4 thoughts on “Lock-Down Cost/Benefit Analyses”

  1. There is uncertainty. And uncertainty is an important.
    I think we would already be mining water on the Moon if not for
    uncertainty- and doing that is far more important than Chinese virus.

    So I am going to tell a story, and probably better to consider it, fiction.

    I think Chinese virus has spreading in the US for a long time, well before Christmas of 2019.
    So when Nancy was doing impeachment, Chinese were hatching a virus, and spread throughout China before the Jan 1 2020, and spreading around rest of world before Jan 1 2020.
    And by time US stopped Air travel from China, there millions of people in the world {outside of China} infected with chinese virus.
    And by time US blocked air travel to Europe, it was tens of millions with significant portion in Europe, but at least couple million in the US.
    It spreads fast in high density population and spreads really fast when larger groups in a crowd. And in certain conditions like cool and dry, it’s even faster and it’s effects upon people is more strong.

    So, predicting the spread has a factor to do with weather conditions and probably weather conditions plus the combination human created environments. And lots factors, such as biology of human body during morning vs evening. Or etc, etc, etc.
    But before New York State went to lockdown probably 1/2 total population had encountered the virus, and reacted to it.
    Or said different way before NYC went lockdown, if you get herd immunity, NYC had it.
    And herd immunity is enough people having it, so as to slow the spread of the virus.
    Which means, the more people having it, it spreads faster, but when enough people have it, it starts to slow in it’s spread, and when even more people have it, it continue to slow the rate of spread, and more people get it it spreads less, and at some point, you can guess or predict it’s at a level where controling factor is herd immunity.
    And in NYC density the moment one wants of call herd immunity happens within time period of less than 1 hour. Or predicting it, is near impossible.
    But I would say the lockdown occurred after NYC attained herd immunity- but it still was spreading, speed of spread was “slow enough”. Or after lockdown it still spread, but more importantly after you got it, it took days before you could even detect it and there are huge amount people who never going to get symptoms and spread it for weeks to anyone who has had it.

    But anyways, one can ask did NYC lockdown “help”, and I think it did. But I think it would have “helped” much more, if it was sooner.
    But the most important aspect that NYC could done besides locking down sooner {even couple days sooner- though even 2 weeks earlier might have been better] would to be isolate people who are 60 years or older. And not stopped children from going to school- the children as we now know were not at threat, but the teachers were at risk. So teachers social distancing and wearing a mask and 1/2 class sizes, would be good idea.
    And as general matter, it might be better “on average” to catch the Chinese virus from children rather than from adults. Children are not going serious effect from virus, but probably can spread it, though probably spread with low viral load. And might amount to roughly, giving people a “natural” vaccinate shot. Though such vaccinate shot could like giving a vaccinate shot with too little or too much dosage of vaccinate. Or when give a vaccinate you give some measure amount to an individual- and can’t depend on exposure to virus carrying children of giving you the proper dose.
    And teacher should not touch their face and should wash their hands- and get the kids to wash their hands, before entering a classroom. And wipe down class rooms, say every hour or two.

    In terms of California, it seems we fairly close to herd immunity.

  2. 26 million people out of work at average of $56,516/year works out to about 122 billion wage loss/month. Add in unemployment pay, it’s coming from the rest of us, and you get 240 billion/month this thing drags out. And that is just loss of income. 2 months would be 240 billion…

  3. Consider that for some pushing to continue lockdown, an economic collapse as Trump is running for reelection is a feature.

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