On a planet with 8 billion people, we are talking about a lot of unnecessary deaths.
I’ve heard abortion advocates make similar sounding arguments.
It wouldn’t be if there was only 100 people living on earth.
Prisoners also exercise in the yard and buy food at the commissary. That the same term is used for something that happens in prison and something that happens in civil society isn't really relevant.
Surface transmission of COVID is pretty low, despite the initial fears. Unless you stick your hand in a puddle of snot (ewww) or touch a surface that someone just sneezed on and is still wet, you're probably not going to pick up a sufficient amount of the virus to cause an infection. Precautions like leaving packages outside for a week after dousing them in alcohol and/or bleach were excessive, in hindsight. However, many buildings in NYC have shared ventilation systems with inadequate filtration. So even if you're locked in your apartment, you're probably still breathing the same air as the guy next door. It also could be transmitted through poor plumbing (here's an example from the 2003 SARS outbreak, which is from the same family of viruses).
You're absolutely allowed to ask that. The question has been asked many times, by many people, and is being investigated by experts who know a lot more about that kind of thing than you or I. The answer so far is, "We're not sure." There is evidence that the Hunan Market was the origin point (most of the early patients had a connection to the market, and genetic data points in that direction as well), but there are also reasons to believe that it could have originated at the Wuhan lab (they were working on coronaviruses and had some issues with safety procedures). Investigations into the origins of the virus are still ongoing, and probably will continue for many years. The problem is that it's been turned into a political issue, and certain groups of people have decided that the answer is one thing or another, despite the lack of any conclusive evidence in any particular direction.
But were they significantly lower? Transmission in cities is driven by the inherent proximity that you have to other people just by existing there. As I already pointed out, living in an apartment building means that you're sharing air with hundreds of people, and in many cities, you could spit out your window and hit another building. Moreover, cities have plenty of "essential workers" as well, so people were still going out there despite the "lockdowns" too. In a rural area, assuming a full lockdown, the rate of infection should approach zero, with any pockets of cases easy to isolate (since the only people you would come into contact with are the people in your household). Add in any level of in-person interaction with outside groups, and that rate will quickly rise. It still may not be worse than a city where a smaller percentage of the population is going out, simply because you're not being exposed to anyone else's germs when you go home, but you're definitely going to get more spread than you would if no one went out.
Curfews are a way to reduce the load on a city's police and emergency services. Even if they're not actually arresting anyone for violating it, it reduces traffic (and corresponding traffic accidents), reduces crime, and makes enforcement of other laws easier. All good things when EMS is overwhelmed by COVID cases and police staffing is reduced.
I think the problem with this post is that you're using evidence your own eyes and ears rather than uncritically accepting what far-right misinformation sources were saying.
Oh? It's called a lockdown in prisons because the cells are locked down. The use of the term implies a less than flattering view of citizens.
Odds still favor transmission because people have to buy things like groceries and could not truly isolate.
That's true. Even asking the question is frowned upon in some circles. If you ask if I have evidence that it originated in the lab, my answer is no. If it didn't, it's an interesting coincidence, but coincidences do happen. China was very sensitive about being associated with the disease, and that's interesting; if it's a coincidence, maybe they wondered the same thing.
What would you call it then?
That definitely factored in, but the same circumstances would apply everywhere - everyone needs to eat. You said that the rates were "surprising" in NYC - I provided some potential explanations.
And in cities, people run hospitals, emergency services, government administration, shipping, grocery stores, etc. Nowhere was truly "locked down" in the sense that no one was going out - there are essential workers everywhere. I would agree that a higher proportion of rural inhabitants were considered "essential", and were not subject to stay-at-home orders, but that would still be a smaller number, and because rural communities tend to be more insular (i.e. they don't get a lot of traffic "just passing through," relative to large cities), the number of cases would be smaller than in cities.
No, because most people will follow the curfew. If the purpose of the curfew is just to reduce workload, then it need not be enforced rigorously as long as it reduces the number of people on the streets.
Maybe, but as I've pointed out, there are other things that a curfew can help with. And note that those things would also apply during natural disasters.
The traditional term is quarantine.
Incorrect. You quarantine an individual (or group of individuals) based on them being sick or potentially sick. You don't put people in quarantine to prevent them from being sick. People were under quarantine during COVD as well.
I'm not sure what you're getting at here. Even if just 10% of the population was being forced to stay home and not work, I'd argue that the government has a duty to alleviate that.
Arguments from incredulity aren't exactly convincing.
There can be multiple purposes to things like a curfew. They can both keep people safe and reduce the load on emergency personnel.
Not quite. The idea seems based more on people being sick without realizing it, either in the first stages or asymptomatic. In essence, everyone was considered a carrier. The situation is the same as in the days ships were quarantined when arriving at port out of fear those aboard were carrying a specific disease. Remember when it was supposed to be just a couple of weeks to slow the spread?
That was done as well - travelers from overseas, people who were sick, and people who had been in contact with someone who was sick were required to quarantine themselves, and it was specifically called that. (e.g. "I was at Debbie's all day yesterday, and she just told me she tested positive this morning. Guess I've got to go into quarantine for a week.")
Yes, and? Situations like pandemics are highly volatile, and predictions of what might happen can change significantly. Ultimately, most stay-at-home orders lasted ~4-8 weeks.
Yes, that is probably one of the more common ways that it spread. But the spread would have been much worse without the stay-at-home orders.
Show me where I've expressed that.
He'll be aware of them. But again, they won't be areas in which he is expert. He'll have no idea of the financial implications of a one week versus two week lockdown. Except that the latter will have a greater impact. He'll have no idea as to how to lessen that impact. He'll have no idea how many people could work at home, or whether there needs to be temporary financial payments to companies to keep afloat. He'll have no idea how they'll affect transportation or education. Supply chains. Travel between states. There are a boatload of considerations to be worked through.
