Quote:
Originally Posted by Irace86.2.0
Profits over lives.
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This is exactly the problem in the U.S., and the heart of why the pandemic has been so woefully mismanaged and is raging out of control in the U.S. All the denial, balking at lockdowns and other containment measures, fighting against mask wearing, and other nonsense is because too many people - elected governmental leaders at the front of the line - prioritize near-term profits over lives.
The fallacy, and reality, is that they are actually mutually aligned. Experience has shown that economies thrive when people not only feel safe, but actually
are safe to go out and spend money without having to worry about whether they might get sick, or die, if they go to a restaurant or store, etc. So many people just don't seem to understand that, and focus only about near-term profits and unsustainable revenues.
It really is simple, and comes down to this: unmasked people gathering in enclosed spaces is a recipe for infection. Period. Stop this and the pandemic can be contained, as it has been in Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam, Taiwan, Thailand, even China and Cuba, and to a lesser extent, Vermont and Maine. Ignore this and it will spread, as it is doing in most places in the U.S.
Allowing indoor dining in restaurants during a raging pandemic is one of the greatest lunacies. A recent study showed that it's possible to get infected in a restaurant in just 5 minutes being 20 feet away from an infected person:
https://jkms.org/DOIx.php?id=10.3346/jkms.2020.35.e415
A long list of public health experts have warned that indoor dining in restaurants, where people sit unmasked for long periods of time, is one of the most dangerous things during the pandemic. Yet, so many states allow it.
Rhode Island has been bouncing along with one of the highest infection rates in the entire world (first, second, or third, depending on the daily fluctuations in the data). Yet, the outgoing governor (to become the new Secretary of Commerce) allows restaurants to seat indoors at 50% of capacity. I heard from one of the RI state representatives that the governor essentially decided that a rate of 50,000 infections and 2,000 deaths per year was an acceptable trade-off for the 'balance' between saving lives and jobs. There are so many things wrong with that thinking, including that it's impossible to 'manage' a pandemic to a particular level of deaths. It's not a spreadsheet one can fineness and tinker with. But then, RI's outgoing governor is a venture capitalist, so it's probably to be expected.
It's a very steep price to pay to eat a hamburger indoors.