San Francisco emerged from a lockdown too soon during the 1918 Spanish flu

Re:San Francisco emerged from a lockdown too soon during the... by coldcode on Saturday April 25, 2020 @10:12AM (#22978209)

50M people died worldwide from "Spanish" Flu, in a world much different than today, yet within a couple years the world had mostly recovered. So far we are still a long way from that number. The problem is you won't know if you are to be in the dead or gravely ill category, or the mild or perfectly fine category, irrespective of age, until it happens.

What we could have had today is the ability to identify, isolate, and thus properly quarantine those who are ill or spreading, but we did not as a society deem it valuable to invest in (outside of places like S Korea). It's a classic pay me now or pay me later situation; now we are reaping the lack of investment in the past (even before the current ineptitude).

I always thought the lack of a comprehensive nation healthcare system or at least a plan that covered everyone in some way in the US would bite us if there ever was a pandemic. We as a society decided that long term planning was not economically viable or even desirable. But we did not even do a minimum. Now we have to hope for the best.

As a nation having everyone (not just some people) healthy and when not have access to affordable healthcare is a benefit to the nation as a whole and the economy, something that the new German nation back in the late 1800's figured out. How we get there in the US in the future I don't know, I just hope we come to the same realization and do something.

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Re:San Francisco emerged from a lockdown too soon during the... by forgotmylogin2 on Saturday April 25, 2020 @10:55AM (#22978570)

This seems like fitting the facts to support a narrative. I don't see how having tax-payer funded healthcare would have helped us. There are numerous countries that do have tax-payer funded healthcare that are in the exact same situation as the US. The fact of the matter is there's nothing preventative that can be done for this virus, so wider access to healthcare should not be expected to change anything.

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Re:San Francisco emerged from a lockdown too soon during the... by ranDOMscripts on Saturday April 25, 2020 @10:47AM (#22978490)

Very few people want to spend $40 on a fire extinguisher every few years until the moment when their kitchen is actually on fire.*

*That is, unless, history repeats itself and we lose ~1-2% of the world population[0] this Fall. That might provide sufficient motivation. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu

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Re:San Francisco emerged from a lockdown too soon during the... by pravda on Saturday April 25, 2020 @11:05AM (#22978649)

>spend $40 on a fire extinguisher every few years

Gosh, I hope they last longer then that!

I have a (genuine) Halon fire extinguisher hanging on the wall. According to the internets, Halon was banned in 1994!

The pressure dial on it is still in the green.

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Re:San Francisco emerged from a lockdown too soon during the... by ranDOMscripts on Saturday April 25, 2020 @11:24AM (#22978796)

"Stored pressure ABC extinguishers are very common, and they often require internal maintenance every 6 years and hydrostatic testing every 12 years. Other types of extinguishers may vary in their internal examination and testing intervals." -https://www.cintas.com/fire-protection-services/fire-extingu...

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