It's what should've happened in tandem when they shut down travel from China.

[Deranged Rhino]

15 minutes ago, TPS said:

No *****.  It's what should've happened in tandem when they shut down travel from China.

 

But it couldn't have (and still can't) because we live in a world of limited resources. The only effective way to distribute them is to triage them. 

 

 

[Magox]

14 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

But it couldn't have (and still can't) because we live in a world of limited resources. The only effective way to distribute them is to triage them. 

 

 

 

It really is a bunch of Monday Morning Quarterbacking.  I laid it out, it is a fact that the system in place was not meant to do this sort of testing at this level.  That's a fact, that is undeniable. 

 

So that only leaves the question, should they have began anticipating this sort of a pandemic a month before that they did.  Keep in mind, the CDC is seen as one of the best if not the top Disease Prevention organizations in the world.  The idea that Trump was maybe overriding what the CDC wanted to do to prepare for this pandemic is ludicrous.  Everyone was caught off guard, ranging from Trump, the CDC, WHO, Cuomo, Europe you name it.  The only ones who were truly prepared for this were the Asians, and that is because of their H1N1 experience.  They lived through something somewhat similar and they already had a system in place to better deal with it.