Open The Doors

I was on board with the stay-at-home orders when school closed over 5 weeks ago.  We thought we were looking at a real pandemic, one that would cut its way like a scythe through the population.  It made sense to try to limit such a catastrophic event.

Here we are 5 weeks later, and we know a lot more now.  We know it's a yucky illness, and we also know that it's not 1918-redux.  The whole point of a temporary shutdown was to "flatten the curve", to ensure that the peak of the illness did not overwhelm our medical facilities' ability to care for patients.  We've accomplished that.  It wasn't to save every single person from the coronavirus, it was to help the population as a whole.  Many medical facilities are going broke because they're not allowed to treat patients without coronavirus--such treatment isn't "critical".  How many patients are on board the Comfort and the Mercy, the naval ships sent to New York City and Southern California?  Do you recall hearing about the temporary hospital set up in a football stadium in Seattle (an early hot spot), that has already been removed because there weren't any patients?

Circumstances have changed since early March.  We should not get into fixed positions based on our politics--Republicans want to get back to life, Democrats want to stay locked up.  No, we should look at this objectively and recognize that conditions have changed, our knowledge of the virus has changed, and the events we feared so much in early March have not come to pass.  The disease isn't near as deadly as we thought it might be and, if a study from Santa Clara County is anywhere near accurate, many more people than we thought have been exposed to the virus (making the death rate even lower).  We should be making decisions based on the conditions, not on politics.

It's time to recognize that the medicine is now known to be worse than the disease.  What's true is that the country is quickly being split into two camps--those who are still getting a paycheck, and those who aren't.

I recognize that it's difficult, now that these draconian rules have been put in place, to back off on them.  If 2 people die after a stay-at-home order is lifted, people on the other side of the politics will scream, "See?  See?  We should still be at home!  Blood is on hands!"  It's kind of like the TSA--the moment they relax one of their stupid orders, people will scream for the head of the person who is now making them less safe!  Except for hand sanitizer, as the TSA has relaxed the 3 oz rule for liquid hand sanitizer, showing the 3 oz rule was never about safety anyway and was only about theater.  My point is that once you institute rules for "safety", any reduction in those rules comes with severe political risk.  And if there's one thing politicians don't like, it's political risk.

These stay-at-home orders weren't created to save just one life.  They were instituted to save huge numbers of lives.  I don't know if they did that, but we now know that we're not in danger of losing huge numbers of people.  The "just one life" argument has to give way to reality.

It's time to reopen America to commerce.

Update, 4/23/20:  Comfort is leaving New York.  Not needed.

Then there's this tweet, which aligns with my concerns:

Update #2, 4/23/20:  This doctor agrees:

The tragedy of the COVID-19 pandemic appears to be entering the containment phase. Tens of thousands of Americans have died, and Americans are now desperate for sensible policymakers who have the courage to ignore the panic and rely on facts. Leaders must examine accumulated data to see what has actually happened, rather than keep emphasizing hypothetical projections; combine that empirical evidence with fundamental principles of biology established for decades; and then thoughtfully restore the country to function.

Five key facts are being ignored by those calling for continuing the near-total lockdown...

His conclusion is the same as mine.

Update #3, 4/26/20:  These California doctors agree:

Both doctors understand and support the initial reactions to the COVID-19 outbreak by the federal, state and local governments. It was a novel virus and there was very limited information. However, now they assert that the data is telling them that the disease pattern of COVID-19 is more like the flu. Dr. Erickson phrased it this way, “Millions of cases, a small number of deaths.” He specifically noted that the difference in the number of deaths between Sweden, with limited restrictions, and Norway, which locked down, is not statistically significant.

"Lockdown versus non-lockdown did not produce a statistically different number of deaths. That is the bottom line," said Erickson.

Throughout the briefing he emphasized that decision making going forward needs to be based on data, not predictive models. This echoes comments made by Dr. Anthony Fauci during press briefings. And we have all watched the predictive models be radically adjusted as actual data has been loaded into them.

Video at the link.

Update #4, 5/1/20:   SEEN ON FACEBOOK: “Corona is starting to feel like the Check Engine light. At first it freaks you out, but after a few weeks you’re like ‘Look, I gotta go to work.'”