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Author Topic: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.  (Read 341542 times)

jhkim

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1575 on: March 03, 2021, 06:33:54 PM »
Oh, I see you think that the Chinese Government is lying with no evidence but at the same time the other Governments are telling the truth even with documented evidence of them over counting Wuhan Flu deaths.

Well I guess that is how science works now.

Imagine posting this and then expecting to be taken seriously. Won’t even bother to address Comrade Kim except to say he seems like a really lousy scientist.

He is a neocon traitor that sold out to China like the Judas bitch he is.  What do you expect?

At first, I was confused by this - but on reflection, I take it that "neocon traitor" is referring to Mistwell, not me. Right, Snowman0147? Otherwise that seems weird.

The China claim seems weird, though, since Shasarak is openly saying to trust the Chinese government and don't believe the governments of other countries. To clarify, I haven't accused the Chinese government of any specific lie here -- but I don't consider them a reliable source of truth, since I consider them untrustworthy and perfectly willing to lie for their purposes. As far as overcounting covid-19 deaths, there is evidence of Western governments both overcounting and undercounting covid-19 deaths. Undercounting happened especially earlier in the pandemic as people died without being tested for covid-19. cf.

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/about-30-covid-deaths-may-not-be-classified-such

There are multiple checks for the overall death rates being consistent -- such as overall excess deaths as well as consistent distribution of ages and geography of deaths. I'm not claiming that the counts of every country are perfectly accurate, but I don't buy that dozens of countries have secretly colluded to intentionally fake millions of deaths, such as Kiero's claim that covid-19 is all a big hoax.

Mistwell

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1576 on: March 03, 2021, 06:36:35 PM »
The best thing about COVID-19 is that it cured the seasonal flu. Went from something like ~100k annual deaths to almost zero. That's good news!

It's true. This pandemic probably did more damage to the influenza virus than anything since before 1918. It's theoretically possible it's permanent damage, as failure to spread in a year on this level could be enough to find it replaced in the ecosystem by other things.
Viruses. Or virii, if you want to annoy pedants. Influenza is a many-headed hydra. That's why the flu shot each year is different; they have to choose which strains they think will be big and target them. It's very unlikely they'll all be beat back. Not that a slow down will do anything anyway. They'll bounce back. Some viruses do vanish, but unless we have near-total immunity like with small pox, that won't happen.

That is true when there isn't viral competition. But, weirdly, it does appear like viruses compete with each other, and they can die off if a different virus takes it's place in the ecosystem. Which seems to be happening with this coronavirus.

We will know this year. Israel has already vaccinated over half it's population in two months, and we should see the flu bounce back there if it will be bouncing back. I don't think it will though.
Yes, but there doesn't seem to be a reason to expect that to happen with covid-19. The reason the flu and the common cold persist is because they're not just one virus, they're many, and that foils both vaccines and natural immunity because the entire populace isn't going to be protected against them all. By contrast, covid-19 is just one virus. There are a handful of major strains that show some resistance to the vaccines, but so it's pretty minor. Unless covid-19 turns into a viral complex, comparing it to the flu is a bad idea.

More likely, it will follow the pattern of historical diseases. Spreads rapidly when new, usually with 2 humps, most of the population becomes immune, and then it dies down and survives in small pockets. It might resurge, but that would require a major mutation (which will become less likely, as fewer people are infected), or after immunity lapses in a large chunk of the population, usually because a new generation is born. Widedpread vaccination, of course, would foil this.

I expect the flu will bounce back in the winter of 2021/2022.

The flu is all just mutations on the same base virus. Just like there are mutations on the Covid-19 virus.  Concerning the current Covid-19 variants, “There are probably too many variants to count” right now.

One key issue we've gotten from this is a new type of RNA vaccine which is likely adaptable to the flu.  In fact we can probably use that new type of vaccine against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria too. "RNA vaccines could include instructions for multiple antigens, either strung together in a single strand, or with several RNAs packaged together in a single nanoparticle." They're now working on an influenza "12-strand shot that could supplant the need for annual vaccinations."

I genuinely think, a few years from now, we may be able to kick the flu's ass, thanks to advances we made against Covid-19. Sort of like the Space program, sometimes focusing everyone on an emergency-level task with massive funding yields tech advances far beyond what we were aiming for.

Mistwell

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1577 on: March 03, 2021, 06:39:34 PM »
Oh, I see you think that the Chinese Government is lying with no evidence but at the same time the other Governments are telling the truth even with documented evidence of them over counting Wuhan Flu deaths.

Well I guess that is how science works now.

Imagine posting this and then expecting to be taken seriously. Won’t even bother to address Comrade Kim except to say he seems like a really lousy scientist.

He is a neocon traitor that sold out to China like the Judas bitch he is.  What do you expect?

At first, I was confused by this - but on reflection, I take it that "neocon traitor" is referring to Mistwell, not me. Right, Snowman0147? Otherwise that seems weird.

The China claim seems weird, though, since Shasarak is openly saying to trust the Chinese government and don't believe the governments of other countries. To clarify, I haven't accused the Chinese government of any specific lie here -- but I don't consider them a reliable source of truth, since I consider them untrustworthy and perfectly willing to lie for their purposes. As far as overcounting covid-19 deaths, there is evidence of Western governments both overcounting and undercounting covid-19 deaths. Undercounting happened especially earlier in the pandemic as people died without being tested for covid-19. cf.

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/about-30-covid-deaths-may-not-be-classified-such

There are multiple checks for the overall death rates being consistent -- such as overall excess deaths as well as consistent distribution of ages and geography of deaths. I'm not claiming that the counts of every country are perfectly accurate, but I don't buy that dozens of countries have secretly colluded to intentionally fake millions of deaths, such as Kiero's claim that covid-19 is all a big hoax.

Yes I am the "Neocon Traitor" apparently. Because I believe in free markets and globalism. Nevermind that socialists like Bernie Sanders are against the free-market and globalism, and conservatives like Dole, Bush, Bush, McCain, Romney, and pretty much everyone who ran as a Republican for the last 30 years besides Trump believed in free markets and globalism. But, I am the "traitor" here.
« Last Edit: March 03, 2021, 06:42:09 PM by Mistwell »

Kiero

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1578 on: March 03, 2021, 07:36:21 PM »
It's hard to even begin to address this nonsense because it's nonsense. We could try facts like the excess mortality rates but you don't deal with facts cos you're a mental.

I always like your NHS workers are lazy spiel cos that's possibly the most pathetic conspiracy theory of all time. I figure you're some sort of well paid IT guy who goldbricks the system to milk as much as he can out of it whilst doing as little as possible. You can't imagine that people may be passionate about they're jobs and not just leeches who don't want to work.

"Excess mortality" that isn't exceptional in the last 5 years, and even less so in the last 20. Equivalent to a bad flu year.

30-60% of NHS staff are "off sick", "isolating" or "shielding" from the reports given by trusts. Or taking the piss as it's commonly known. Encouraged by this ridiculous system whereby if you have the sniffles, you're supposed to be off for 10 days.

I don't milk the system, because I don't even fucking use it. I just have the privilege of paying for it.
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jhkim

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1579 on: March 03, 2021, 08:17:33 PM »
"Excess mortality" that isn't exceptional in the last 5 years, and even less so in the last 20. Equivalent to a bad flu year.

30-60% of NHS staff are "off sick", "isolating" or "shielding" from the reports given by trusts. Or taking the piss as it's commonly known. Encouraged by this ridiculous system whereby if you have the sniffles, you're supposed to be off for 10 days.

Here's the excess mortality data that I see for 2020.


Source: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/excess-mortality-raw-death-count?tab=chart&stackMode=absolute&region=World

What source is saying that excess mortality isn't exceptional?

Pat
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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1580 on: March 03, 2021, 08:59:04 PM »
The flu is all just mutations on the same base virus. Just like there are mutations on the Covid-19 virus.  Concerning the current Covid-19 variants, “There are probably too many variants to count” right now.

One key issue we've gotten from this is a new type of RNA vaccine which is likely adaptable to the flu.  In fact we can probably use that new type of vaccine against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria too. "RNA vaccines could include instructions for multiple antigens, either strung together in a single strand, or with several RNAs packaged together in a single nanoparticle." They're now working on an influenza "12-strand shot that could supplant the need for annual vaccinations."

I genuinely think, a few years from now, we may be able to kick the flu's ass, thanks to advances we made against Covid-19. Sort of like the Space program, sometimes focusing everyone on an emergency-level task with massive funding yields tech advances far beyond what we were aiming for.
No, that's just false. The flu is an entire family of viruses, with 7 genera. Even the UK variant of covid-19 had what, only 19 mutations? And that was considered a remarkably huge number.

Yes, viruses change all the time. See here:
https://nextstrain.org/ncov/global
But no, that doesn't meant covid-19 and the flu have anything even vaguely approaching the same diversity.

I'm not nearly as sanguine as you are that the flu is on the way out. Even the new methods -- Moderna had what, about 20 possible vaccines designed less than a week after China sequenced and released the sars2 genome? -- still require significant (almost a year's worth) testing.

dkabq

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1581 on: March 03, 2021, 09:39:40 PM »
"Excess mortality" that isn't exceptional in the last 5 years, and even less so in the last 20. Equivalent to a bad flu year.

30-60% of NHS staff are "off sick", "isolating" or "shielding" from the reports given by trusts. Or taking the piss as it's commonly known. Encouraged by this ridiculous system whereby if you have the sniffles, you're supposed to be off for 10 days.

Here's the excess mortality data that I see for 2020.


Source: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/excess-mortality-raw-death-count?tab=chart&stackMode=absolute&region=World

What source is saying that excess mortality isn't exceptional?

FWIW, the excess death numbers greatly exceed the CDCs COVID weekly deaths. For example, the peak number (79,051 @ April 12) is 3x higher than the sum of the CDC number for all deaths involving COVID for the weeks ending 04/04/20 (10,073) and 04/11/20 (16,242) = 26,315. Even if you add in the week ending 04/18/20 (17,106), the peak number (79,051) is still ~2x higher (43,421). In addition, even using the "Deaths involving Pnuemonia, Influenza, or COVID-19 is a lower total (57,892). Not sure what to make of the difference.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/index.htm

To my mind, a more interesting way of looking at the data would be to look a excess deaths by age cohorts. For example, the 208 deaths (or 960, if you like the higher number) in the 0-17 year cohort are likely in the normal year-to-year variability.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm#SexAndAge

Even the 155,175 (or 214,459) numbers for 85+ might be within the normal variability, if you look at the deaths going forward for the next couple of years (i.e., excess deaths occurred, but only a couple of years early [873,746/6,604,958 = 13%   of the 85+ cohort die each year: https://wonder.cdc.gov/controller/datarequest/D76;jsessionid=D4482A325582CFC030F11DF7D00B]).

Even more interesting would be to estimate the total person-years saved by lockdowns compared to the number of person-years lost due to deaths from the lockdowns. And even, even better would be to convert all of the death and suffering (e.g., long COVID, broken homes, chronic unemployment, etc.) into a dollar-values and to get an estimate if the "cure was worse than the disease". And even, even, better would be to do it with a proper uncertainty analysis so as to see the degree of variability in the results and identify the parameters that contribute the most to the variability.

Sorry... I got all excited there. Better go clean up.


SHARK

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1582 on: March 03, 2021, 09:53:17 PM »
Greetings!

Well, Gamedaddy just flamed out and threw a stupid fit, and Pundit brought the *BANHAMMER* down like the wrath of god. Gamedaddy was told more than once by other members to take his Covid arguments, political commentary, and conspiracy theory ranting to this sub-forum, here. Pundit even graciously warned Gamedaddy, and Gamedaddy proceeded to rant in the EN-World thread, and even *dared* Pundit to banhammer him. Gameaddy proceeded to lament--or conversely, brag--about how he had been banned from so many other forums, and that he was unfairly victimized and persecuted because he wanted to talk about "THE TRUTH".

Gamedaddy, by his own account, has been a member here and regular poster since 2006. 14 Years.

What the fuck is wrong with people like Gamedaddy? It is definitely difficult not to bring in political elements into any discussion, especially nowadays--and I think Pundit is keenly aware of this fact, and goes to some length to keep us all focused and on point, as for the appropriate forum, and does so in a gracious and fair-minded manner. Then Gamedaddy brazenly ignores Pundit's warning, purposely defying and provoking Pundit, and continues to rant about political theories in the gaming forum.

Geesus, man. Fucking sad. Gamedaddy seemed to scream, "YES! Please Banhammer me!"

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK
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Ghostmaker

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1583 on: March 03, 2021, 10:28:49 PM »
Greetings!

Well, Gamedaddy just flamed out and threw a stupid fit, and Pundit brought the *BANHAMMER* down like the wrath of god. Gamedaddy was told more than once by other members to take his Covid arguments, political commentary, and conspiracy theory ranting to this sub-forum, here. Pundit even graciously warned Gamedaddy, and Gamedaddy proceeded to rant in the EN-World thread, and even *dared* Pundit to banhammer him. Gameaddy proceeded to lament--or conversely, brag--about how he had been banned from so many other forums, and that he was unfairly victimized and persecuted because he wanted to talk about "THE TRUTH".

Gamedaddy, by his own account, has been a member here and regular poster since 2006. 14 Years.

What the fuck is wrong with people like Gamedaddy? It is definitely difficult not to bring in political elements into any discussion, especially nowadays--and I think Pundit is keenly aware of this fact, and goes to some length to keep us all focused and on point, as for the appropriate forum, and does so in a gracious and fair-minded manner. Then Gamedaddy brazenly ignores Pundit's warning, purposely defying and provoking Pundit, and continues to rant about political theories in the gaming forum.

Geesus, man. Fucking sad. Gamedaddy seemed to scream, "YES! Please Banhammer me!"

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK
To quote Immortan Joe, 'Mediocre!'.

I have no idea what Gamedaddy was thinking. I'm not even sure he WAS thinking. I mean, he straight up triple-dog-dared Pundit to go hard option on him (metaphorically speaking) and Pundit obliged. Suicide by mod, I guess.

Shasarak

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1584 on: March 03, 2021, 10:45:23 PM »
What the fuck is wrong with people like Gamedaddy? It is definitely difficult not to bring in political elements into any discussion, especially nowadays--and I think Pundit is keenly aware of this fact, and goes to some length to keep us all focused and on point, as for the appropriate forum, and does so in a gracious and fair-minded manner. Then Gamedaddy brazenly ignores Pundit's warning, purposely defying and provoking Pundit, and continues to rant about political theories in the gaming forum.

Geesus, man. Fucking sad. Gamedaddy seemed to scream, "YES! Please Banhammer me!"

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Is any of us getting through a year of lock downs and constant fear of the sword of Damocles over your head unscathed?
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There will be poor always,
pathetically struggling,
look at the good things you've got! -  Jesus

Brad

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1585 on: March 03, 2021, 11:30:07 PM »
Brad insults
Brad, third and last chance. Name one business which has gone under because of mask mandates.

We both know you cannot. Because it was a bullshit claim which you and others were trying to pretend meant "lockdowns" even though under no even vague definition of that phrase could it mean lockdowns. You DON'T wear masks when locked down because you're at home. Mask mandates are for when you're NOT LOCKED DOWN and just out in society at large. It's OK that you're a piece of shit liar who wanted to pretend black meant white, but now that you're called on it just calling me stupid while being unable to answer the simple question of "Who?" to your claim that businesses have gone under because of mask mandates doesn't make you look to bright there, porn boy.

Oh the irony...wtf does "porn boy" mean, exactly? RE: mask mandates, I know of a bunch of places that NO LONGER ARE IN BUSINESS directly because of the mask requirements. You literally are trying to claim that requiring masks has zero effect on a business, when the reality is it indeed does. If you want a specific example, there was a small feed store close by that was fined multiple times for refusing to enforce an unenforceable order and thus went out of business because they didn't have the means to go to court. There were cops handing out citations to people in a fucking parking lot at a place that rents tubes here for no masks and they had to eventually just shut down because people didn't want to be harassed anymore about it. A parking lot where the closest you'd be is maybe 20-30 feet from other people. I don't know if that guy is going to make it, honestly.

So yeah...fuck off.

EDIT: Waiting for your claim that's NOT what you meant, but unlike your faggot ass some business owners around here would rather shutdown than have to spend a ton of money and fuck with their customers for something that's not legally enforceable.
« Last Edit: March 03, 2021, 11:33:06 PM by Brad »
It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.

Kiero

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1586 on: March 04, 2021, 05:59:09 AM »
Lockdowns are not mask mandates. Indeed, you don't wear a mask in a lockdown because you're staying at home. Mask mandates are for when you're NOT LOCKED DOWN. So, mask mandates are clearly not lockdowns.

Not in the UK. We have both operating at the same time (mask mandate since July 2020, lockdowns on and off since then). Mask mandates make some people choose not to shop in-store, which generally hurts small businesses who are not online.

Here's the excess mortality data that I see for 2020.


Source: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/excess-mortality-raw-death-count?tab=chart&stackMode=absolute&region=World

What source is saying that excess mortality isn't exceptional?

I'm not talking about the US, I'm talking about the UK. With the exception of a spike in March/April last year, our pattern of deaths is normal.
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spon

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1587 on: March 04, 2021, 06:26:49 AM »

dkabq

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1588 on: March 04, 2021, 07:18:06 AM »
Yeah, no excess deaths in England. Dream on.

https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/static-reports/mortality-surveillance/excess-mortality-in-england-latest.html

He did not say there were no excess deaths in the UK. He said, "With the exception of a spike in March/April last year, our pattern of deaths is normal." This is what is shown in the plot of UK deaths/week (at least up to October):
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/excess-mortality-raw-death-count?tab=chart&stackMode=absolute&country=~England%20%26%20Wales&region=World

The April-May spike in the death rate (deaths/week) is reflected in the (time-integrated) cumulative deaths. It is the spike in death rate that causes the higher slope in the Registered deaths line. Once the peak abated (beginning of June), the slope of the Registered deaths line returned to that of the Modeled (expected) deaths line, as would be expected.

The smaller year-end spike (starting in October) is reflected in the increase in the slope of the Registered deaths line. Also, note that the Modeled (expected) deaths line also has increase in slope at about the same time. I suspicion those are expected deaths due to the flu.

« Last Edit: March 04, 2021, 08:00:57 AM by dkabq »

Kiero

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Re: Covid, the "lockdowns" etc.
« Reply #1589 on: March 04, 2021, 07:55:21 AM »
So many people struggle with basic reading comprehension...
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