Economic implications of a SARS/Coronavirus outbreak

[Sdajii]

Seriously Qfrog Redrob does deal in facts. Trying to gaslight him or others to the contrary is rubbish.

Sdajii's supremely certain, self opinionated observations on COVID are so far off reality they are ridiculous. And I suspect there are plenty of other people who share his delusions an happy to spread them. Perhaps you should all get a room together.

This thread was supposed to be about the economic implications of COVID . Be good if it went back to that theme rather than a relentless barrage of denial that there is any problem with this virus beyond actually trying to limit its spread.

You say it's off topic because you disagree with what I'm saying, but it's not off topic.

The virus itself is not causing significant changes to the economy or anything else, when compared to the impact of the fear campaigns and government-imposed shut downs. If we just calmly treated it like the flu (no harm in encouraging extra hand washing, hygiene measures, etc), we'd have a few more people than usual dying in nursing homes, a few more people than usual in hospitals, and really not that much else. Again, look at Sweden, the mainstream predictions were that they would have calamity, people said I was insane for predicting otherwise, but now that their deaths are completely and utterly negligible and their number of sick people is trivial, the narrative has had to change to 'Oh, but so many people died, we can't have that' (look at the average age of those deaths!!!) and consider that even with the most extreme restrictions, all this time into the pandemic, Victoria is having the virus spreading like crazy anyway, and more outbreaks in other states are inevitable, while a Sweden model would by this stage allow for absolute business as usual, while I am literally not allowed outside for more than an hour per day and have an 8PM curfew and extreme restrictions on my activity, despite having been in perfect health since before any of us had heard of this virus. Businesses closed, extraordinary unemployment, etc etc... how can anyone not see that this is caused by the government-imposed restrictions and not the virus itself?

Surely no one can honestly say this is untrue, but it does go against the implication of the mainstream narrative, which is what people are feeling, which influences their thinking. This means understanding this is a critical step in understanding the economic impact of the virus, which means it is absolutely fundamental to the topic of this thread.

The virus is not just going to go away. The economy will recover when we stop being scared of the virus. If you want to understand what the economy will do, you need to understand what is causing the changes to the economy, and when that will change.

Some of you keep saying that I'm "off topic" because you disagree. But surely even a below average frog can see that even if what I'm saying was wrong, it would not be off topic.

Whether or not there will be an effective vaccine is absolutely on topic. If you are correct and there is a medical miracle which gives us a highly effective, safe vaccine, then obviously that eliminates the need for shutdowns and we can all go back to work, starting up businesses, flying around the world on holidays, drinking until we throw up at the pup, hanging out in big groups at our friends' houses to watch mainstream 6O'clock propaganda and cry when we see Trump get reelected. If there isn't a virus, obviously that's also relevant to the economic impact. If there's an ineffective vaccine which gets used anyway, surely you can see that it also has a relevance to the situation, and if you somehow think the virus itself is the main thing causing the economic issues, then you'd think that was highly relevant.

The fact that you disagree with me doesn't mean I'm off topic.

The double standards in this thread about what is absolute fact and what is speculation or definitively incorrect are also crazy.

 

[Sdajii]

Zero basis for your claim.

Zero basis to the claim that most of the people dying from the virus were soon to die anyway?

Are you even aware that most of them have been in nursing homes? You know people don't go to nursing homes when they're young and have the world at their feet, right? You know the average age of the people dying is around the same as the average life expectancy of the country, right? Do you deny that too? Most of the younger deaths have comorbidities. You know I'm not making this up.


I'll leave it at your first point and won't address them all because it gets tedious, but it would all be much like this.

 

[Smurf1976]

Are you even aware that most of them have been in nursing homes? You know people don't go to nursing homes when they're young and have the world at their feet, right? You know the average age of the people dying is around the same as the average life expectancy of the country, right? Do you deny that too? Most of the younger deaths have comorbidities. You know I'm not making this up.

The issue is that you are indeed correct. With the lockdowns etc it is indeed mostly the elderly and sick who are ending up dead.

Now go to the US and that isn't the case at all, it's drastically worse even by their own official figures.

That's the problem. What you say is true is true only because of the lockdowns, that being the point of them. Much like the car moves because it has fuel but its ongoing movement is by no means proof that you should stop putting fuel in. Do that and it stops working.

Downside = they're costing an outright fortune and will leave society significantly poorer with effects on pretty much everything. Hence the need to do it once and get it right without all this half hearted nonsense.

 

[Smurf1976]

The fact that you disagree with me doesn't mean I'm off topic.

Agreed we should all consider others' views politely and respectfully.

Nobody here, or anywhere for that matter, is really sure where all this is heading.

 

[Sdajii]

The issue is that you are indeed correct. With the lockdowns etc it is indeed mostly the elderly and sick who are ending up dead.

Now go to the US and that isn't the case at all, it's drastically worse even by their own official figures.

That's the problem. What you say is true is true only because of the lockdowns, that being the point of them. Much like the car moves because it has fuel but its ongoing movement is by no means proof that you should stop putting fuel in. Do that and it stops working.

Downside = they're costing an outright fortune and will leave society significantly poorer with effects on pretty much everything. Hence the need to do it once and get it right without all this half hearted nonsense.

Now you're the one who is actually getting off topic.

The response to this is that if we look at a place like Sweden which went for no lockdown, no removal of human freedom, no shutting down of businesses, the virus has already run its course and deaths close enough to zero now. Here's a link to a display of the official figures: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/

To relate this back to the topic, this is the only real way to get to that point, assuming an effective vaccine is not coming any time soon (I don't believe it will come at all, but no point going around in circles with that argument - but consider that Trump agrees with you and not me, so perhaps you'll change your mind!). Contrast this with Australia, where after having the virus already at very low numbers and with all we've learned, bang, we suddenly had a far bigger ripple (I'm not going to call it a wave; 50 people being significantly ill in the whole country does not count as a wave of anything) than the initial one. If that's the best we can do even with all we've learned, all the economic destruction, all the efforts, all the drastic measures, and we still have it spreading like this (you would no doubt call it a wave), clearly the efforts are pointless. To avoid an argument let's assume you are correct in trusting the official story that it all started with security guards having sex with a tiny number of people. If that's all it takes to set this off, an average sock puppet should be able to see that if that's true we're going to have more such outbreaks, because human beings being human beings, you'll have an occasional individual doing something like this. While a Sweden strategy already has the death rate at effectively zero (average of less than 1 per day over the last 10 days, after a very steady downwards trend). How is this not a no brainer? Look at Australia's figures and consider that even if we magically get on top of it by way of destroying our economy, the strategy means we will inevitably have the same thing happen again. If a vaccine or magical cure does come along, there's nothing stopping anyone from using it.

Again, to relate it to the topic, the economy can't function properly and return to normal until one or the other happens (herd immunity, for which we have a proven model) or the hypothetical vaccine. This gives us information on what to expect the economy to do.

Detractors of the Sweden model point out that Sweden's economy has suffered, but neglect to point out that this is only because other countries refused to do business with them or travel there, because they saw Sweden as a risky place. It didn't overwhelm the healthcare system or wipe out a quarter of the population or anything like that, they've just been caught up in the global economic nonsense - the effects of the virus within the country did nothing of great significance to the economy.

 

[Smurf1976]

Again, to relate it to the topic, the economy

The topic is the economic implications of the virus not simply "how to get the economy going". It's by no means off topic to be thinking that we're not actually going to return to the 2019 economy in a hurry or indeed ever.

There's a good reason why the cruise lines and airlines have started scrapping ships and planes respectively. They're not fools and they know full well that the economy, globally, is not going back to how it was in 2019 anytime soon and that situation isn't limited to Australia.

It's not as though the basic concepts here are new. It's only about 50 years since Torrens Island, on the outskirts of Adelaide, became better known for its then new power station rather than its quarantine station. Yes, quarantine station - where they used to keep arriving passengers before allowing them to enter the state and that facility was in use for close to a century. Plenty of similar things existed elsewhere too.

The invention of aircraft didn't remove the need for quarantine. We just stopped doing it until it blew up.

I'll happily trade what the markets do and if the market does a V-shaped recovery then so be it but I'm sure not seeing any reason to expect that from the real economy especially tourism and things relating to it. Airlines and the cruise ship industry seem to have reached the same conclusion - they wouldn't have become scrap metal suppliers if not.

As for the medical aspect of all this, the big unanswered question remains the facts. If we "let it rip" through the population then can someone, anyone, simply explain what happens?

How many people die?

Of those who die, what are their circumstances? Age? Background health issues?

How many suffer ongoing effects but not immediate death?

Of those who do suffer such effects, what are those effects? And what are the characteristics of the people who suffer from those effects? Age? Background health issues? Etc.

Once that's answered, sensible debate about the best course of action becomes far simpler and it may well turn out that "let it rip" is a rational approach.

In the meantime the lack of an answer to that question strongly suggests that either nobody knows or the answers are decidedly unpleasant.

 

[Smurf1976]

Detractors of the Sweden model point out that Sweden's economy has suffered, but neglect to point out that this is only because other countries refused to do business with them or travel there, because they saw Sweden as a risky place. It didn't overwhelm the healthcare system or wipe out a quarter of the population or anything like that

Just imagine if we actually had Sweden's approach to healthcare and society generally.

We could have then followed their model and achieved the same results yes.

Trouble is, in Australia it's rather hard to convince anyone to resource things like hospitals to be ready and there's stuff all spare capacity to cope with a spike in requirements so as to avoid the problem of hospitals being overwhelmed. There simply isn't the capacity to cope beyond a very low level.

Resource the hospitals so that we don't have waiting lists and so on under normal circumstances then we'll have plenty of ability to cope when there's some sort of problem like this one. That's one lesson we can definitely learn.

 

[Garpal Gumnut]

Just imagine if we actually had Sweden's approach to healthcare and society generally.

We could have then followed their model and achieved the same results yes.

Trouble is, in Australia it's rather hard to convince anyone to resource things like hospitals to be ready and there's stuff all spare capacity to cope with a spike in requirements so as to avoid the problem of hospitals being overwhelmed. There simply isn't the capacity to cope beyond a very low level.

Resource the hospitals so that we don't have waiting lists and so on under normal circumstances then we'll have plenty of ability to cope when there's some sort of problem like this one. That's one lesson we can definitely learn.

With the caveat that coronavirus does not have further surprises for us, e.g. medium term severe complications after recovery in those stricken, the major difference between our and the NZ public health approach and the UK and Italian experience is that our healthcare resources have not been overwhelmed to the same degree. This has given us time. Time to care for the unwell as well as to plan for suitable closing of non vital industries.

This leaves Mining and Commodities, Agriculture, Health, IT and Communications a chance to function as normal or even thrive.

The "business" of sipping lattes in Carlton or having a pie and peas at Grappa in Leichardt are for the lightweight and inessential in our economy. It has also given the bloated, dangerous education sector a good cleanout.

We are a nation rich and robust enough to endure two years of significant economic downturn to recover.

The market is now beginning to indicate this.

gg

 

[Smurf1976]

With the caveat that coronavirus does not have further surprises for us

Indeed and at this stage I’m assuming that governments at least suspect there’s cause for concern.

 

[qldfrog]

But surely even a below average frog can see that even if what I'm saying was wrong, it would not be off topic

Ohh feeling a bit offended here
As to
what a let it rip thru attitude would do here?
.yes we are not Sweden
So what about comparing us to an indian slum,
Can we all agree we are not worse?
If so: this is what happens
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08...um-declares-victory-over-coronavirus/12518818
From ABC to make sure that it is not discarded as extreme right Murdock conspiracy LoL
DYOR out of this, please read till the end
The economic issue for Australia is that mining and essential services are employing a minuscule amount of people
This crisis self made or not, demonstrates how lopsided our economy is
In the same way as the average Aussie is no blond supra fit surfer dude, he is not a miner, farmer or carpenter
You average Aussie is in PS, a nurse,on welfare or part time barista
This is a bloody sick economy more than a covid sick society, with parasiting as its basis.it never ends well, and we are increasing the imbalance with our response

 

[rederob]

Typical Rederob ,you (not me) state that Italian and Spanish hospitals are overwhelmed , now aka today and when confronted go on a tangent.
What a piece...

Versus:

Spain, Italy the UK and dozens of nations had....

Try denying that with evidence.
Want me to pick a dozen other right now which have their medical resources overrun as a result of COVID-19 so you can deny that as well.
You are a factless zone peddling pseudoscience and lies on these matters.

 

[SirRumpole]

Again, look at Sweden, the mainstream predictions were that they would have calamity, people said I was insane for predicting otherwise, but now that their deaths are completely and utterly negligible and their number of sick people is trivial,

You are joking aren't you ?

The figures tell a different story.

 

[rederob]

The virus itself is not causing significant changes to the economy or anything else, when compared to the impact of the fear campaigns and government-imposed shut downs.

Zero evidence - again.

If we just calmly treated it like the flu (no harm in encouraging extra hand washing, hygiene measures, etc), we'd have a few more people than usual dying in nursing homes, a few more people than usual in hospitals, and really not that much else.

Show us where the flu has collapsed hospital systems as continues to be the case in many nations across the world. Or show us where the flu leaves sufferers with a range of other lifelong morbidities.
You simply make this up as you go.

Businesses closed, extraordinary unemployment, etc etc... how can anyone not see that this is caused by the government-imposed restrictions and not the virus itself?

Were it not for the infection rate of the virus and its serious health consequences governments would not be taking this action. We are nothing like Sweden. The USA is nothing like Sweden but has tried their approach in opening up, only to suffer worse than previously. We get it that you don't.

Surely no one can honestly say this is untrue....

Yes, a lot of people can use data to show your points are poorly based.

The economy will recover when we stop being scared of the virus.

Another completely baseless claim.

The double standards in this thread about what is absolute fact and what is speculation or definitively incorrect are also crazy.

Can you please show us where you are providing "facts" to support your claims.

Detractors of the Sweden model point out that Sweden's economy has suffered, but neglect to point out that this is only because other countries refused to do business with them or travel there, because they saw Sweden as a risky place.

It's true that bordering nations stopped Swedes from crossing, and that actually worked as a "lockdown" effect by mitigating spread. However, countries did not stop doing business, so that's another fabrication.

 

[rederob]

Zero basis to the claim that most of the people dying from the virus were soon to die anyway?

Tomorrow, next week, next month, next year, in ten years, or longer?
Should I be telling my 97 year old mother that her life is worthless and that she and her partner should drop dead asap so we can all get on with our lives?
The problem with your idea of "soon" is that it's a guess. Put your point into a logical context, had she died of COVID-19 and was 80 years old, then that's ok because not many people live longer anyway. Yet that 17 year difference (and counting) in life expectancy is not just statistically significant, it has human value.

 

[Knobby22]

While we are it, can we also do our bit for poverty, drug abuse, domestic violence and multi nationals paying taxes. All have an ecomomic impact on Aussies doing their bit. But none of them cause govnuts to close down society and remove our freedoms.

No they don't. And as my Dad would say, how does that relate to the price of fish.

 

[Junior]

If we just calmly treated it like the flu (no harm in encouraging extra hand washing, hygiene measures, etc), we'd have a few more people than usual dying in nursing homes, a few more people than usual in hospitals, and really not that much else.

Unfortunately this is simply untrue.

Victoria is a good example to look at, as we have high rates of testing, and detailed data which is updated daily.

We have a total of 695 ICU beds across the entire state (which was increased earlier this year due to COVID...in 2018 we had 476 beds). Right Now, there are 41 COVID cases in ICU beds (up from just 1 or 2 cases a month ago). This means more than 10% of people in ICU in Victoria, are there due to COVID19. Keep in mind, this is happening despite Stage 3, and now Stage 4 restrictions, and this is happening whilst we have the vast majority of the population who have not been exposed to the virus, due to restrictions and physical distancing.

If we just let it rip, and treated it like it's no big deal, like the flu, what do you think would happen to our healthcare system?

My wife is an experienced nurse and works in the COVID ward at Monash clayton, so I'm getting first-hand accounts of how the hospital is coping. It's already strained just with the current numbers, despite the cancellation/postponement of elective surgeries etc.

Because this virus is so contagious, we have large numbers of healthcare workers contracting the virus, we also have some nurses who are terrified and trying to get re-deployed to other wards and away from COVID patients. We have nurses and doctors who have another risk factor i.e. pregnancy or heart condition, who are terrified of catching COVID, and so refusing to treat COVID patients.

The virus cannot just be ignored, or treated like the flu. It is not the flu.

 

[wayneL]

Unfortunately this is simply untrue.

Victoria is a good example to look at, as we have high rates of testing, and detailed data which is updated daily.

We have a total of 695 ICU beds across the entire state (which was increased earlier this year due to COVID...in 2018 we had 476 beds). Right Now, there are 41 COVID cases in ICU beds (up from just 1 or 2 cases a month ago). This means more than 10% of people in ICU in Victoria, are there due to COVID19. Keep in mind, this is happening despite Stage 3, and now Stage 4 restrictions, and this is happening whilst we have the vast majority of the population who have not been exposed to the virus, due to restrictions and physical distancing.

If we just let it rip, and treated it like it's no big deal, like the flu, what do you think would happen to our healthcare system?

My wife is an experienced nurse and works in the COVID ward at Monash clayton, so I'm getting first-hand accounts of how the hospital is coping. It's already strained just with the current numbers, despite the cancellation/postponement of elective surgeries etc.

Because this virus is so contagious, we have large numbers of healthcare workers contracting the virus, we also have some nurses who are terrified and trying to get re-deployed to other wards and away from COVID patients. We have nurses and doctors who have another risk factor i.e. pregnancy or heart condition, who are terrified of catching COVID, and so refusing to treat COVID patients.

The virus cannot just be ignored, or treated like the flu. It is not the flu.

No it is not the flu. The flu, at times has been much worse by a number of multiples.... Even in my own lifetime.

It is interesting that the demarcation of alarm about covid roughly coincides with the same demarcation with Trump derangement syndrome, climate change alarm, and neo Marxist, postmodernist, identitarian ideologies

The correlation factor would be so close to 1.0 that it would not matter.

I find that interesting.

 

[satanoperca]

The virus cannot just be ignored, or treated like the flu. It is not the flu.

Junior, if you take time into consideration, it is a lot less worse than the first cases of H1N1 virus, 1918 Spanish Flu.

What is the difference between the general term used for the flu today, we humans have built up an immunity to it or that be it, the various strains and mutations of it.

History always gives us insight into the future.

 

[Sdajii]

You are joking aren't you ?

The figures tell a different story.

It's literally less than one person per day and since they hit their flatline low level of scarcely above zero (again, literally less than one person per day!) every single one of those people have been elderly.

On what planet or in what warped state of mind is the death of less than one elderly person per day in a whole country of millions of people not trivial?

 

[Sdajii]

Zero evidence - again.

It's difficult to imagine what state of mind you require to think that a total of around 275 people over the course of this whole year, most of whom have been elderly or extremely ill, none of which is disputed by anyone, is the thing causing the economic problems we're experiencing. You really need evidence to see that the shutdowns are the cause rather than the trivial number of people actually affected by the virus? Obviously we'd have more cases if we had no mitigation measures, but obviously, as it stands, the economic problems can not possibly be caused by the virus.

Show us where the flu has collapsed hospital systems as continues to be the case in many nations across the world.

EXACTLY!!! Flus which kill and harm far, far, far more people than this have don't cause these problems, because we don't take ridiculous actions in response to them.

Or show us where the flu leaves sufferers with a range of other lifelong morbidities.

You keep asking for evidence and also keep saying bizarre stuff like this.

Were it not for the infection rate of the virus and its serious health consequences governments would not be taking this action. We are nothing like Sweden. The USA is nothing like Sweden but has tried their approach in opening up, only to suffer worse than previously. We get it that you don't.

In what relevant way are we not like Sweden?

The USA has not tried the same approach as Sweden! The USA is a very large, very populous countries with over 50 states, each of which has taken a different approach!

It's true that bordering nations stopped Swedes from crossing, and that actually worked as a "lockdown" effect by mitigating spread. However, countries did not stop doing business, so that's another fabrication.

So... with Sweden now having effectively zero deaths (less than 1 per day now), you think it helped neighbouring countries to isolate from Sweden and take different approaches, while those countries which avoided Sweden are having higher rates of death than Sweden is?

And honestly, you think that shutting down borders doesn't mean Sweden lost business? I suppose you want evidence and some peer-reviewed journal reference to show that if people are not allowed into the country they will travel less and buy less stuff in that country?