This is not at all tech-related, but wanted to post this anyway. On another forum some folks said that they thought COVID-19 wasn't "rea", with the following comments: That, and the current push to "re-open" the country inspired this response from me: Even IF the virus was "only" this year's version of the flu, I don't think you can argue that it certainly is a nasty one. Typically, including this year, the death rate from seasonal flu is around 0.1% in the U.S., while for COVID-19, the death rate is at least 6 time higher. But, because there are effective flu vaccines, the flu only affects 8% of the U.S. population every year, while COVID-19 can infect up to between 50% and 80% of the population. There have been 24,000 – 62,000 flu deaths in the US for this year's entire flu season, while the current estimates for COVID-19 deaths in the US just for March - May will be 100,000 - 150,000, more than twice as many deaths than occurred of US soldiers in 16 years of the Vietnam War. Beyond that, the total US deaths for this year will depend on whether it can be contained, which has not been proven to date. Unlike flu, COVID-19 does not seem to necessarily be seasonal. So there have been flu and pneumonia deaths this year, but they have not been publicized much in comparison to COVID-19. I used these links to get this data - https://www.livescience.com/new-coronavirus-compare-with-flu.html and https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/covid-data/forecasting-us.html. Also, I believe that COVID-19 seems to be spread over much more of the world than "regular" flu typically is. The biggest problem is that no vaccine exists to treat or prevent COVID-19, and probably won't exist for at least another year. This compares to other US annual death rates such as: AIDS - 13,000, car crashes - 38,000, gun-related - 40,000, drug overdose - 67,000, alcohol-related - 88,000, obesity - 300,000, tobacco smoking related - 480,000, and cancer - 607,000. There is some crossover between some of the categories. Over-all, I think folks are pretty fucked up since so many of those deaths can be at least partially influenced by their own behavior and preventative actions. I just wanted to get that off my chest.
I have felt sorry for America having to see, hear and live through your current president and his inaction, deflection and distraction tactics. Him being so self obsessed and being so gullible as to watch and believe FOX news everyday etc. We have Sky news here and they are so out there and push their opinions instead of telling the news and letting people have their own opinions based on the facts, I know Australia has a group very very similar to Trump supporters, makes me feel dirty knowing I am in the same gene pool. I have realized that Trumps "Make America Great Again" will happen, but only AFTER he has left office! The only reason ANYONE thinks this virus is a hoax is because they are delusional, their beliefs have taken over their logic and actual truths. While it is true that you can deal with an outbreak in many ways, the balancing act of life over economy has been winning so far, with the addition of time to build up stock piles of needed supplies and strategies to trace and deal with the influx of infections once you do open back up. Link anyone who talks like this to watch the Spanish Flu or read the statistics and see how Covid is almost identical to it's rates and how a second and third wave were responsible for the higher amount of deaths due to people thinking "it wasn't that bad" because the government back then locked down and distanced back then until people grew restless and came out to celebrate the returning soldiers etc. The goal of this shutdown is to make the hospitals able to handle the amount of patients they WILL have once you open it back up, opening up does NOT mean you have beaten the virus and things will be normal. Even if you did open up, most people will refuse to go out and spend money, so you'll be working with a tiny amount of customers where you will be lucky to pay your power bill or rent for your business. Once it is safe to do so, the scientists will let you know when, why and how it's able to happen. All it takes is to look at Youtube and watch someone show a walkthrough of a hospital in New York and you can see the devastation. What people need to realize is that even if you don't have symptoms and/or you do survive the infection that you will lose some lung capacity and it can take up to 20+ years for all the scar tissue to heal. Of cause everybody wants to go back to normal, but I can picture myself transmitting the virus to my mum, dad, grandma, my friends parents and know that it will cause them to suffer or even worse. I couldn't cause the death of another person when I have the knowledge that it is very possible if I ignore the truth, this virus does kill a lot of people - at least until we have a proven way to fight back.
This explains why everyone should care about Covid-19 -EDIT- https://imgur.com/gallery/dPPmiQA Or read the above and try and appreciate what this strong, well trained person is going through only to have people demand not to wear masks and go out for no good reason or even worse, to gather in groups and demand that many others can come out by law... It is stupid to assume that just because you haven't personally got anyone you care enough about that would suffer and die if infected that the rest of us are willing to let our loved ones do the same! Australia have had it very easy so far, but I know it may not last through the rest of the year like this. I just feel so bad seeing the gap between the people who are good and actually helping save lives, and those who say money is more important, if you think that is true, go watch some of thunderf00t's youtube videos on how it's cheaper to run the country for 18 months as it is shutdown to now, then after 10 years you could make it all back (due to the extra working people who survived Covid), but if you open the wrong things up (nobody knows for sure what these are yet), you could have enough people die that it would take 30+ years to get to the same point of growth. Even if people don't care about the compassion side they need to trust peer reviewed science and math.
