The actions taken during February in Wuhan and neighboring provinces seem to have stopped the spread there, so effective actions can be taken.

Thing is, it appears that there's little overlap between actions that seem reasonable and actions that are effective. If you wait until drastic actions seem justifiable, then by that time it's too late to be effective (i.e. the Italy lockdown which would have helped Italy if it was done 2-3 weeks earlier); and if you take effective actions, then most people and media will wonder why you're so authorative and unreasonable (e.g. the reaction to early Wuhan containment measure enforcement).

Another interesting penalty of delayed action is that any exponential increase that happened while you were delaying needs to be balanced by a period of exponential decrease once you have measures in place. Exactly how much depends on assumptions, but e.g. delaying applying measures by 2 weeks could mean they need to be kept for 4 additional weeks.

So the overall cost picture is strongly in favor of early action.

Denmark did close every school and most administrations. France did not.

Many decisions can be taken, but are not (for various reasons). Most experts recommend to limit contacts rather than closing down borders, and no one is pretending to stop the virus but they all should try to flatten the curve. You don't seem to pay attention to the current situation.

Yeah, and we don't know the reasoning behind either decision. I can come up with maybe a hundred different parameters that could be relevant or not.

At this point we can trust authorities to have a reasonable approach to this and that they monitor the situation closely. Or we can assume they don't.

In the first case, we follow the action plan. In the latter we do what we can, best based on actions that worked elsewhere. Just complaining about how insufficient actions are in our eyes doesn't help.

Anyway, there plans for stuff like this government drawers everywhere. Ranging from school closures to plan keeping critical infrastructure up. Heritage from the cold war.

And even if the US federal government seems to screw up, states like New York and Washington seem to react rather decisively. And we shouldn't forget that things in China are calming down to an extent ad-hoc hospitals are closed down and medical supplies can be shipped to Italy.

It also depends on the country's government.

Afaik in Germany the country's government can't force schools to close or public events to be cancelled. These decisions have to be taken locally (at state/city or even district level). All the health ministry can do is tell people "you shouldn't do A B C and you should do X Y Z"

No, that's not the real reason.

In the places where they have shut down schools, they can't really do it either. But when government says "do X" and has good reasons, the institutions comply. I'm in the board of a private institution in a country with a shutdown order, and there was really no discussion between the board members that this institution would shut down too, despite there being no legal backing at all.

That seems to be exactly the reason in Germany. The federal government has no say regarding public gatherings or schools. They have given out recommendations, some have followed, others have not. There's no repercussion for cities not following the government's decision.

You can hide behind "I lack the legal authority" or you can act. This is one of the rare occasions that absolutely do call for the old "ask for forgiveness" mentality. Nobody in the lower tiers would complain about central government to take a very difficult decision off their plate. (some people will complain, those who still think they can just pretend that the epidemic does not happen, but they will complain anyways)

The difference is that, in China, if you don't comply the state security detains you and you get sentenced to re-education camp at best.

In other places there are no real consequences for you, even if people die. But there are legal and economic consequences if you shut down without top cover. That is why the government and legislative paralysis is so damaging -- with no safety net, people will prefer the unknown loss over the certain loss.

They do end up complying. But it's not as fast and efficient as in China.

Not saying it's good or bad, but it's definitely a different system.

This is correct afaik, I'm pretty sure the decision to close schools is with the ministries of education of each German state, however if federal institutions put out strong recommendations, state and local administrators will likely follow very soon after. Federal ministries may not have absolute control here (unless they declare a state of emergency or something) but they do have plenty of influence.

Japan has the same limitation, but the government put out a "strong recommendation" for schools to close and all the local governments complied.

Japan has a different culture. When the government puts out a "strong recommendation", the society generally follows. This even happens with corporations. There's a culture of conformity there that just isn't present in western nations.

They haven't got laws on the books to do this? - the UK Passed some enabling legislation in Jan I believe

We do, ever since the cold war.

France has 11x Denmark's population and 4x it's confirmed cases, so it seems like doing nothing worked better.

Don't forget:

a) There's a time-lag of probably 1-2 weeks between someone becoming infected, until their case hits the official statistics.

b) There will be different rates of testing between different areas, healthcare systems, and countries, which will be hard to quantify.

c) There will be fundamental differences between countries (e.g. patterns of population density, quality/availability of healthcare, etc.) which mean that direct per capita comparisons (as you made) are of little value.

Denmark's case number has increased far more than that of other countries in recent days. They probably had to act as they'd overtake Italy in less than a week with cases/capita if growth continues like that.

The case #'s only go up if you test more people. In Ohio for instance they are only testing very few people and there is now evidence of community spread because the 4th person confirmed had no known contact but you basically need to be in intensive car to get tested or have an obvious connection. So the case # in and of themselves could vary based upon testing criteria. Not sure if they have the same standards in Denmark vs France.

France just closed down all schools and universities...

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-12/france-cl...

Ah yes, because the pandemic is over and the disease has stopped spreading.

The effects of this will be seen in 4-8 weeks. Revisit this comment then

these numbers don't mean anything anymore. there is no more systematic testing going on

The fact that they refuse to do things like closing borders and immediately ceasing all travel by foreigners or citizens who've traveled traveled abroad meanwhile ending arbitrary social events is the reason you know it's hype up media nonsense.

Most of the actions taken are those most likely not affecting those in the target older or immuno-compromised demographic likely to have the serious consequences.

https://omny.fm/shows/inside-the-huddle/03-dr-laura-power-on...

Shutting down borders helps if the virus hasn't reached your country.

If it has, there's no point in banning incoming people (maybe you can stop people from leaving so other regions don't get infected, but that's a less strong incentive). If you already have the virus in your country, the best thing you can do is slow its spreading, by banning large groups of people from congregating.

Is that why now two countries have had mass quarantines?

It's a balancing act between lowering infections/death and economic impact.

France population: 66.99 million.

Denmark population: 5.6 million.

Doesn't seem like an accurate comparison.

Has there every been a time when, "Country X can't do what country Y can, because X is too [big/small] while Y is [small/big]" has not been a useless comment?

Is there a generic term for this sort of fallacy, where someone brings up a random difference between [cities/states/countries] as an excuse for why one can't do what the other has already done, without ever bothering to explain why the difference matters?

It's even worse than useless. Giant states are often assumed to be much better than small states, because "efficiency". Yet, whenever actual conditions are examined, and (inevitably) small states turn out to be better for humans, we get this sort of "well of course smaller problems are easier to solve" apologia.

I mean, I'm sure in some cases being bigger or smaller is helpful. It just feels incredibly lazy, borderline disingenuous to throw it out there without bothering to connect the dots or analyze how size would matter in that specific case.

> small states turn out to be better for humans

Source/examples of this? In Europe, the larger countries like the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain don't seem obviously worse off to me than their smaller counterparts. Like if you compare the UK to Ireland, Germany to Austria, Spain to Portugal, etc.

How is it a useless comment? If you want to compare the actions of Denmark to France, it's more relevant to compare it to a particular region. Grand Est, for example has a similar population as Denmark.

This is almost common sense in the business world. No one thinks BigCo and LittleStartup are capable of the same things or that one's ability or inability to do something is equivalent.

Well, in that case, let's compare: the Grand Est region has about the same population as Denmark, slightly more COVID-19 cases than Denmark (587 vs 514), and more deaths (9 vs 0). And yet, most schools and the administration are still open.

For now. In business, people deciding on the very weak data basis we have to discuss we have, would rightfully be have their asses kicked. Yet, here we are, doing exactly this.

This is blatanly false.

> there isn't anything governments can do about it.

Banning public events, locking down geographical areas, closing schools, pulling in retired medical workforce etc.

> doesn't mean that that something is meaningful or will have a positive impact

You can see the impact of measures such as enforcing lockdowns (e.g. Wuhan cases) and you can compare the spread of the virus in countries which take measures vs those that do not.

What? There is tons of stuff governments can do to flatten the curve. Educating people, closing schools, people gatherings, obligatory masks for all (or DIY bandanas), testing more.

> obligatory masks for all

States struggle to get enough masks for medical staff, diverting any for the general public doesn't seem smart. And self made masks will have so little effect that they could be detrimental if people decide to be less careful because they wear a masks.

To the other points, education about hand washing and behavior in public is the one thing governments have all done for weeks now. It just seems that this isn't nearly enough.

This mentality is just false. If more people of the general populous have masks, how does that not reduce transmission therefore flatten the curve?

Now I understand the logic behind there being shortages. But saying that the general populous shouldn't wear masks because it doesn't do anything doesn't sound accurate.

Without training it is very hard to wear PPE correctly. Even if you change masks regularly, it is hard not to touch the outside (hot side) of the mask with your hands. Reusing masks makes this even more likely.

Most people don't get a good fit of the mask either. Respirators are a bit easier but nowhere near enough of them.

Practically speaking all it does is burn through a small supply of masks.

> The reality is probably closer to the fact that there isn't anything governments can do about it.

They can proactively close schools, government jobs. They can roll out bailout programs to encourage business closings that would otherwise cause the businesses to go bankrupt. They can aggressively close borders, and enforce quarantines with military force. They can mandate the production of respirators, testing kits and other medical necessities.

Government can do A LOT that no other actor can, so I don't quite get where you're coming from with this statement.

Russia shutdown its borders pretty much straight away and IIRC they have hardly any cases.

If you believe them, they don't have any gay people either.

Well, there is still no panic and hospitals are not overrun with patients. Russia is not China and far from being able to hide such things from public.

Yeah, the Russian government seems really trustworthy. /s You can depend on them to investigate the whistleblowers, who will mysteriously die from a sudden case of "community-acquired pneumonia".

Doctors in Russia are accusing the government of covering up its coronavirus outbreak and denying them protective equipment

https://www.businessinsider.nl/coronavirus-russia-doctors-sa...

>“While the whole world is facing an outbreak of a new coronavirus, Russia is facing an outbreak of a community-acquired pneumonia,” Vasilyeva said. “And as usual, we’re facing the lie of the authorities.”

>She said Russian authorities were referring to coronavirus cases as ordinary pneumonia, implying that they’re distinct from the coronavirus pandemic.

>Russian authorities strongly denied her claims. A statement from the Moscow Department of Health accused her of seeking “to discredit Russian medicine and relevant government agencies” and called for authorities to investigate her.

Coronavirus: Reported spike in pneumonia cases in Moscow as Russia accuses critics of fake news

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-...

>“I have a feeling they (the authorities) are lying to us,” said Anastasia Vasilyeva, head of Russia's Doctor's Alliance trade union.

>“I don't believe the coronavirus numbers,” said Ekaterina, a Moscow accountant. “I remember what they told us about Chernobyl at the time. It's only now that we're finding out what really happened.”

Maybe it because they know this virus very well.

Not being able to hide things from the public has never kept Putin or Trump from lying through their teeth about anything.

The Moscow Times is currently reporting that there are 28 cases so far. We'll see how that turns out, regardless of whether they're currently telling the truth about it.

Coronavirus in Russia: The Latest News | March 12

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/03/12/coronavirus-in-rus...

>— A religious procession in central Russia aimed at fighting the coronavirus has been canceled due to the threat of the virus itself.

Apparently they believe the gay isn't the only thing you can pray away.

Trump seeks a 'miracle' as virus fears mount

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/28/politics/donald-trump-cor...

>"It's going to disappear. One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear," Trump said at the White House Thursday as the virus marched across Asia and Europe after US officials said the US should brace for severe disruption to everyday life.

>The President also warned that things could "get worse before it gets better," but he added it could "maybe go away. We'll see what happens. Nobody really knows."

I don’t think Russia has ever claimed to have no homosexuals. I think you are confusing it with maybe Brunei.

Except this one: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/17/blast-sparks-f...

That not not really that relevant.

It looks like a great cover up, which will be used if/when origins of virus will be traced back to RF. Such behavior is typical for RF. IMHO, it's better to watch actions of RF government and army. AFAIK, they already agitated some desperate Chinese, which lost someone they love, to spread virus at Evil West. They have plans to spread virus within Ukraine, as reported by Ukrainian intelligence agency. It looks like they have no fear of this virus and plan to use this situation for their advantage.

I believe only Moscow faces restrictions for travel from Europe. Maybe they just had much less travel anyway and that's why few got infected.

I thought I heard on the radio they shut the entire border. It seems they shut the border with China after doing a quick web search.

https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/30/russia-closes-2700-mile-borde...

They shut the land border with China pretty early on, that's when I realised that things were pretty serious in Wuhan and in China as a whole.

There’s a lot that governments can do. Ireland just closed schools and universities, and banned large indoor gatherings, for instance, and directed companies to make work from home available where possible (though this last one is really more a suggestion). This won’t get rid of the virus, but it may help to slow it and thus reduce deaths.

Closing borders, certainly at this point, seems largely futile.

>banned large indoor gatherings

I've read (true, who knows?) that in the USA this isn't legally possible. Federal government doesn't have that power.

This may be behind Trump's move to stop flights only to Europe, and not domestic flights. He has the power to do the former but not the latter, apparently.

It has everything to do with deflection, point out that the problem is over there, even though the virus is spreading inside already unchecked. The Governor of Ohio is putting an order to shut down all mass gatherings like sporting events and also suggesting people stay at home. Ohio State was closed before any cases where confirmed but it doesn't seem like other states are taking it as serious outside of California and Washington and testing is still only happening for cases that are in intensive care or had traveled still. So we have no idea what the true lay of the land is at this point.

If the internment of Japanese-American citizens during WW2 [1] was legally possible for the federal government, to me it would seem odd if cancelling Coachella wasn't.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_America...

The US courts have since explicitly rejected the reasoning used to justify the internment of Japanese-American citizens. It would not be legally possible today.

So do it anyway, and then 12 months later, after everyone is released, maybe the Supreme Court says you can't do it.

I'm not sating that it is a good idea, just that judicial review doesn't seem particularly effective.

He's not just making shit up--the curves are reasonable. However, where he's very, very wrong is thinking that the government is deliberately waiting from T1 to T2. We don't have enough data to actually figure where T1, T2 and T3 are, and counting it in terms of known cases ensures you blow past T2. Look how fast Italy went from first infections to T3.

Except that the head of the US Government just makes up random shit on twitter. So yes, the government does just make up random shit like him.

And there most certainly are many things the government can do about it. How about Medicare for all people, and for all diseases?

Republicans Want Medicare for All, but Just for This One Disease. Everyone’s a socialist in a pandemic.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/11/opinion/coronavirus-socia...

Govts CAN do plenty: close schools, theaters, offices, events, parades, mandate WfH, quarantine affected areas, distribute supplies, educate... there's a ton governments can do.

That's probably not the decision-making strategy of most governments, but it's a compelling POV for looking at the situation. Let it spread fast, wreak havoc and disrupt the social order, or control it within the capacity of health systems, or try to minimise the infections with constant awareness of the society for a prolonged period of time, affecting the economy in the long run.