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it's hard to know what is the best approach. Look at Italy, where the economy has been totally disrupted .... but look at how their hospitals have been completely overwhelmed, with people not able to get treatment because there is insufficient staff and equipment.
How much worse would all that be, and how much might the economy be hit, if that situation spread at the pace it was before the lockdown? How many businesses would have closed because owners and staff were waiting to get treatment, and meanwhile spreading the virus everywhere? Ultimately, would the cost be greater to have a much higher infection- and death rate (getting exponentially worse each day because hospitals would have less and less care to offer and more and more people would get infected) or would it cost more to keep everyone home and limit the spread of the disease? That kind of stuff is impossible to calculate.
here is something else: no matter what, a large number of people are going to complain. Some will complain because they cannot watch their soccer match, or are losing money by not working .... but they would complain if they got sick, or their friends did, and if the death toll got high, they would really complain .... even though they would have been the same people saying that the government shouldn't shut things down.
if there is going to be a high financial cost anyway, but there can be a lower cost in lives .... seems like we might as well try that route.
I can guarantee, anyone complaining now, before the disease has really gotten a foothold in the U.S., would be complaining ten times as loud if they got sick, went to the hospital and couldn't get admitted.
Eventually there will be a vaccine, or the virus will die out, or mutate ..... this is a temporary situation. But it is a real thing. it is infecting a lot of people, and what has been happening in Italy shows what can happen if the virus is ignored a couple weeks too long ... and remember, you have the disease for five days before you have symptoms. Everyone reading this might have already infected half their family and friend sin the past two days---or you might have gotten infected by someone who didn't take it seriously, coughed into his hand, and shook your hand without stopping to think.
And how would you feel if you went to the meat market and the guy in the back room sawing up the sides of beef was coughing? probably he just smokes too much .... right?
And sure, kids aren't much affected .... but if half the teachers in a school get sick, I guess they would have to close the school down anyway ... but by that point the kids would have spread the virus all over--to each other, to friends' parents, to the bus drivers, ...... imagine a school bus full of kids all talking and laughing ... and one kid coughing ....
People complain, but I bet if the person behind you at the grocery store tomorrow starts coughing, you get a really creepy feeling ... or get angry that they are putting you at risk.
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