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What& #39;s the govt& #39;s goal? Is it to flatten the curve so the NHS is not overwhelmed? If so, now we& #39;re a couple of weeks past the infections peak, it& #39;ll shortly be time to allow more spread again, to keep the flow not too far below the NHS& #39; capacity to cope? Or is there another goal?
I& #39;m not necessarily saying there shldn& #39;t be any other goal than flattening the curve, but if there is shldn& #39;t we be told what that other goal is to see if we agree with it?
Part of the reason I keep asking what the goal is is that things the govt says make me suspicious it sees the goal as returning to containment - getting numbers down so low that individual cases can be identified & isolated. I don& #39;t think I agree with that goal at all, one bit.
It seems to me that if we could get out of this with only 60k excess deaths this year & another 60k excess deaths next year, with GDP declining no more than 15% & no more than two 1-mth lockdowns, that shld be considered a triumph.
Aiming for less than that risks being so greedy on the deaths reduction side that we disproportionately damage people& #39;s lives.
If there are 60k excess deaths this year that& #39;ll mean abt 610k deaths instead of 550k. That& #39;s bad. It& #39;s certainly not trivial & it& #39;s not like the flu. But does it justify totally overturning 66.4m people& #39;s lives for years?
& no, I don& #39;t mainly mean "the economy". I mainly mean: no choirs, sports, theatre, pubs, weddings, holding grandad& #39;s hand as he dies from cancer, seeing your daughter go on her 1st date, dancing in a nightclub til dawn, screaming yourself hoarse in a crowd when your team scores.
The above things are not worthless, & those that value them are not "heartless folk valuing money over lives".
