When you expect an institution to always be impartial and tell the truth, those sorts of white lies can quickly erode trust.
Does it matter that they lied? This is the proposition that can be debated sensibly and rationally - but will likely be overwhelmed with emotion.
In my own observation there seems to be rather a lot of people who have almost no faith in their fellow humans and believe the only way "people" believe a thing and will act is because they have been told to believe it by someone. Misinformation takes all the blame in this paradigm. The populations is dominated by people who have outsourced their critical thinking.
It may be true, I don't know. But it seems to me to be really quite worrying if a population has to be told lies to get them to do the right thing or lies have to be censored because people will not be able to assess competing evidence and reject bullshit. Does it have to be this way? Was it always? Is it fixable? Is it really a thing at all? I have no answers there.
It's my observation that even in the service of "good", the debt to the truth always comes due and the interest rate is super steep. Many will disagree.
[1] Lack of PPE for medical professionals in the front line of pandemic response is the justification. This may well be a very good justification.
The reality is that the knowledge about Covid changed significantly in march/April last year. In particular the understanding about unsymptomatic spread lead to a significant change of thinking. That makes sense, if the virus only spreads from sick people, the advice for everyone to wear a mask is not good health policy especially if there is a shortage. You want to prioritise people who get in contact with sick people and prevent sick people to go out. However, if unsymptomatic people spread the virus, you want everyone to wear masks, because you can't prevent spreaders to go out. But the masks are different, you want cloth masks more than n95, because it is about protecting others.
The below article is one which elaborates on the whole discussion
https://eu.statesman.com/story/news/politics/2020/12/29/did-...
And Fauci said at one point (2/14/2020):
“There is no reason for anyone right now in the United States, with regard to coronavirus, to wear a mask” [1]
And at another point (6/15/2020):
"[...] we were concerned the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal protective equipment, including the N-95 masks and the surgical masks, were in very short supply." [1]
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYyH4N8VXvA
[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dr-fauci-made-the-coronavi...
In defense of Dr. Fauci's statement, saying "there is no reason right now to wear a mask" is quite different from "masks are ineffective", as it keeps getting paraphrased. The latter is obviously absurd, as there were numerous studies on the effectiveness of masks against various viruses prior to 2020, just not against SARS-CoV-2 specifically, since as far as we know it didn't exist yet.
A lot medical professionals were claiming the average person wearing a mask will make things worse by putting it on ineffectively.
I heard one doctor say, "All it takes is one virus particle to become infected. I haven't heard any doctor talk about Viral Loads, even now.
My point is our medical professionals seemed as much in the "I just don't know?" catagory as the rest of us with this virus.
I'm still shocked researchers found a vaccine.
https://www.theinsight.org/p/the-few-sentences-that-explain-...
It's still true that if you are covid suceptible, and if a covid-shedding person is walking around, you should try to be as far as possible from the covid. But, a brief close pass e.g. on the sidewalk, isn't as risky as sharing a 20'x10' office for hours, even if you stay >6ft the entire time.
We were lied to because america did not stockpile enough masks for first responders
If the Wired article, which was downvoted to oblivion, is accurate then the WHO and the CDC (who parroted the WHO) bear a great deal of responsibility.
They shutdown scientists who were telling them that Covid was spreading as an aerosol, way back in early 2020.
The WHO now want MORE power, yet they’re not accepting accountability nor cleaning house.
Journalists should give advanced information in digestible form about topics you didn't need to know about, but which are currently relevant. Instead, we get sixth grade hand waving in propaganda form.
Things like adaptive immune response, T-cells, immune escape, antibody dependent enhancement, viral loads, and lots of other things could be explained well but simply. It's a tragedy of modernity that we have so much information and so little understanding.
But there are simple things that can be explained visually. See, for instance, this video of Japanese scientists illuminating airborne droplets with green lasers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyZm6dx9Hss
Now, the contention here isn't that there are important concepts that should be explained to layman; the contention here is that there are important concepts that actual scientists need to explain to the decision-makers at the CDC.
If masks are effective, that would be a compelling reason for someone to wear a mask. Saying there is no reason to wear a mask, strongly implies that they aren't beneficial to the individual wearing them. Fauci must have known that this is how people would have interpreted his statements. He should have said "there are very compelling reasons not to wear a mask", which is very different from "there is no reason to wear a mask".
I understand that Fauci had good intentions behind his statement. But it's very hard to regain trust after making misleading statements like the above.
Sometimes, certain people being told not to trust you is a sign you're doing the right thing.
I’m a Democrat; my circle is mostly Democrats. We also knew last year in February and March that we wanted masks.
So trust that Fauci meant well? Yes. He was in an extremely difficult position and in a position of policy advisor.
But trudt that masks were ineffective for the average person? Absolutely not.
It’s a contradiction that masks are effective for frontlines, yet somehow without reason or usefulness for everyone else.
So if it didn’t decline, perphaps it’s more accurate to say that there was only ever a certain type of trust to begin with.
And the past 12 months have borne out that suspicion.
For example: https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/health/2021/04/26/poll-...
Despite Fauci assuring that the J&J is safe, people are still very hesitant.
Which means the trust extended to Fauci only goes so far.
So while you want to paint a broad stroke of “Democrats trust” vs “Republicans don’t”, the reality is far more nuanced.
No, yeah it did tremendous damage. While there'd certainly be anti maskers without anti-mask hysteria by authorities, the scale would not be the same. It's hard to quantify but likely many tens of thousands of excess deaths globally are on WHO lies.
People were having difficulty providing evidence that Fauci admitted to telling a white lie elsewhere in these comments, yet it's widely believed by certain people that he did so.
There's a link to a factcheck in the comments that quotes what he actually said and it's not at all what many people in this thread seem to sincerely, but mistakenly, think he said.
So allow me to doubt that "anti-mask hysteria" was ever coming from the medical and scientific community unless I see exactly what you're talking about and evaluate it with my own eyes.
But I guess if we disagree on the facts, that helps explain why we draw different conclusions.
However back in spring 2020 when the official position amounted to "a mask is a facehugger", arguing for using masks (including by medical professionals) was effectively impossible.
Well I guess it would be fruitless to ask for a source on this.
https://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/national/article240...
"Masks may actually increase your coronavirus risk if worn improperly, surgeon general warns"
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/02/health/surgeon-general-co...
It was literally everywhere until correction in april 2020.
Don't let that facehugger insert a parasite embryo down your throat! Why not? Well overall it would be more beneficial to society if frontline medical staff were wearing that facehugger while treating patients with confirmed or suspected cases of the virus. Oh okay, that seems sensible.
“Seriously people- STOP BUYING MASKS!” he wrote. “They are NOT effective in preventing general public from catching #Coronavirus, but if healthcare providers can’t get them to care for sick patients, it puts them and our communities at risk!”
Is he saying that N95 masks don't work at all? That they only magically work for healthcare professionals?
Or is he very, very, clearly, even within the limited confines of a tweet, explaining that N95 masks are better allocated to frontline medical staff than being randomly worn by low risk people in low risk locations doing low risk tasks? That using those resources more effectively will save more lives and that people in those lowee risk situations can easily get protection by keeping a safe distance and following other sensible precautions that they list.
I can see how someone could intentionally misrepresent what he says, but I don't see an honest way to make that mistake.
The masks ARE effective in prevention COVID (both ways), and there is no demonstrated risk in wearing masks wrong. They lied on both accounts providing fuel to anti-masker movement. And yes the logical inconsistency of insisting masks are ineffective yet are necessary to frontline workers were pointed out year ago - you're not breaking any fresh ground here.
It takes time for knowledge to get formulated, broadly accepted, and turn into actual policy. It has to be like that. Most of the time, being prepared but doing nothing is the best thing to.
SARS, H1N1, Ebola + probably many others all burned out before they reached the west.
If scientists are looking at the same data and the same set of facts, then they cannot disagree.
Back when Hong Kong health authorities were warning about 14 days of asymptomatic spread, Chinese authorities had already placed multiple cities under martial law and set up concentration camps for infected people. It's absurd that the West was still in a "wait-and-see" mindset.
Lots of assumptions went wrong on this one
Isn’t this defensible if it was indeed true that there was a temporary shortage of masks for health care workers?
The same thing was done in other countries, including mine (Finland). Result: covid deniers are still using the year-old statements from national health agency to downplay the significance of masks.
"Masks are useless; the officials themselves say so", they quote.
Big mistake not to be honest, even if it leads to criticism against the government for inadequate preparation.
There's your issue. Saying masks are in short supply begs the question of why. Whether it's reasonable or not, no politician wants to defend their unpreparedness.
There seems to be a lot of post hoc rationalization for what appears to simply be a mistake. This is why accountability is so difficult. People decide ahead of time that certain organizations or individuals are right. If it looks like they made a mistake, then there must be some good reason that justifies their actions that we just don't see.
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/22/coronavirus-why-a-ppe-shorta...
The wording here is good because we _should_ be skeptical towards any organization that is supposed to protect our citizenry, but unflinchingly lied to the entire population/world. Government has powers so that that it can control society. Why did the CDC need to lie and mislead people instead of finding a way to restrict the flow and supply of masks? The sad thing is that it would even be more forgivable if they were just completely incompetent and made a wildly incorrect guess. But they knowingly and deliberately lied in possibly the worst scenario to lie during.
We have a lot of research into mask use, both to protect the wearer and to protect people around the wearer.
Can you point to any that you think CDC should have been using to support mask wearing in the general public?
You can argue about the level of evidence required (organisations like CDC strongly prefer well run meta analyses or a bunch of RCTs), but to say "it's always been known" simply isn't true.
The virus spreads via droplets exhaled or emitted from nose and mouth. What happens when something obstructs that flow - the % of droplets going in & out & velocity decreases and likelihood of transmission reduces. Why do you think surgeons wear masks - it's both to protect the patient and the surgeon from droplet borne infections.
What was unknown was whether it was economical to wear masks widely and whether there were supplies, not that it would work.
The Street: "So, why weren't we told to wear masks in the beginning?"
Fauci: "Well, the reason for that is that we were concerned the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal protective equipment, including the N95 masks and the surgical masks, were in very short supply. And we wanted to make sure that the people namely, the health care workers, who were brave enough to put themselves in a harm way, to take care of people who you know were infected with the coronavirus and the danger of them getting infected."
https://www.thestreet.com/video/dr-fauci-masks-changing-dire...
If mask initial recommendation actually was a white lie a case can be made that they are unfit for communicating their results to the masses as they think their peers to be petulant children unfit for handling truths, and they should be stripped of that function
The other cases just convert into variations of them politicising a pandemic to unknown ends
As for the WHO, these organisations shouldn't have an easy way out of their responsibilities
Look at the gas crisis in the south. It's obvious that enough of America truly _are_ "petulant children" as you say that they cannot be trusted with such information. Given an opportunity, the American people will choose to make the national situation worse, to improve their personal one.
I think the main disconnect here is that the CDC communicated like it's job was to say what was needed for the best possible outcome (and still made mistakes and miscalculations) while (some of) the people believe the CDCs job is to communicate the whole truth 100% of the time. We can see from looking back at literally any war or the 1918 flu pandemic that the populace is routinely lied to for the 'benefit' of the country. What is happening now is that we can instantly fact check and communicate to millions of people our opinions on what was said. I am not saying they were right to do it, but attempting to provide the framework in which is becomes believable that _they_ believed it was right to do it.
People tell me that I should trust those those who lie to me because at least their goals are honorable. I disagree. While it might be possible to lie to someone you trying to help or even someone you dearly love, it's pretty much by definition not something you do to someone you respect. I generally am wary of help from people who don't respect me.
Perhaps it would be helpful to have separate news channels for petulant children who need to be lied to so that they don't destroy civilization. Everyone else could watch the real news. Of course, nobody wants to be told they're a petulant child.
And droplet basically translates to: "yes, masks would help, but simply keeping a few feet of distance will be just as good". Unfortunately, distance does to aerosol transmission what soda cans do to a wildfire.
"Not to value and employ men of superior ability is the way to keep the people from rivalry among themselves; not to prize articles which are difficult to procure is the way to keep them from becoming thieves; not to show them what is likely to excite their desires is the way to keep their minds from disorder. Therefore the sage, in the exercise of his government, empties their minds, fills their bellies, weakens their wills, and strengthens their bones. He constantly (tries to) keep them without knowledge and without desire, and where there are those who have knowledge, to keep them from presuming to act (on it). When there is this abstinence from action, good order is universal."
- Dao De Jing, Chapter 3, The Chinese Text Project
I feel we are at the end result of "keeping those who have knowledge from acting on it". Misinformation is spread by people with the knowledge of how to control people and they tell people they are smart and they need to act.
I do not agree with Fauci's decision, but there was no other choice.
Look at what happened with the gas panic this week, it is the same thing was written about here:
https://songofthedao.substack.com/p/panic-at-the-gas-station
My personal feeling is that it was hard to know if masks worked for the general populace before Covid-19.
There are so many confounding variables that it very difficult to study masks from a public health side.
The best approximation was studies of health professionals in hospitals or clinics which doesn't exactly translate for a multitude of reasons.
It's totally worth it to bend an exponential function. But the individual benefit from mask wearing in any given interaction is negligible.
Common sense seems to say that masks make s difference, but if that is the strongest argument, then why not let people decide for themselves using common sense.
The wearing of masks to combat airborne disease spread is a decidedly not a new thing. That was never a novel concept, at least since the early part of the 20th century.
Coronaviruses in general aren't a novel concept either; we have a pretty good idea how they're spread.
So, when confronted with a new coronavirus, it's a little bit stronger than "common sense" to surmise that masks will be effective to some extent. The burden of proof would be on anybody suggesting that this virus is somehow so different than other airborne disease that the wearing of masks had no benefit.
then why not let people decide for themselves using common sense.
If masks are effective to some degree, the downside to not wearing masks was that millions of additional people would suffer and die worldwide, and we would incur a financial and human cost orders of magnitude greater than the modest cost of masks.
* Various studies of droplet propagation, which show well-fitting masks reduce droplets significantly. In theory, this should reduce spread.
* Many confounded observational and cohort studies tied to voluntary compliance with mask guidelines that show a lower risk of infection or secondary transmission. They are confounded because voluntary compliance with this measure increases the likelihood of general caution. Many show somewhat large effect sizes.
* Many population based trend-line studies/other ecological studies that show post requiring it as a public health measure in various environments, that daily case counts began to decline by .4% to 2.0% per day.
The studies in the second category showing larger effects are generally inconsistent with the third category, because the results in the third would be much bigger if the effect was real. And even the third category isn't great, because the mask requirement measures weren't instituted in a vacuum independent of other controls.
I wonder if we’re splitting hairs, so what if mask wearing is confounded with other voluntary measures of general caution?
For me the take away is that some people take precaution, and some don’t.
Another measured case growth in a hospital community where there was a very strictly enforced mandate for patients compared to the rate of case growth before, so compliance is a small factor.
It's very likely that masks help. It's also very likely that the effect is relatively small. But even a tiny effect can become a big one when raised to a big power-- 1.1^20 is 6.7x growth in cases, and 1.07^20 is 3.8x.
I'd have liked this guidance change in masks to come a week or two later. Keeping another couple weeks of somewhat sharper decline in cases means a lot fewer people affected through the rest of the pandemic.
Not sure why you feel like this is a worthy hair to split.
This kind of attitude is why the western response could have been better. Western medicine is hews rigorously close to the “do no harm” ideal and interpret it that you need to have conclusive evidence before recommending a treatment, even something as harmless as mask wearing.
In Asian countries they just do it and so what if it hasn’t been demonstrated as a causal factor in a dozen studies.
Lay people see the indecision, the hemming and hawing, the hand wringing.
The cdc says shit like people shouldn’t wear masks.
This shit is actively harmful and thousands of people have died because of it.
I think it's worthwhile to have doubt and be skeptical.
I'll note that, at the beginning of the pandemic, I was saying that masks may or may not work, but they should still be recommended at a time that the CDC was implying that they might even be harmful.
This is all completely consistent with what I originally said: "To be honest, we still don't really know if masks work. They look like they probably do something, but the evidence is weak and the effect size small."
In this case, the combination of masks and vaccines might have been required for a long time.
(hacker news analogy: "just in case Rust doesn't remove all defects, we are still going to need to debug"
seemingly because Trump supported vaccines but
not masks.
First I must strongly state that the idea itself makes no sense: one can wear a mask and be vaccinated; they're not competing ideas in any meaningful way.
However, at the outset of COVID-19, we certainly were not sure that there would be effective vaccines, or how long they might take to develop, or what their supply levels would be.
Therefore it made sense to take whatever (effective) measures we could, while waiting for a vaccine that was never guaranteed to exist. Nobody argues that a fire extinguisher is better than a squad of professional firefighters, but fire extinguishers can have important utility, especially while you're waiting for help to arrive.
As far as the Trump angle, perhaps you can show us a counter example, but I have seen zero evidence that anti-Trump folks have rejected vaccines because Trump favored them. It's a non-factor.
One, the liberal/progressive/whatever crowd is overwhelmingly pro-vaccination (in general) to begin with. Two, and perhaps more importantly, they're just not competing with masks in any way. Masks are imperfect; vaccines are more effective but also imperfect and not approved for all people even today. That is how you deal with many if not most threats in the real world: multiple layers of imperfect defences.
Though in this particular case, I don't really remember him being all that positive about vaccines for Covid or in general.
Here's a publication worrying about him undermining vaccines before Covid was a thing: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5678397/
Which is another data point to support the general principle.
Everyone seems to also forget that a lot of this took place when they wrongly thought surface transmission was the main vector. The bigger problem was the delay in recognizing aerosol transmission, Chinese scientists cottoned on to this very early but the CDC and WHO dragged their feet.
We also saw everything play out and get politicized in real time in a way that's never happened before. There are lags between data and science, further lags between science and science communication and then even more from science communication to government policy. On one end of this lag you've got scientist warning of aerosol transmission, on the other side you've got Fauci still operating under the surface transmission advice leading to some very mixed messaging. Reducing this lag will be important in future.
China didn't even admit human to human transmission until mid January.
They haven't even admitted when the outbreak started, which almost certainly wasn't November 2019 since there are suspect cases in Europe already at the beginning of December, of people that had never been in Wuhan.
If this is true, then it's not a given that COVID-19 even originated in China.
This new study of scanners identified two cases of suspected coronavirus, on November 16 and 17
[0]: https://www.francetvinfo.fr/sante/maladie/coronavirus/corona...
China’s first confirmed Covid-19 case traced back to November 17
[1]: https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3074991/coro...
The outbreak of pneumonia was recorded in the Orenburg region
(Turn on captions, then select Captions -> Automatic translation -> English)
Because it was even newer and more unknown at that point. Wuhan was in lockdown on the 23rd of January, so they had a pretty good idea by then. Meanwhile the rest of the world twiddled their thumbs and lost the opportunity to contain it.
> They haven't even admitted when the outbreak started, which almost certainly wasn't November 2019
How do you "admit" something unknown? Either way we know it couldn't have been too much before November/December, considering everything we know about how fast it spreads.
Actually, this is not so clear. The evidence of community cases in November/December in e.g. France were not picked up at the time either. There is a phase were a new disease can fly completely under the radar, because we are still in a very slow growth and only see a few isolated cases, which often don't even get seen by the same health professionals. This is particularly true in the case of covid were there is evidence that spreading is disproportionately from "superspreaders" (unless some of that information changed now?). So unless there was a superspreader, you only have few isolated cases.
People are a lot more critical about the other rules, the curfews, the ban on outdoor dining and bars and the closure of sports facilities. And the ‘you can’t have more than one person over’ rule is generally ignored.
By the way the official Dutch position still is that surface transmission is significant and one of the three ‘main rules’ is to wash your hands a lot.
Because Donald Trump wanted to downplay the potential scale of the pandemic, believing it distracted from his narrative of economic success playing into his re-election, so he attributed reporting on the pandemic to a "Democratic hoax," feeding into right-wing mistrust of the motives behind both mainstream media reportage and legal measures like lockdowns, which many considered unconstitutional and a pretext for installing a leftist police state.
Also because Trump refused to wear a mask publicly, considering it a display of weakness in front of the "liberal media" which he considered to be the enemy, and would often ridicule people who did wear a mask.
As a result, among Trump supporting Republicans, wearing a mask became associated with sheep-like submission to "leftist' (read: Democratic) authoritarianism, and not wearing a mask became a display of defiance along with the MAGA caps.
It is impossible to consider the phenomenon of the way masks are perceived in the US today outside of the context of the atmosphere of deep paranoia, polarization, mistrust of the press and "international" organizations created by the Trump administration, or the effect of conspiracy theories and misinformation spread across social media by QAnon and Trump supporters.
Seriously. I have explained this many times to my European friends. It is difficult to appreciate how people here will always want to push their own personal freedom of choice out as far as they can no matter how much someone else suffers.
Everyone else in the hotel was sick, there was a tensor of coughing, all I could do was sit in my hotel room and watch politicians go back and forth about how we should all patronize stores in Chinatown and not be horrible racists.
All I can say is the is that the CDC performed extremely poorly in their response to this, over and over again. Mishandling tests, allowing the FDA to actively block testing. Even the pausing of the J&J vaccine was an extreme CYA blunder.
NASA had Challenger, NIST had Dual_EC_DRBG and the CDC had COVID. Not the same in scope, but the systemic dysfunction was similar in its structure.
Plus, it also makes sense, if their and the government’s interests are for the greater good. E.g. being cautious about promoting early use of masks when supplies were scarce/preserving them for the front line medical workers.
Theoretically it would also make sense for current guidance to incentivize vaccines when the remaining unvaccinated population is hesitant.
To be clear, I’m not saying I have certainly that this is what’s happening. But the theories aren’t unreasonable, and CDC’s past reversal on guidance doesn’t help the confidence others have in their guidance.
So the uncertainty isn’t completely unreasonable.
In reality, the usual suspects were pushing conspiracy theories about the CDC even before they determined masks were useful. A famous conspiracy peddler famously claimed the CDC was downplaying how bad the virus was and 'it was over for humanity, it'll only be lone survivors' when we only had a handful of cases in the US.
In other words: the CDC could've nailed every single guideline and we'd still have half of the population making up conspiracy theories about it. It's just too politically convenient.
So is the post-facto realization of "we knew masks work, we just didn't want the people to grab all the supply".
* N95 masks
* Everything else
We knew N95 masks worked because that's what professionals use in hospitals. Unfortunately, there was a shortage of PPE so telling people to buy them would put them in direct competition with professionals treating very sick patients. In April 2020 we were looking at a really bleak scenario so there was a very strong incentive to keep professionals alive even if it came at the expense of some citizens (think: doomsday scenario).
We also had no idea whether 'everything else' helped at all. Recommending non-N95 use might have given people a false sense of security that might have played against more effective measures such as extreme social distancing and self-quarantining of people with symptoms.
As knowledge improved, guidance changed. Nothing crazy to see here.
Recommending people use masks could've given people a false sense of security in people and probably acted against more effective measures such as social distancing and self-quarantining of people with symptoms matching those of Covid-19 ('well, I know I have a cough, but I'll just wear a mask and it'll be fine').
Recommending people use the only masks we knew to somewhat work - N95s - would've created a huge problem for hospitals that already were having issues procuring PPE to protect the professionals who were dealing with Covid-19 patients.
Basically, there was no reason for the CDC to recommend masks. Again, there's no need for some nefarious explanation.
The exact same thing is happening with the mask discussion. The people who say the CDC lied about masks and it was obvious that they help, are the same who strongly refuse to wear them because it's a security theatre. It's completely dishonest argumentation.
* The virus is lethal and the government is hiding it
* The virus is just the common cold and tests are a conspiracy to make Trump look bad
* The virus is lethal and a conspiracy by dark forces to kill people
* The virus doesn't exist and people wearing masks are idiots
* The virus is lethal (again!) and a conspiracy by the Chinese to destroy the world's economy
It's no surprise that people who are marginally sucked into the conspiracy world have their brains completely fried by the constant narrative shift.
Now, it's perhaps inevitable that they would use that lens, but it seems like it's the only lens they use.
Perhaps they're even right -- perhaps the average US citizen really is selfish and lacking in independent critical thinking skills, and perhaps we can't be trusted with the truth. But it means that anyone who knows better is constantly trying to read between the lines.
I blame the pervasive PR culture in the US, as well as basic stuff like a shit education system.
You may not like this, but what it boils down to (as you indicated) is that unless you can improve the average American through education or cultural shift, you've got this pretty grim baseline. The PR culture is a response to that reality.
Does that mean that being honest is necessarily always the best thing to do? I'm not sure. It's worth considering. But I suspect that it will take a while for that kind of understanding to make headway in the higher levels of government.
(This goes with the caveat that people and organizations who simply lie all the time can get away with it. Basically, you either have to live firmly in reality, or you have to sell a version of the real world that's been thoroughly modified in order to conform to some vision. Living mostly in reality while occasionally lying is becoming an untenable strategy.)
All I know is that there is no way that I am going to be physically in the US for the next presidential election(s), if there is a neoliberal political candidate in that election.
(And, part of caring a lot is paying attention to the other 99% of elected positions)
Check out "Hate, Inc." by Matt Taibbi. He details the process by which party bosses essentially determine the primary field (and have done so for decades), and the media complex reinforces these choices using terms like "electable" or "wise choice" or "stubborn" or "off reservation".
Yes, this is only about the single off of the President (the Vice President choice is even less available to the people), but there is something to be said about the most visible and paid-attention-to office being the one that is categorically the least in the hands of the people. ...yet nobody seems to mention it.
This was ended only 50 years ago. Suspicion of the CDC is not crazy if they've pulled this sort of shit within living memory.
To NOT be suspicious of institutions, essential or not, seems crazy to me. As Adam Smith said:
"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."
"It is impossible indeed to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies; much less to render them necessary. A regulation which obliges all those of the same trade in a particular town to enter their names and places of abode in a public register, facilitates such assemblies. . . . A regulation which enables those of the same trade to tax themselves in order to provide for their poor, their sick, their widows, and orphans, by giving them a common interest to manage, renders such assemblies necessary. An incorporation not only renders them necessary, but makes the act of the majority binding upon the whole."
– Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter X.
It seems that many confuse science for government, which is understandable given the very recent muzzling of science for political gain.
Fauci's facial expressions during and after the recent regime have been a pretty good litmus for me: he's a scientist that's bad a hiding his emotions. That allows me to figure out when to trust what him and his colleagues want to, or have been forced to, say.
It's pretty clear the EU health regulatory agencies aren't much better.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...
500 to 2000 people died in France because the regulatory authorities choose to ignore multiple warning signs the drug has issues.
Maybe you shouldn't be so trusting?
I do trust the police, tax authorities, medical authorities, statistics department. I even trust the politicians work towards their stated goals and ideals, each aiming for what they consider the best for the country.
I'm from the Nordics, with a pretty good track record of honesty and societal trust. I would find that continuous mistrust immensely tiring. That would just be a sad, sad world.
Its a thing :https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_trust_and_low_trust_soc...
But yes, I agree that the skepticism of the Federal government in the US is far too skewed towards assumptions of malevolence, when it really should be skewed towards incompetence.
If you've ever travelled to the US, it's absolutely embarrassing how incompetent and awful of an experience it is to enter the country. Compared to when I go to basically ANY other country, the US customs personnel are rude, unprofessional, and just outright incompetent. It's such a massive difference in experience that you it slaps you in the face, every time.
Instead of a debate limited to how big or small the Federal government in the US should be, we should be having a debate about how efficient it is. We don't, due to the absurd, theatrical polarization we have baked into our system.
Virginia's compulsory sterilization law was repealed in 1974[1].
Oregon performed its last compulsory sterilization in 1981[2].
Japan didn't abolish compulsory sterilization until 1996[3].
There are reports that detained immigrants were involuntarily sterilized in 2020 in the US[2].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_the_United_States#...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization#Unite...
Europeans seem to think that they are above all this and such atrocities could never, ever happen again. But history shows otherwise, and human nature remains the same. Checks and balances and eternal vigilance is how you make sure it really doesn't happen, which requires the belief that it seriously can happen again.
We do not have, and also never really had, this kind of far right here in Switzerland. Our most right party is very liberal. I think you are generalizing Germany to Europe.
Everyone knows about these things. By everyone I mean everyone who went to the same schools as me.
I maybe a minority here though, because I also to a large degree trust other American institutions. And that's coming from an immigrant who grew up in a country where the population is bombarded with anti-American conspiracy theories on a daily basis. The reason that I believe in American institutions is not because I take their words as Gospel. But because I believe for the most part trusting them leads to better results than the other way around.
So yes it has lost its credibility.
https://www.snopes.com/news/2020/04/06/the-cdc-now-recommend...
Overall, science is a process. If research came out that changed the recommendations, well, that's how science works. This is no different in my mind than the gradual change in the recommendations towards cigarette smoking over the decades, only in this case it played out over weeks and months (that article was from April of 2020).
If you want something infallible and written in stone from day 1, that's what religious texts are for. But to claim that scientists lost credibility because new research led them to change their minds is to misunderstand the purpose of science.
But that's not what happened. There was plenty of studies showing that masks could be effective before the pandemic started[1]. Here are a couple of Hacker news discussions from early March 2020 about studies done years earlier showing that mask use is effective[2][3]. And this article from right before the CDC changed it's recommendation, for good measure[4]: "Do you need a mask? The science hasn't changed, but public guidance might"
I'm not sure why it's so hard for people to consider the possibility that the CDC made a mistake.
[1] https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HLrm0pqBN_5bdyysOeoOBX4p... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22460630 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22498941 [4] https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/do-you-need-mask-...
If that early statement can be justified by "fog of war" changing virus-related information at that time, then Fauchi should have allowed himself that complication. By offering "there were not enough masks available then" as a later explanation, he seems to have explained it essentially by saying he lied. In doing so he apparently threw away a substantial amount of his credibility, for many people. At worst a lying move; at best a lightweight move with lives at risk.
Rather than saying "Hey lets hold off on buying masks so that we have enough for essential care workers" they instead said "do not buy masks because they aren't effective, or might even make risk of infection higher!"
And then a short while later they said wear a mask again. These things have real world ramifications. You can't just point to a snopes a year later and retain the context within which this trust destroying episode went down.
People have memories. They felt the frustration. They felt the betrayal.
And they have yet to recover from that. To dismiss that very real feeling of betrayal as "well, this is what snopes says" is rewriting history.
And, all of that comes on the heels of big tobacco, DDT, thalidomide, BPA, climate change, and then the new climate change, big pharma with their oxycontin and big medicine fleecing Americans and they won't even discuss medicare for all and we have to protect corporate profits over saving humanity?? Seriously??
And you dismiss all that with "science is a process."
Except the process has been completely dismissed as well. Science created the process that takes years to approve a new vaccine, all of that has been completely dismissed exactly when a brand new technology for creating vaccines has been created.
No part of this is science. This is politics. Period. 8 Months ago Kamala Harris herself said she would NOT get Trump's Vaccine.
And so now it's somehow a different vaccine that we should all get? Now folks who don't want to get Biden's vaccine are science deniers?
This. is. not. science.
This is politics and a lot of people are refusing to get the vaccine purely because it's politics and NOT science.
Did you watch Fauci get destroyed up there this week? He's a liar. Period.
Politics decide when a country/state gets to remove restrictions, this is where the heated arguments begin.
And sometimes they have false memories. For example, regarding:
> 8 Months ago Kamala Harris herself said she would NOT get Trump's Vaccine.
What she said was that she would take the vaccine if the professionals said it was safe, not if Trump told her to take it [1]. A rather understandable level of skepticism given Trump's peddling of miracle cures such as hydroxychloroquine.
CDC is a public health organization, not a science making organization. Its responsibility is to make the competent public health decisions based on the best available data and sound risk management. No one is faulting CDC for eventually course correcting, they are criticizing it for not having followed a more risk averse strategy from the get go and not having communicated their rationale honestly.
Imagine if FDA behaved like CDC; roll out the vaccines to general public with minimal trial, updating their decision on safety as more data came in. Scientific incrementalism doesn't suit all use cases, and this has nothing to do with infallibility.
That’s literally what they do. They paused when there were concerns over blood clots, then expanded access to more cohorts as more studies were completed.
So people wore masks and life went on.
I still don't understand why sooooo many countries can't be more honest about these things
Depending on the jurisdiction and on your political opponents what the Swiss virus guy did is liable to send you to prison for intentionally lying and acting on that lie when employed as a public servant.
Most probably the political debate is less vicious in Switzerland and that won't happen to your virus guy, but where I live (EU country from Eastern Europe) that would have been very dangerous for him to do in regards to his freedom. I guess that's why a lot of politicians double down on their lies, because if they're caught there's a small chance of them going to prison for them, so why take the risk?
The chief of our CDC equivalent said he was shopping in supermarket without mask.
Then they admitted saying that because stocks were too low and wearing a mask was gradually made mandatory and they told us to make our own masks.
So, a lot of trust lost.
Now I suspect them to do the same with the astrazeneca stock they have to liquidate.
Headlines this week said the indian variant is going to be the major one in Belgium.
I don't know anyone who uses the name Vaxzevria instead of the Astra Zeneca vaccine or just AZ.
The UK is about to open up fully in June but is now worried about the Indian variant (B.1.617).
Even though we in Denmark back in january was informed by health authorities that the English variant (B.1.1.7) was very worrying.
Truth is there will always be another variant, just look at this overview.
https://nextstrain.org/ncov/global
The trust in health authorities have been reduced greatly and have been replaced with mistrust to politicians motives, I'm sad to say.
>> I still don't understand why sooooo many countries can't be more honest about these things
Interesting definition of honest. The fact is, all these large organisations believe in the "noble lie" which undermines their credibility.
I feel like this black and white, "you get one chance" kind of bridge burning is very unproductive. When you look at these agencies not as omniscient entities but as what they are - a collaborative effort of many individuals - then you allow for the evolution of understanding.
People can be wrong, especially in regards to more novel situations, so why should we view our institutions as any different? Yes having more eyes and varied perspectives means that it may make sense to expect something more reliable than an individual, but that doesn't make it infallible and IMO that's ok.
I have not looked closely enough at electret properties to know if meshes with larger pore sizes can really stop 0.06um virus particles. (Or 10nm according to this https://www.news-medical.net/health/The-Size-of-SARS-CoV-2-C... )
I don't believe you. Do you use a food thermometer when cooking food? Do you make sure to cook eggs until the yoke is firm? If you're a woman, do you make sure you never have more than 1 (alcoholic) drink in a particular day? Do you never eat rare steak?
People ignore almost everything the CDC says in their regular lives as the CDC is completely optimizing for health, not quality of life.
And the word is "yolk", not "yoke".
In startup speak the organizations have the same VC and share many board members.
The actual committees:
https://intelligence.house.gov/ (23 members)
https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/ (14 members)
So that's 37 members of Congress they're accountable to, but not directly. If you read the actual law, it only says the "President" has to inform these committees of what the intelligence agencies are doing, and if they happen to do anything illegal, the President has to tell Congress (but only these 37 members).
Theoretically, the President is not above the law, but as we've seen in recent history, if the President is of the same political party as the majority party of Congress, they're not likely to actually enforce the law.
Practically speaking, all of Congress isn't going to care what all of the Executive Branch is doing all of the time given the limited number of hours in a day, which is why they they have committees, but at least in the case of the CDC, NASA, and IRS, if all 538 members of Congress request information, they have to give it to them. With the NSA, only 37 members of Congress are authorized to even receive information and only through the President.
Not only is the analogy questionable with board members, but it also carries the implication that they are essentially the same sorts of organizations. They are not.
If you really want to carry this analogy out further, you probably need to expand it so one is a traditional startup and the other a charitable non-profit, or something of the sort. Even if you did have the same people in charge (which again, questionably applicable here), the goals, transparency, and measures of success vary so wildly that I'm not sure it means that much.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/01/30/1017086/cdc-44-m... https://projects.propublica.org/coronavirus-contracts/contra...
It's a historical point of fact that this is untrue.
The CDC has knowingly lied about the efficacy of masks intending to trick the public to deprive them of useful medical gear. They were slow to identify the spread of covid as aerosol based, even after it was widely known. CDC guidance focused on "6 feet apart" instead of the importance of ventilation. The CDC temporarily halted the J&J vaccine unnecessarily, wasting time and eroding trust in vaccines generally. Early in the pandemic the CDC blocked hundreds of labs from doing their own covid tests in favor of flawed CDC tests that took substantially longer - again, this was at an absolutely time critical moment in the pandemic.
I have never really paid attention to the CDC until this pandemic. Now, I feel like they constantly make huge blunders and don't really deserve much trust. Even when they aren't lying to you, as they did regarding masks, they don't seem like they really know what they're doing.
I always assumed the virus was airborne, and they tended to say outside was safer than inside. I haven't looked at the new way they're phrasing it, but I need to look more.
The J&J vaccine halt was done for scientific reasons, and precisely to instill confidence in people that the CDC is acting in good faith and isn't going to sling something out there without knowing all they can about its effects. That you think they made the wrong decision is funny if it weren't sad.
Finally, and I don't know you, but I think it's cute how all the CDC haters/people saying Fauci is evil are the ones who through the pandemic have laughed at the virus and said vaccines are evil. Now here we have an instance of someone skeptical of the CDC because they didn't give enough warning about the virus and they eroded trust in vaccines!
The importance of following the principles for public health is greater than the importance of the advice being unbiasedly perfect at every moment.
You're falsely conflating "principles for public health" with "public health advice". Principles for public health include protecting yourself against airborne diseases, which meant that anybody with some knowledge on the issue and ability to think for themselves should have disregarded "public health advice" when it contradicted "principles for public health". It also means we should be wary when "public health advice" doesn't line up with "principles for public health", and even more so when "public health advice" has been shown to be a deliberate lie when it suits the advice giver.
Following principles of public health is important, but you stretch too far and without basis to equate that to following public health advice. That kind of unthinking obedience to authority is how people commit atrocities by "just following orders"
That slippery slope must be lubed up real good for anyone to fall off it. Wearing masks, staying away from people, getting vaccinated, etc are far, far away from committing atrocities, and you know it. The point GP was making is in times of crisis, following advice from public health authorities, even if it changes, is the general best strategy. It’s extremely (that’s not even a strong enough word) unlikely they’ll be goading people into committing ‘atrocities’ when a novel pandemic is taking place.
For me, "the greater good" does not over-ride personal critical analysis.
100 % disagree. The "social distancing" has caused state governments to take extreme measures closing down many business. The distancing has also put undo stress upon families. How many business have closed permanently? How many people are now suffering major depression due to these policies? How many people have committed suicide due to economic or relational hardship due to these polices? Masks and social distancing have done WAY more harm, than if we just ignored the virus and went about our lives.
It adds up to significant unnecessary suffering.
The it, I assume, refers to the topic at hand. Namely wearing masks. It does not in any way add up to suffering.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Also, even if this is true at some point, as more people adopt your mindset of conformity, it would become very valuable to manipulate, which is easy to do (Goodhart’s law).
1) regardless of how you might think masks are unobtrusive, enough of the population will consider it annoying to wear a mask when jogging or cycling that they won't exercise. Even during this pandemic, public-health officials think exercise needs to be encouraged for long-term public health and less demand on the healthcare system.
2) The science shows that the risk of COVID spread outdoors in non-public spaces is negligible. If a health minister requires masks in spite of the science, he harms his own credibility. That means that the population might also start to ignore those measures that scientists say are essential.
Definitely wearing a mask indoors or in crowded outdoor spaces remains relevant. But there are legitimate grounds for criticism here and nuance, it isn't just inane outrage or defiance.
This has never stopped mandatory cycle helmet laws.
> 2) ... risk ... is negligible.
This has never stopped mandatory cycle helmet laws.
Although many people vocally disagree with cycle helmet laws, nobody has ever called it an 'atrocity' or said that complying with these laws was a 'mindset of conformity'. This is a ridiculous exaggeration.
Actually it has, at least, it is one way the introduction of new laws in jurisdictions is opposed. There is research to suggest that mandatory cycle-helmet laws discourage healthful recreational cycling and commuting, and this has been used to suggest that the laws would ultimately be counterproductive from a public-health perspective.
My media consumption is also extremely limited, and comes almost exclusively from left-centrist (HN top posts, Techmeme) sources.
We'd be in a very different conversation if the CDC was telling everyone "we need you to take this pill. No we're not telling you what's in it, or why you should take it and no one else in the world will be reviewing it."
I'd imagine people aren't just being "stupid" when they decide not to trust these institutions but are simply cynical knowing the process can be hi-jacked by politics (regardless what side) every 4 years, and hardly any continuity due to the deep polarization. It doesn't make people trust in institutions when its core mission can be put upside down simply because a new administration comes to power.
- FBI: Hoover
- NSA: Snowden
- Police: Floyd
For the CDC I know only of the recommendation to not wear a mask at the beginning of the pandemic, and it’s debatable if it was a lie given the knowledge at the time (many other health agencies did the same recommendation in other countries at the time).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_Syphilis_Study
The CDC (like the US police and military) also does not keep track of the number of people doctors kill. A 2016 study by Johns Hopkins estimates that iatrogenesis (deaths caused by doctors) kills 250,000 people per year, making it the third leading cause of death in the US.
>"The Johns Hopkins team says the CDC’s way of collecting national health statistics fails to classify medical errors separately on the death certificate. The researchers are advocating for updated criteria for classifying deaths on death certificates."
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/study_su...
Second, the difference between CIA, FBI and CDC is that usually when the CDC makes a pronouncement, it is linked to some scientific basis. Unlike the CIA that can claim Iraq has 'weapons of mass destruction' based on vague evidence that nobody - except for a handful of legislators and the president - get to see, one can go and track the science behind a CDC's announcement relatively easily.
I don't think that many people on this site are claiming that the American government is incompetent in their surveillance and SIGINT endeavors, from a strictly scientific/technical point of view. Rather that they're too competent and being too effective. Whether those technical capabilities should be applied in certain situations is a political question.
> CDC
I would hope that the majority of the site here, who do not have doctorate level degrees in epidemiology and virology, can realize the extent of education and experience that it takes to get a PhD in those fields. My primary complaint with the American government's handling of covid19 (600,000+ dead??!) is not with any incompetence on the part of the scientists, but the policy makers, in particular the previous administration. And the general populace's resistance to measures that could have halved the cumulative death toll. Additionally with state governments that have gone through multiple rounds of "we must reopen the economy!" to "oh shit! coronavirus is spreading again!"
To treat any organization larger than about a few hundred people that way is naive to the point of being stupid.
I don't think the way they handled all this shows them to be as competent as advised.
They generally match what Id expect them to be saying, so it seems trustworthy enough, but it is confirmation bias. When they'll say something I don't expect, I think bit more about it and try to figure out why there's a mismatch.
The FBI and NSA and the like don't speak publically, and when they do, they're trying to cover up wrongdoings
The CDC is for the benefit of the public. Peoples trust in them is needed in order to be effective. It is pretty transparent in that you can usually look at the data they are using to support their guidelines. If they were keeping something secret the chance of a leak is much greater and there is data from other countries that can be used to corroborate their conclusions.
Snowden's leak was barely a blip on the radar. And it was a proof of how deep the surveillance went. Nobody cared. Patriot act - nobody cared.
People are addicted to outrage and conspiracies not actual reality.
Possibly the aftermath will be the crime, to continue the measure when there is no need, but we reached 200 death in a megalopolis of 8M people only because we shut the fuck up a bit and synchronized our behaviour.
In a word, I dont think the american CDC main goal is to profit or enjoy a sadist power bath... at worst, they re honestly misguided, I think.
Why is it political here, when it is a matter of global public safety?
But I just don't believe it. If the Atlantic published that, they sought out the small minority of people who believe that in order to make waves.
Wearing a mask is not a political statement. It is just a prudent measure you can take to help protect yourself and -- often more importantly -- others. It isn't a guarantee that you won't get (or give someone) COVID, but it can help, when combined with other things like social distancing.
It's funny, because my perception is the opposite of yours: that people who refuse to wear masks have turned that into a political identity. That somehow refusing to wear a mask is the patriotic, freedom-loving thing to do. When the fact is that they're just selfish, and view that refusal as marking themselves as part of a tribe.
It's not just the mask wearing either. It's things with much more substantial actual harm, like keeping schools closed well past the point it was unjustified, along with the belief that anyone who won't deny kids education is evil and a completely inaccurate understanding of the level of risk to them.
Also, you're politicizing mask wearing right here in your comment: "It's funny, because my perception is the opposite of yours: that people who refuse to wear masks have turned that into a political identity. That somehow refusing to wear a mask is the patriotic, freedom-loving thing to do. When the fact is that they're just selfish, and view that refusal as marking themselves as part of a tribe." That you think of anyone who doesn't wear a mask as an evil, selfish right-winger is 100% politicisation.
Among the US citizens (mostly LA area) which I know it was not uncommon to hear how they "love America", similarly to how Christian believers "love Jesus".
Moreover from what I understand the local historical textbooks are censoring displeasing moments from the time of oppression of the black community.
I'm far from an anarchist yet I would take my kids out of the system if I found a meaningful alternative which would not cost a fortune.
Your tone makes me wonder if you're German; having studied German for many years, we learned about how Germany has somewhat of a complex around country pride given certain historical events. My school system had people from over a hundred countries and love for your country was almost universal, including to the extent of wearing clothing with the national flag on it like some Americans do
This is usually done by requiring certain things be taught in great detail in order to preclude time being spent on other things.
What political gain does a ruling clique get when e.g. they force people to admit "2+2=5"?
About the falsity of "two plus two equals five", in Room 101, the interrogator O'Brien tells the thought criminal Smith that control over physical reality is unimportant to the Party, provided the citizens of Oceania subordinate their real-world perceptions to the political will of the Party; and that, by way of doublethink: "Sometimes, Winston. [Sometimes it is four fingers.] Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once".[3]
In any case, stepping back from the pandemic and other personal biases, the tactics and narrative of the last 15+ months begin to feel like some new (covert?) form of totalitarianism.
- There's an evil enemy that must be intricated for the good of all.
- There's hyperbolic fear and widespread death. The deaths are real, but data is cherry-picked in a propaganda-y sort of way. Correlation is more important than causation.
- There is a lone figure-head we must promise our allegiance and dedication to. Signs on front yards, t-shirts, etc. Note: No one voted for Fauci. And while he's certainly accomplished it's difficult to imagine one single opinion - in a cloud of unknowns - could carry so much authority.
- Churches were closed, as were other assemblies. The State persists. It's powers broader.
- There is a tide of "The State knows best (your rights and liberty be damned.)" Do as you're told or you will be marginalized or (socially) silenced. As long as you cooperate and follow the gov's you will be safe.
Please try not to knee-jerk. The above list are simple facts.
All that aside, for anyone still trusting of the CDC it's best to check the data on causes of death prior to this pandemic. Make note of how many of those conditions are preventable. Nrxt track down the Covid death's comorbidies - which are rarely mentioned - that killer Covid pairs well with. To say Covid killed someone who was (e.g.) morbidly obese is misleading. It's called morbidly obese for a reason.
Ultimately, Covid 19 is a symptom. It's a symptom of our heath personally and as a society. It's a symptom of bigger and broader forces "at war" over who is in control.
Yeah, sounds like madness. But please keep in mind, so did totalitarianism.
https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/living-und...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Age_of_Surveillance_Capi...
p.s. There's a chapter in Adam Grant's book "Think Again" on jabs, and how to go about convincing someone to think again about their anti vax ideas. What we've been doing for Covid is off target. Yet why is that? Adam Grant knows something the whole of the USA readership does not?
There's been multiple threads lately, including one that is on the front page as we speak, critical of the American surveillance state. The comments exhibit a high degree of distrust towards the FBI, NSA, and other law-enforcement institutions. This degree of distrust seems almost absolute, yet the word of the CDC seems to be taken as gospel, despite clear hints of politicization of the COVID crisis on their behalf.