
California's new lockdown could be brutal for the economy - LinuxBender
https://lite.cnn.com/en/article/h_20222f17fef5fdd81adf2c94217eba86
======
samtho
I'm from California and what blows my mind is that places like gyms, bars, and
restaurants were allowed to have people indoors before places personal care
places like hair and nail salons, barbers, waxing centers, and tattoo parlors
because all these professions (for the most part) follow good sanitization
practices. And unlike restaurants and bars, these are not places you'd bring
large groups as the services rendered are 1-on-1 typically. Liquor stores are
still open, why are bars needed? I cannot cut my own hair (well) for example,
and tattoo parlors, waxing centers, and salons all have specialty tools and
services you simply cannot do at home.

Also, why are we not focused on making sure education is able to start back up
in the fall? Why did we prioritize opening restaurants (who already has a
revenue stream: togo orders) and bars? I get recreational stuff is needed, but
the bars, for example should be among the last to open. It sucks for the
business owner, and they need more federal support to stay afloat. How are
paying this much in tax and getting nothing when we need it the most?

~~~
cultus
School starting is going to be such an unmitigated disaster. With the utterly
inept handling of this pandemic (not just Trump, but our entire rotting
neoliberal government) it just won't be feasible. Even if they do open, many
teachers won't show up, and many parents will keep their kids home.

Talk of social distancing in schools is just ludicrous. It makes one wonder
whether these officials have ever stepped foot inside of a school. Resources
would be far better spent on trying to do remote learning passably well. For
example, making sure that all schoolchildren have access to fast and reliable
internet on a real computer, etc.

~~~
commandlinefan
> trying to do remote learning

My wife actually wondered why they don't just "skip" this year - let everybody
stay home and pretend this school year never even happened, and everybody who
would have graduated in, say, 2023 will now graduate in 2024. I'm not sure
that's such a bad idea - maybe better than remote learning.

~~~
erickhill
Interesting idea - particularly for those that can manage it with their jobs.
But then do you just keep paying everyone in public education for a whole year
to take the year off, too?

Here in Seattle, the last 3 months of school the kids were enrolled in was a
complete and utter joke. I have two kids, one in middle school and the other
in elementary. When the kids got online to talk to teachers it was never about
actual instruction, course work, etc. It was almost entirely kum-ba-yah
sessions where the teachers would ask the kids what they were doing and how
they were feeling. School was essentially put on hold. Grades were sent out
and based mainly on the 1st half of the year.

The prospect of remote learning is very promising, but at least in 2020 there
seems to be an utter lack in leadership or will to implement a quality
product. It's a race to the bottom.

Skipping a year? Honestly, I think even if my kids wind up doing remote
learning in the Fall they'll be going through the motions but intellectually
skipping a year anyway. It's a mess.

~~~
zamfi
> It was almost entirely kum-ba-yah sessions where the teachers would ask the
> kids what they were doing and how they were feeling.

Maybe in the middle of a pandemic, when you’re trapped at home, away from your
friends, with parents who are busy working — what you really need is a little
kumbaya?

At some point we need to transition away from “crisis mode” but making sure
kids are doing ok, when their worlds have been turned upside-down, seems like
a completely reasonable use of time to me.

~~~
erickhill
I understand this. And honestly, a part of me believes in several years we (my
wife and I) will look back on this time with fondness as we've never been able
to spend this much time together as a family unit.

But what I meant in the OP was how - across 3 months - school was put on hold
even though my kids would dial in a few times a week. I could tell some of the
teachers _wanted_ to teach but I am certain there were orders from above not
to. If there's one child who didn't have access to a laptop or internet across
the district, I think the idea was that no one would be taught material as a
result. I don't have the right answers - I just know that if that's what
school looks like in the Fall, it will only deepen class divides where the
well-off pay for private tutors, and the rest of the kids simply drift.

I have one friend who has a daughter here who - across 3 months - only had 2
sessions with her teacher. That was it. Effectively, school _was_ cancelled,
if not officially.

Hence why the idea of just lobbing off a whole year's worth sounded
intriguing.

But at the end of the day this is really all about economics and why there's a
push to get kids back in school no matter what, plan or no plan. The economy
won't start to heal until kids are under the in-person daycare of schools.
It's just a fact.

This is all going to be very messy for at least another 12-18 months.

EDIT: My dad taught for over 50 years at the high school level. He is now 81.
He taught well into his 70s. I imagine there are quite a few teachers who are
terrified of being forced back to work in-person unless significant changes
are made, and even then... This may force a lot of early retirements.

------
erehweb
Compared to what? Governments that try to trade safety for the economy will
end up with neither.

~~~
matz1
Trade safety? How? The latest cdc estimate of ifr is only 0.65%, how is that
going to destroy the economy?

~~~
HarryHirsch
Convalescence in hospitalized patients (about 20 % of patients will end up in
hospital) is extremely protracted. You will end up with a torrent of people
unable to work for months if not years if the disease continues to spread. The
recent JAMA paper from Italy (this one:
[https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768351](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768351))
is frankly terrifying.

------
dehrmann
This should worry people more than they realize. I've been keeping an eye on
the Bay Area's COVID-19 case rate:

[https://projects.sfchronicle.com/2020/coronavirus-
map/](https://projects.sfchronicle.com/2020/coronavirus-map/)

Something obviously happened in early June that drove new cases up. What
worries me is the only place you'll get better compliance with mask wearing
and social distancing in the US is NYC, leading me to think "just wear a mask"
isn't enough. There's no version of reopening anything indoors that works.

Meanwhile, in Hong Kong, a city that has generally had COVID-19 under control,
has just banned gatherings of more than four people. There a case report from
China, I think, where people seated more than six feet apart at a restaurant
got infected, possibly through fans or an HVAC system.

I also saw the slightly disingenuous (he didn't quite say that) headline that
"Dr. Anthony Fauci says U.S. coronavirus cases are surging because nation
didn’t totally shut down." Ignoring the bit about a surge, a longer, harder
shutdown isn't a fix, either. Look at countries that had stricter shutdowns.
Pockets are still popping up.

If the virus is active at all in an area, anything indoors risks spreading it,
and there's no escape from whack-a-mole lockdowns...unless you're New Zealand.
Maybe.

~~~
ogre_codes
> Something obviously happened in early June that drove new cases up.

It's likely secondary infections from people who caught it Memorial Day
weekend.

~~~
skellington
Oh sure, it was Memorial Day, not the mass groupings of people who were
protesting for BLM.

~~~
fzeroracer
No, the BLM protests did not cause an uptick in cases. Multiple studies [1]
[2] [3] seem to indicate that the coronavirus doesn't spread nearly as well
outdoors as it does indoors. In fact, studies have indicated that one of the
greatest surge predictors is card-present transactions in restaurants [4].

The reason why we're seeing such a massive uptick in Austin is because of poor
state leadership and the fact that we opened too early and with reckless
abandon. As the other commentator said, the coronavirus hotspots do not
correspond with the protest activities.

[1] [https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/494348-new-study-
finds...](https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/494348-new-study-finds-few-
cases-of-outdoor-transmission-of-coronavirus-in-china)

[2]
[https://apnews.com/a288340b3bd3fbc62e564b3d0adfaa2e](https://apnews.com/a288340b3bd3fbc62e564b3d0adfaa2e)

[3]
[https://www.nber.org/papers/w27408.pdf](https://www.nber.org/papers/w27408.pdf)

[4] [https://fortune.com/2020/06/26/is-it-safe-restaurant-
coronav...](https://fortune.com/2020/06/26/is-it-safe-restaurant-coronavirus-
cases-credit-cards-restaurants-jp-morgan-chase-covid-19-outbreaks/)

reply

------
gumby
The thing that is forgotten in these _reductio_ analyses is that the economy
is made of people, so if they die you have no economy either.

The evidence from 1918/19 is that early opening, or failure to close down
again when opening fails, leads to stronger economic growth. It’s a shame some
wish to learn this from themselves instead of from the suffering of people a
century ago.

~~~
robotron
Hopefully we'll learn for the third time when something crops up again?

------
jasonv
As an SF East Bay person:

I've spoken at length with my best friend, a doctor, and a neighbor, also a
doctor -- both of whom believe it's not rational to shut down the economy for
the risks of this pandemic, particularly w/r/t the demographics of those most
at risk given the (relatively low) mortality rate. Neither are Trump/GOP
supporters.

I've spoken at length with others.. not doctors.. who think it's not rational
to open up at all, and that things need to be shut down further until progress
is made.

My workplace recently sent out a survey and asked if we were ready to come
back to the office, if there were those who were interested in volunteering
for a Back to Office pilot project. My team all voted against, with "commuting
on Bart" as the first and conclusive deal-breaker. I also don't want to sit in
an office with a mask on all day. So, for now, WFH.

Of course, if I was subject to unemployment... I don't think I'd change my
vote but I would have a different emotional response to the question.

(FWIW, I was let go from a contract gig during the first week of SIP, and was
hired a week later by a company I'd been in process with for a few weeks).

~~~
voxl
Where your doctor friends virologists? Doctors are some of the worst people to
ask, in my opinion, about what to do if they do not have subject expertise.
They have just enough knowledge to speak authoritatively and not nearly enough
subject expertise to really know what they're talking about.

The old adage that doctors are the worst patients, I think, rings true.

~~~
djsumdog
So we can trust some experts, but not others? We're getting into a dangerous
situation where some experts are blessed and others are not:

[https://battlepenguin.com/politics/secondary-
effects/#minist...](https://battlepenguin.com/politics/secondary-
effects/#ministry-of-truth)

We are no longer having real honest debates where we talk about all the
evidence. Most of the studies can't even be replicated due to the dangerous
nature of containing a virus and the limited labs and universities equipped to
handle that research. You combined that with the massive political influences
of Gavi, the Gates Foundation and others, and we're looking directly in the
face of a Orwellian Ministry or Truth.

Texas is talking to other experts ([https://www.westernjournal.com/texas-lt-
governor-goes-off-fa...](https://www.westernjournal.com/texas-lt-governor-
goes-off-fauci-wrong-every-time-every-issue/amp/)) and you can be sure that,
since they're a red state, they'll be slammed for not taking the official dose
of science from the US federal government, where Colorado can have the same
numbers and no one will blame them since they're blue.

Very little of this virus is about "experts" as much as it is about politics.
That's the fucked up part.

~~~
voxl
The answer is yes. Being an "expert" in one field does not make an expert in
another. Knowing how to perform brain surgery does not make you an authority
on vaccines.

This should be obvious.

~~~
djsumdog
In the case of Karol Sikora, he is an expert who even spent 2 years working as
a director at the WHO.

Yet whenever anyone posts anything about him, it's met with immediately
criticism, either ignoring his WHO work, stating he's 'only' an ecologist, his
exaggeration on his connections to the Imperial College .. but none of those
criticisms invalidate his expertise or the fact that he was hired by the WHO
and had experience directly in infectious diseases.

Oddly enough, people will immediately attack his character and background, but
they won't bring up his involvement in Lockerbie.

------
option
I wish our “leaders” (federal, state, local) had at least approximate plan
further than half a month into the future.

~~~
giardini
Our "leaders" likely know little better than we and we barely know what is
happening. Under such circumstances it is difficult to know "the right thing"
to do.

The public is so naive that they cannot comprehend a monotonically increasing
function (e.g., total deaths/cases). The news daily points out "the total
number of deaths/cases is increasing &c...", a trivial truism in an epidemic,
yet it engenders fear and panic.

~~~
option
a good reminder to people to vote in elections based on candidates’ track
record and not based on FB/youtube ads

~~~
AnimalMuppet
"Who do you want running your country/state when a pandemic hits" _is_ a
different axis than most voters have historically decided on. We're finding
out that competence matters, not just ideology.

~~~
option
competence matters always, not just during pandemic. I hope US will learn the
lesson

~~~
giardini
Luck, yes. Competence, no. There is no "lesson" here unless you mistakenly
believe history repeats itself.

------
squabble
The government shouldn't continue to prop up businesses and systems which are
not essential.

Help people who are affected by the disruption, but not outdated systems.

------
beefok
"could be brutal for the economy"

Uhh, racking up deaths WILL be way more brutal for the economy.

~~~
matz1
Racking up death? The cdc latest estimatate the ifr to be only 0.65%.

~~~
throwaway713
> only 0.65%

...

~~~
LanceH
In the context of "brutal for the economy", 0.65% deaths pales in comparison
to 20% unemployment.

~~~
rurp
Unfortunately we don't have a choice between unemployment being 20% vs 3%. The
choice is between the current unemployment and whatever the rate would be if
the govt issued no lock-downs and let the virus run rampant. I don't know what
the unemployment rate would be in a world with overflowing hospitals and many
thousands of deaths per day, but I bet it would be a heck of a lot closer to
20% than 3%.

~~~
matz1
Hospital are frequently overwhelmed already even without this "pandemic". Many
thousand deaths per day are normal situation even before this.

~~~
beefok
That's the point buddy. They will now be irrecoverably overwhelmed. Every
portion of the infrastructure is going to be overwhelmed.

~~~
matz1
My point is the hospital are no more overwhelmed then what has frequently
happen in the past. We don't need lockdown back then, why we do lockdown now ?

------
mcdramamean
Why don't we.... 1\. Allow pharmacies to test for COVID (currently illegal in
California) 2\. Make COVID testing mandatory every 2 weeks via a statewide
digital system (like jury duty). California could then partner will pharmacies
to allow wider spread testing. We could even create jobs by hiring and
training those who are unemployed to administer the actual tests. 3\. Make it
mandatory that every business/person use the statewide system to scan people
to ensure they have been tested recently. That, combined with temperature
checks at the door will serve to catch any issues quickly; as well as
providing REAL TIME feed back to the state about possible infections and
outbreaks

It seems to me that pandemics are the new normal. We aren't going to have a
vaccine ready for every virus within 1-2 years; so it seems prudent for us to
invest in a good system now with a virus that isn't as deadly.

What does everyone else think? I really would like to create a thread and have
some of the best minds (yes that's you) work on a real solution. Let's plan it
and build it!

------
daveslash
Thank you for posting the CNN text-only version instead of the _" full
experience"_ version. For those who aren't aware,
[https://lite.cnn.com](https://lite.cnn.com) is text only, but has all the
same articles/headlines as the main site.. [Edit] Additionally, There's also
[https://text.npr.org](https://text.npr.org)

------
DiffEq
So...what is the mortality rate down to these days?

~~~
chipuni
According to
[https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/)
, among US closed cases, 8% of people who test positive for Covid-19 die.

(BIG CLUE: Use closed cases for estimating mortality of an illness.)

~~~
albntomat0
Is that not heavily distorted by how tests are distributed, as not everyone
ends up getting tested?

~~~
kulahan
Also, it's kind of a self-selecting population. This statistic is likely
skewed towards those with an infection bad enough to warrant getting a test in
the first place.

