Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[Tamas]

 

Yeah well what he was saying is that they have only recently started Britishing frail elderly away from the ICU, but the trend toward younger patients have been happening earlier.

[Iormlund]

... I think there are lessons to learn from this...

There is one lesson, yes. Every major country needs to have the capability to manufacture vaccines and PPEs in huge quantities at a moment's notice. I don't think we've learned it. though.

The next time will be just as bad.

[Sheilbh]

There is one lesson, yes. Every major country needs to have the capability to manufacture vaccines and PPEs in huge quantities at a moment's notice. I don't think we've learned it. though.

The next time will be just as bad.

Agreed - and I'd add gene sequencing and diagnostics/testing. Because I think the thing we're seeing now is the risk of variants in pandemics and even when we have vaccines we need to be able to identify them, test them and probably manufacture boosters for them.

I think every medium sized country probably needs some form of industry on this now. But I don't know if that lesson will be learned - I really hope that having ramped up to doing over a million tests today that the UK is back where we were this time last year doing about 10k tests a day with over 50% coming back positive. I really hope we don't end up blind again and without the tools to fix it.

[Barrister]

... I think there are lessons to learn from this...

There is one lesson, yes. Every major country needs to have the capability to manufacture vaccines and PPEs in huge quantities at a moment's notice. I don't think we've learned it. though.

The next time will be just as bad.

BUt that's really the wrong lesson to learn.  Rather than every country having vaccine and PPE manufacturing capability, which is hugely inefficient, the lesson we should have learned is all countries need to work together in a global effort to fight the next pandemic.

[DGuller]

... I think there are lessons to learn from this...

There is one lesson, yes. Every major country needs to have the capability to manufacture vaccines and PPEs in huge quantities at a moment's notice. I don't think we've learned it. though.

The next time will be just as bad.

BUt that's really the wrong lesson to learn.  Rather than every country having vaccine and PPE manufacturing capability, which is hugely inefficient, the lesson we should have learned is all countries need to work together in a global effort to fight the next pandemic.

I think that's a naive lesson to learn.  What's the enforcement mechanism for every nation to work together? 

When they going gets really tough, most governments will prioritize their citizens over others, international cooperation be damned.  US presidents get elected by US citizens, and maybe with a little help from Russian citizens, but they don't get elected by Canadian citizens.

Free trade is obviously more efficient, but nations still have strategic reserves.  They understand that in times of deep distress, trade breaks down at least temporarily.  You should strive for efficiency for everyday life, but you should strive for robustness to deal with extreme events.

[Sheilbh]

BUt that's really the wrong lesson to learn.  Rather than every country having vaccine and PPE manufacturing capability, which is hugely inefficient, the lesson we should have learned is all countries need to work together in a global effort to fight the next pandemic.

Isn't it a bit of both though? You need the cooperation but I think you also need the localised production and diversity of manufacturers/supply chains.

And I think in a way haven't we benefited from the diversity of suppliers producing vaccines - that's why we have what 5-6 vaccines in production and use around the world with different supply chains that are scaling up independently. I think we definitely need cooperation on distribution - especially to ensure the entire world has access - but I feel like actually multiple suppliers and research projects there has been really helpful because we never knew what would work.

[crazy canuck]

... I think there are lessons to learn from this...

There is one lesson, yes. Every major country needs to have the capability to manufacture vaccines and PPEs in huge quantities at a moment's notice. I don't think we've learned it. though.

The next time will be just as bad.

BUt that's really the wrong lesson to learn.  Rather than every country having vaccine and PPE manufacturing capability, which is hugely inefficient, the lesson we should have learned is all countries need to work together in a global effort to fight the next pandemic.

Ivory tower thinking at best.  In the real world we need to plan for allies and trade partners to abandon international commitments and turn on allies, depending on how their elections go.  Gone is the era when there is any certainty in international relationships and alliances.  It is one of the most damaging things the Trump era gave the world.  And it will take years to repair.

[Grey Fox]

What we need to learn is to take the GAFAs money.

[Jacob]

BUt that's really the wrong lesson to learn.  Rather than every country having vaccine and PPE manufacturing capability, which is hugely inefficient, the lesson we should have learned is all countries need to work together in a global effort to fight the next pandemic.

For sure, but that is vulnerable to a Trump on the scene or shit like what the Chinese pulled with Canada. So the lesson is true, but bad faith political actors remain a possibility.

[Sheilbh]

Or even innocent issues like half the world discovering they rely on the same Chinese PPE suppliers which is fine in normal times, but an issue when there's a pandemic and everyone needs billions of pieces of PPE now.

[Admiral Yi]

People are talking as if the US broke contractual or treaty obligations to Canada.  Is this really the case?

[Legbiter]

Also I have a lot of sympathy with the Commission in the vaccine debate in Europe - but I think there are lessons to learn from this and I am slightly alarmed that I saw a quote in the French press from a senior European civil servant that "it's cultural, the Brits don't have the same risk aversion as Europeans, the precautionary principle and its less structured" in the UK. It just feels very complacent and lazy - like saying Asia's been successful in clamping down on covid because of "Confucian values" (including Australia and New Zealand). I always worry when I see civil servants or politicians vaguely gesturing to cultural differences (especially in such a narrow cultural difference as the UK v continental Europe ) because it sounds to me like they've just decided not to try and learn any lessons or make any changes, for whatever reason.

Classic CYA. The EU were late in the game and ordered too little.

[Iormlund]

BUt that's really the wrong lesson to learn.  Rather than every country having vaccine and PPE manufacturing capability, which is hugely inefficient, the lesson we should have learned is all countries need to work together in a global effort to fight the next pandemic.

As DG says, that's rather naive.

Look at who's furthest in vaccination efforts right now. The US and the UK, both of which have banned export of vaccines (de iure or de facto). Whereas the EU, which has not, or Canada, which lacks capacity, face months of delays coming out of the pandemic in comparison.

[Jacob]

People are talking as if the US broke contractual or treaty obligations to Canada.  Is this really the case?

That's not what I was talking about, at least... and I don't think he was.

I was talking about Trump pulling stuff like trying to buy that German vaccine researcher/ manufacturer for US use only, shitting on WHO cooperation, and generally go all in on the everyone-for-themselves approach. I think that set the tone and undermined a good deal of potential cooperation.

[crazy canuck]

People are talking as if the US broke contractual or treaty obligations to Canada.  Is this really the case?

BB's proposition is that the lesson to be learned is that we need to create such obligations.  But who would put their faith in what the US or China agreed to do after witnessing the last few years.

Much better to have robust domestic capability.