News US declares public health emergency

[Pilot7893]

I better start playing Left 4 Dead more. Can't get enough practice for the inevitable, you know.

 

[MJR]

I heard this morning on my local radio that there was two cases in my town. It was some elementary school. People are cleaning the school up and scrubbing it all down.

 

[eveningsky339]

Two confirmed cases in my state today. :dry:

Guess I can't go swimming in the Mexican dumpsters anymore. At least until the panic clears up.

Oh, and several of the New York teens who brought it back to the US are in the stages of recovery.

 

[Moonwalker]

Allegedly 16 H1N1-deaths out of all in all more than 100 usual influenza-deaths in Mexico. H1N1 (which by the way is not swine flu) doesn't seem to be a bigger threat than a usual influenza.

 

[Urwumpe]

Don't forget taking the number of infections in account. The normal influenza (usually H3N2) is a few ten thousand times more common, while causing 36000 deaths in the USA every year.

But we have only 926 cases of the new H1N1 strain, but already 20 confirmed deaths. Compare this to 200,000 hospitalized cases of influenza every year in the USA.

 

[Moonwalker]

Just as I said. The usual influenza is more deadly. 36.000 out of 200.000 is 18%, while 20 out of 926 is only 2%.

 

[Urwumpe]

Moonwalker: The latest outbreak is not even one month old. Better wait a few months more before you estimate the severity of the new virus strain and make a fool out of you. The other statistics are per year. One month is not enough to say much.

And as the new strain has the same deadly symptoms as the Spanish flu strain, all that really makes a difference is actually how fast it spreads. And in that case, it reached quite many people for the single month it had, with cases already in Europe.

 

[Moonwalker]

I used your numbers. And since they don't fit the panics you guess we should wait a few month. But guess what? In a few month it will be silent again (of course because of all the measures...). Mark my words.

We've had more than 30.000 influenza death's in Germany only in 1995/96. That's about 80 deaths each day. Nobody was and is interested (beside the vaccine-industries). It wasn't even noticed in the public, just like the usual ~10.000 deaths each year.

Beside Mexico, there are about 400 cases globally but no deaths. It's the Mexicans who sadly die for now (the baby also was from Mexico). I don't think it is basically the virus who is causing the deaths. It has something to do with the Mexican healthcare system, food, and so on, which all has effects to the immune system of people. Do not even drink water out of the tap in Mexico...

There are probably thousands of people globally who right now suffer from influenza. Even two of my workmates suffer from at the moment (we already joked on them).

 

[Urwumpe]

I used your numbers. And since they don't fit the panics you guess we should wait a few month. But guess what? In a few month it will be silent again (of course because of all the measures...). Mark my words.

Marked.

Don't you want to think twice regarding the fact that the virus first appeared in a small village in Mexico just one month ago before spreading over the world?

(Something people might have explained you often enough in the past: Any statistic is only as good as the model it is based on)

 

[Moonwalker]

(Something people might have explained you often enough in the past: Any statistic is only as good as the model it is based on)

Something I've already explained in the global warming and climate modeling discussions

 

[Urwumpe]

Something I've already explained in the global warming and climate modeling discussions

Actually, there you had rejected all models, because you did not like the numbers. The rule can't be reverted as it is not bidirectional: If you get unpleasant numbers, this is not a sign that the model is wrong.

 

[dmc]

I personally think this swine flu is blown way out of proportion. Accordoing to CDC there are only 896 Laboratory confirmed cases of swine flu as of today( May 7th). To me this is nothing at all to be worried about catching. People seem to think it is spreading like diseases in movies (I am Legend, 28 Days Later). In reality you have a better chance of dying from a car accident than even seeing someone with swine flu. So for real for real, I wouldnt even worry about it. There are tons of other sicknesses that are to be worried about that are more easy to come across and easier to catch.​

 

[Andy44]

Of course it's blown out of proportion. Government agencies have spent lots of homeland security money and set up plans to quarantine and vaccinate and mobolize and generally flex their bureaucratic muscle, and they all hoped this would be their big day.

Now they are upset because it didn't happen, so they are trying to scare us some more by telling us it'll be back in force when the winter comes. No doubt they will then find a way to attribute many seasonal flu deaths to swine flu and finally get to show us what they can do. At the same time they'll use the skewed statistics to brag about the great job they've done with seasonal flu.

The other day on the radio there was talk about Homeland Security's plans to force people into mandatory quarantine and what the penalties would be for trying to escape from this extra-judicial prison. There was also talk of mandatory vaccinations.

Boobus Americanus eats this stuff up. Something Mencken said about the goal of politics being to keep the populace in a continual state of alarm, and then selling itself as the savior.

 

[Eagle]

Actually, there you had rejected all models, because you did not like the numbers. The rule can't be reverted as it is not bidirectional: If you get unpleasant numbers, this is not a sign that the model is wrong.

The model is ALWAYS wrong. The question is if it's close enough for your purposes.

Unsurprisingly, when politics gets involved the necessary accuracy is reduced.

 

[Urwumpe]

Unsurprisingly, when politics gets involved the necessary accuracy is reduced.

Or the model gets recursive - it models itself. Happens far too often in politics. A law has to be made, because of problems, which are caused by the discussion of having such a law (for example internet censorship or banning paint ball)