If this is what our decision-makers believe, then why isn't there a lockdown every winter to stop flu deaths?
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Because we have grown accustomed to the flu, it spreads much less, and it kills far fewer people. People can even get vaccinated, and we try to vaccinate as many as we can every year - not an option we have with Covid19.
A new disease with unpredictable long-term effects, that kills at least twice as many people as the flu despite unprecedented preventive measures is bound to cause more alarm.
Remember that regions hit early and unprepared were carting dead people by the truck load, most notably in Northern Italy. If we didn't have lockdowns and other measures, that would have continued and escalated all over the world - we would have probably easily had 10 million or more dead just this year if we had treated this just like a flu.
> it spreads much less, and it kills far fewer people.
Over what timeframe? Novel viruses come but once per century, flu kills consistently year after year after year, always mutating to escape eradication... and the flu deaths pile up to astronomical heights over the decades
Covid 19 is likely here to stay forever as a seasonal outbreak, like the flu. Viruses in general don't go away unless extraordinary measures are taken. They also tend to add up - the flu kills this many people each year, Covid19 will kill an extra this many people each year.
CoVID-19 has already killed as many Americans as flu typically does in 10 years.
Only a relatively small percentage of Americans have gotten infected with SARS-CoV-2 yet. Without vaccination, in the space of a few years at most, CoVID-19 will kill as many people as flu does in many decades.
Source? According to CDC, flu has killed 336k over the past 9 years[0]
Ok, so Covid 19 killed 60% as many people in one year as the flu in 10, and this only after huge efforts have been made to slow it down. Without the lockdowns and masks, it would have easily topped flu deaths for the decade. Much worse, if the Healthcare system gets overrun.
Yeah only because it's a novel virus and there is little to no herd immunity. I'm sure flu killed even more its first year when it was novel (since we didn't know about how viruses spread). Once it is no longer novel it will be a seasonal virus likely that kills at similar rates to flu. The real question is, can we stop wearing masks once we've achieve herd immunity? Or is it worth wearing them cradle to grave to reduce seasonal deaths as well?
Herd immunity is something that happens when you have the majority of the population vaccinated. There's no such thing as natural herd immunity. Hopefully, the Covid19 vaccines will be able to destroy a broader variety of the SARS-CoV2 strains than the flu vaccines can.
Masks are something we will hopefully have learned to wear forever during the cold season, as they will have a measurable impact on deaths not just from seasonal Covid, but from seasonal flu as well. I believe that the majority of the population will internalize this simple hygienic practice from now on, which would be one silver lining for this pandemic. People in East Asia have learned this habit some time ago, and it has served them well.
The US is already at 250,000 confirmed CoVID-19 deaths, with over 1000 deaths every day, and rising.