Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[Sheilbh]

I've seen a few mentions of this age-based opening (the "unleash the youth") approach while cocooning the elderly and vulnerable. I get its appeal but it just seems sort of fundamentally unfair to me

Unfair how?

Speaking as someone in the at-risk group, I'd rather have those who can keep the economy going while I self-isolate than remain in quarantine anyway AND most likely lose my job.

Yeah - that's fair. I suppose I was mainly thinking about the elderly where this is already a group that I think are disproportionately likely to be lonely (there's been a big campaign in the UK about loneliness and mental health in the elderly), being isolated for 18 months while everyone else goes about their business. Not seeing kids and grandkids, or friends for that long is a horrible thing to ask of the elderly, even if it's right. It just feels more fair if the rest of us are also socially distanced so not seeing each other too.

There's a fairly damning account of the government's response in the Sunday Times, apparently. But it's paywalled so I don't know what it says

[Tamas]

There's a fairly damning account of the government's response in the Sunday Times, apparently. But it's paywalled so I don't know what it says

Yeah would be nice to read, especially as it sounds like Gove was lukewarm at best in rebutting it.

[Sheilbh]

There's a fairly damning account of the government's response in the Sunday Times, apparently. But it's paywalled so I don't know what it says

Yeah would be nice to read, especially as it sounds like Gove was lukewarm at best in rebutting it.

Yeah and the bits on Twitter seem to go from the genuinely serious to just quite personal attacks (like Johnson "managed to find time" to host the Chinese community for Lunar New Year - which was only days after the Chinese government shut Wuhan and, at that time, I remember there were concerns about boycotts of Chinatown and racism towards the Chinese community).

Tory twitter seems to be comparing it to the more positive story in the Sunday Telegraph and reading it as, at least in part, Murdoch's preference for Gove over Johnson v the Barclay brothers' preference for Johnson. This country. A global crisis and there is still a nagging suspicion that at the tope of the country we're all just extras in their fucked up Brideshead Revisited psychodrama

[Legbiter]

There's a fairly damning account of the government's response in the Sunday Times, apparently. But it's paywalled so I don't know what it says

Here's an archived link.

https://archive.li/9dJ00

[Iormlund]

Trending topic in Spain today is a paramilitary police general announcing in the daily briefing that one of their lines of work is "minimizing criticism of the government's actions" during this crisis. Hungary, Poland, hold our beers!

[Legbiter]

Need to start climbing down from lockdown in phases, if only because certain elements will start to like it a little too much, Iormlund. 

[DGuller]

Russia's growth continues to be unabated.  it's been stuck at 16%, give or take a percent or two, for all of April.  That's a 4.5-day doubling rate.  I'm actually shocked that they've been so perfectly ineffective at containing the growth, they're no trumps at this at the government level.  I guess the fatalism of the average Russian can negate any action on the government level.

[mongers]

Russia's growth continues to be unabated.  it's been stuck at 16%, give or take a percent or two, for all of April.  That's a 4.5-day doubling rate.  I'm actually shocked that they've been so perfectly ineffective at containing the growth, they're no trumps at this at the government level.  I guess the fatalism of the average Russian can negate any action on the government level.

Maybe because Trump, Putin and Bolsonaro are mainly singing from the same hymn sheet?

[DGuller]

Russia's growth continues to be unabated.  it's been stuck at 16%, give or take a percent or two, for all of April.  That's a 4.5-day doubling rate.  I'm actually shocked that they've been so perfectly ineffective at containing the growth, they're no trumps at this at the government level.  I guess the fatalism of the average Russian can negate any action on the government level.

Maybe because Trump, Putin and Bolsonaro are mainly singing from the same hymn sheet?

That may be true, but Moscow has been on quarantine for three weeks now.  Not the bullshit NYC quarantine, of the "please don't do something stupid or we'll have to start thinking about how to enforce our mandates", but the kind where you have to get a permit to leave your apartment.

[Valmy]

Russia's growth continues to be unabated.  it's been stuck at 16%, give or take a percent or two, for all of April.  That's a 4.5-day doubling rate.  I'm actually shocked that they've been so perfectly ineffective at containing the growth, they're no trumps at this at the government level.  I guess the fatalism of the average Russian can negate any action on the government level.

Maybe because Trump, Putin and Bolsonaro are mainly singing from the same hymn sheet?

That may be true, but Moscow has been on quarantine for three weeks now.  Not the bullshit NYC quarantine, of the "please don't do something stupid or we'll have to start thinking about how to enforce our mandates", but the kind where you have to get a permit to leave your apartment.

Isn't Moscow kind of special though? The rest of the country might not be so...um...thorough.

[Valmy]

Trending topic in Spain today is a paramilitary police general announcing in the daily briefing that one of their lines of work is "minimizing criticism of the government's actions" during this crisis. Hungary, Poland, hold our beers!

[celedhring]

C'mon, this was an obvious slip of the tongue from a dude that wasn't expected to have "appear daily in front of the press" in his job description, while talking about how they try to disprove fake news making rounds in social media (so dictatorial!). The opposition has taken the sound bite and ran with it, which is what they're supposed to do, but there's nothing here.

[Iormlund]

His statement was:

We are working in two directions: Working to avoid the social stress created by fake news and and [the other of the things we are working on is] minimizing the climate against the management of the crisis by the government.

Seems very clear to me, and many others.

[celedhring]

His statement was:

We are working in two directions: Working to avoid the social stress created by fake news and and [the other of the things we are working on is] minimizing the climate against the management of the crisis by the government.

Seems very clear to me, and many others.

Watch the full clip. The context is clear (fake news) and people are inflating this to create a scandal. Also this "fight" is reduced to try to disprove them, the Spanish state has no power (and rightly so) to persecute people/media, for merely providing fake news unless the statements are a felony themselves (i.e. hate speech).

Many, many, real things to criticize this government for.

[Iormlund]

Watch the full clip.

I have. The government has no business deciding what is fake news, much less using the police against them.