
Shutdowns prevented 60M coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds - djoshea
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/06/08/shutdowns-prevented-60-million-coronavirus-infections-us-study-finds/
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cheald
"Received: 22 March 2020" \- direct from the study cover page at
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2404-8_reference....](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2404-8_reference.pdf)

States imposed lockdowns between March 21 and early April. Someone want to
explain to me how a study submitted before the lockdowns were issued
(nevermind had time to actually have an impact) "found" those results?

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sauwan
It must be a typo. March 22nd was a Sunday, where May 22nd was a Friday. It
seems unlikely that it would take over 2 months to accept it, considering so
many other articles are being rushed to publication in fractions of that time.

ETA: also, charts in that publication also show data collected from April, so
unlikely they had data from the future.

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sukilot
Study _suggests_ , not _finds_. Simulation models can't "find" facts.
Observation finds facts.

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undersuit
Didn't the study of the simulation model find facts about the simulation
model?

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rogerkirkness
So far.

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sukilot
"So far" meaning "might save more later" or "only postponed, not prevented"?

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oarabbus_
The latter. That's always what "flattening the curve" has meant. The total
area under the curve (i.e. total unique infected individuals) stays about the
same.

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thephyber
"Flattening the curve" is not the only possible outcome.

A cure, an inoculation, or segmenting geographic regions until localized herd
immunity (like New Zealand just did) are all examples of cutting the curve
short.

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oarabbus_
Vaccines are far away from approval for widespread use, and New Zealand's
situation as an island nation is not applicable to something like 98% of the
World's population and quite frankly, irrelevant to the discussion.

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madmaniak
Simulacrum.

