Re:I am a New York City public high school student. The situ...
by dragonwriter on Saturday January 08, 2022 @09:32PM
(#29859318)
> When a virus is endemic, it means everyone will get it
No, it means that it tends to be maintained at some (whether very high or very low or other) stable baseline level in a region in the absence of external inputs or interventions.
> Which means most of these precautions are ultimately worthless
No, it doesn't, and wouldn't even if “endemic” did mean everyone would get it, since the control measures are not intended to prevent people from eventually getting COVID in the absence of a fundamental change in available countermeasures, but to reduce the speed of particular outbreaks and mitigate acute impacts to health systems (which affects ability to treat anyone needing the system) from caseload and to other essential social services from temporary incapacitation of key staff.
> But oh, how long have we been "flattening the curve" now
Rarely for more than a couple weeks in a row, on a local basis, in response to particular sharp outbreaks, and invariably with much weaker measures than were taken for the same purpose earlier on in the pandemic, despite outbreaks that are much worse by every measure (in part, because the ultimate goal is much more limited and temporary, and in part because the political faction that deliberately avoided fighting the pandemic in the hopes of blaming the effects on political opponents has turned avoiding control measures into a quasi-religious doctrine to avoid accountability for their earlier malfeasance.)
No, it means that it tends to be maintained at some (whether very high or very low or other) stable baseline level in a region in the absence of external inputs or interventions.
> Which means most of these precautions are ultimately worthless
No, it doesn't, and wouldn't even if “endemic” did mean everyone would get it, since the control measures are not intended to prevent people from eventually getting COVID in the absence of a fundamental change in available countermeasures, but to reduce the speed of particular outbreaks and mitigate acute impacts to health systems (which affects ability to treat anyone needing the system) from caseload and to other essential social services from temporary incapacitation of key staff.
> But oh, how long have we been "flattening the curve" now
Rarely for more than a couple weeks in a row, on a local basis, in response to particular sharp outbreaks, and invariably with much weaker measures than were taken for the same purpose earlier on in the pandemic, despite outbreaks that are much worse by every measure (in part, because the ultimate goal is much more limited and temporary, and in part because the political faction that deliberately avoided fighting the pandemic in the hopes of blaming the effects on political opponents has turned avoiding control measures into a quasi-religious doctrine to avoid accountability for their earlier malfeasance.)