How are Europe's Coronavirus Cases so Bad???

dawnrunner wrote:

Europe is a few weeks ahead of usa. It will hit you as well hard. This is a lesson in the dynamics of exponential growth. The growth function we see in europe has not changed a lot recently. We see exponential growth since a while and now suddenly everybody is surprised. Humans have difficulty to understand exponential growth.

4runnerII wrote:

-Higher population density

-Higher % use of public transit

-It's colder in Europe earlier in the year.

Don't worry-- winter is coming to the US too...

I don't think either of you understand why this is irregular. Nobody should be surprised that the US has large-scale outbreaks of the virus. The Federal Government does almost nothing to mitigate it, and leaves it to individual state governments, most of whom do almost nothing to mitigate it. An exponential spread in the US is expected more than anything else.

The reason this is so strange is that the vast majority of European nations actually DO engage in substantial mitigation efforts. The UK, France, Spain, Germany, Belgium, etc. all had fairly aggressive lockdowns and have substantial contact tracing in place that has, for months, kept the virus at perfectly manageable levels. It is incredibly surprising that the current outbreak is so bad. Seriously, density as an explanation? Europe has been managing very competently for half a year now, and their population density most certainly has not changed.

As a side note, as far as this year is concerned, it is not actually colder in Europe earlier in the year. The East Coast of the US has had snow for weeks now. A student of mine who arrived from Oxford a few weeks ago was shocked that Boston was getting snow in October.

Just Another LRC Idiot wrote:

Tatar wrote:

Nonsense?

FAR less wealthy countries have dealt better with COVID than any country in Europe or North America. Yes, they had the infrastructure post-SARS but the ability of government agencies and talent of civil service and politicians in those countries has dwarfed us.

We've just been told since the Reagan days in the 1980s how government is always inefficient and now the rest of the world has pulled a number on us.

^This. People in many Asian countries are complying with the contact tracing because they believe the government is doing the right thing. They even accept the digital tracking by the GPS devices.

This is not rocket science. Test, trace and isolate will get the virus under control. So many people in Europe and Americas do not want to control the virus.

The main reason is a lot of Asian cultures don't generally hug. A lot of them bow. They also have been dealing with coronavirus outbreaks far longer and many of them already had masked from dealing with extremely poor air quality.

We're still pretending Sweden is a disaster are.

Oh my god look at the jump in deaths. They breifly went to 6 a day and then back to 3. Oh, the humanity. Herd immunity is imaginary, they're going to go exponential!!!!

We need put Covid Captain Cuomo on the case and he'll fix it up. He knows how to handle Covid. Since he killed literally twice as many people per capita as any place anywhere he's done fantastically. You know C'mon man because of the science man.

I think you or someone with similar views on the success of Asian nations posted something similar on another thread. I reiterate a point I made there, which is that it is nearly impossible for most European countries to actually eliminate the virus because they have progressive and democratic governments. Australia and New Zealand are the exceptions among western nations, as they are so isolated from the rest of the world (and have low populations). In the case of Latin America, they cannot achieve it simply because they lack the infrastructure, and because most governments are in a constant state of chaos.

The vast majority of East Asian countries (we will exclude the Middle East, because they're faring relatively poorly for a different set of reasons) that managed to fully eliminate the virus had extraordinarily strict policies in place that are only possible because they exist under Authoritarian or near-Authoritarian governments. Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Singapore, Thailand, and China were effectively saved by the government unilaterally enforcing full quarantines (and often incredibly xenophobic restrictions) with or without consent by the populace. In the case of Singapore, lockdowns were even racially segregated, with migrant workers being forced to shelter-in-place 10 people to a room, while normal residents went about limited daily activity.

South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan have the most influence from the west in their governments, and South Korea and Japan are, relatively speaking, currently fare poorly compared to most other Asian nations (though still well compared to the rest of the world). Both have had repeated outbreaks, and are in a constant state of virus whack-a-mole, and they largely rely on cooperation from their populace to maintain control. They have a very educated and fairly homogeneous population, so this has actually worked well.

Taiwan is the one true exception here, but their entire populace is fanatically opposed to China to the point that they ignored all WHO guidelines early on, stopped international travel (particularly from China), and assumed the Chinese government was being dishonest the whole way through. This is probably the one of very few cases where intense xenophobia/racism has actually had substantial benefits.

Compare this to Europe. Like the US, many nations in Europe have had "anti-lockdown protests", which serve nothing but spreading the virus. The same with virtually ALL other protests. BLM protests, anti-police protests, and whatever else, will ALL ensure that the virus cannot actually be fully eliminated, even with serious measures in place. And Europe cannot do anything to prevent this, because these freedoms are inherently part of the political and government culture there. More than that, Europe is far more globalistic than the Asian nations, and individual countries, while managing well, can end up failing due to poor control of their neighbors.

If you want the virus to be eliminated, you effectively need a dictator who can impose incredibly harsh measures and implement punishments so harsh for breaking those measures that no one will actually do it. Barring that, no Nation that is not an isolated Island is going to be eliminating this thing. China imprisoned and executed people for breaking quarantine and trying to leave the Wuhan region, and now the virus is under control. Can you imagine a single progressive European country doing that? They can't even stop their own populations from protesting lockdowns.

Sweden backfills their data. They do not report in real time. Data from last week will get updated as this week goes on. And it is early in Sweden's outbreak. They do have a chance to avoid the worst if they act now. If the voluntary measures recommended by the government have compliance that results in reduced activity that is equivalent to a government mandated lockdown, then they will get this under control quickly. If they keep doing what they have been doing and think that it can't happen to them because Swedes are special, they will be in very bad shape in a few weeks and deaths will take off. What is clear is that any claim of herd immunity in Sweden has been completely eviscerated.

This view of East Asians is really bordering on a racist trope. East Asians did not have to be forced with the threat of imprisonment and death to comply with coronavirus measures. Compliance in East Asia was by and large voluntary because people had experience with SARS, MERS and other infectious diseases and understood how important it was to do your part and protect the community. The idea that East Asia would be just like the US but for their autocratic governments demeans the intelligence of East Asians and their very admirable sense of community. It also ignores the fact that East Asian governments have nailed their response while Western governments have floundered. if anything, this observation is an indictment of Western democracy that should have us all taking a very hard look at what our governments are doing instead of constructing a fantasy world where the coronavirus can only be stopped at the but of a soldier's rifle.

I’m from Belgium.

During summer, restrictions were lifted.

Although wearing a face mask was obligatory in shops and supermarkets, we were allowed to see up to 15 different people per week (close contact).

Later this was reduced to 5 different contacts per week.

And now, with our dramatic figures, we can see 1 person/ week in close contact outside of our nuclear family.

People have been asked to wear face masks in public places, but meanwhile they could see a lot of people privately. This has led to the current situation.

We have a Covid mortality of 1 in thousand Belgians; this figure would mean 328000 deaths in the US.

It’s clear that Covid is very contagious and that asymptomatic or presymptomatic spreading is a big factor.

A positive thing is that less patients (18 % instead of 25%) need transfer to ICU. This is attributed to the widespread use of dexamethasone.

Just my humble opnion.

Its election day and the Chinese bots are out in force!

I am Chinese, grew up in China and Vietnam, and my ENTIRE family save four individuals are currently in China, Taiwan, or Vietnam.

Are you Chinese, and did you come from China? No? Then I don't think you have enough cultural experience to even remotely comment on this. The fact that you do would be forgivable if you got anything correct, but you did NOT.

You clearly do NOT understand the systems that are in place, nor do you understand ANYTHING about East Asian culture, given what you just stated. South Korea and Japan barely fit your description. China absolutely does NOT, nor does almost anywhere in South East Asia.

Let's use Vietnam as an example here.

First, since there start, there have been a set of military-controlled quarantine camps to deal with the virus. Every single person under suspicion (particularly those re-entering the country at any time) were placed in one of these camps. Propaganda posters were placed across the country, and military personnel were sent out and about to ensure order. Contrast this with Europe and the US, where quarantines were quite literally not enforced. At ALL.

Do you think the military was mobilized because the government trusted people to act on their own?

Second, citizens would incur utterly enormous fines for violations. Participating in a large gathering would incur a fine of 20 million VND, and spreading fake information could incur a fine of 15 million VND (or prison time) when the median wage is ~3 million VND. For a US citizen, that would be akin to being fined $150,000+ for attending a party or spreading a Breitbart link. Breaking quarantine orders would incur a 100 MILLION VND fine.

Not only this, but you could be IMPRISONED for up to 5 years for refusing quarantine, spreading the virus, spreading fake news, or continuing to run a business that has been required to close.

Again, do you think these fines were imposed because the government trusted the population to act on its own?

Third is something you would not understand, which is that Vietnam functions incredibly well as a surveillance state. Not because of central government infrastructure, but because the population is highly individualistic and nationalistic. Vietnam does NOT have an obedient population because we are considerate of our neighbors. It has an obedient population because we hold a generally self-serving but incredibly Vietnam-centric mindset.

The best example is the article above, the only one I could find in English. Vietnamese citizens were ENCOURAGED to report their neighbors for violations (and absolutely did so). You keep yourself and your family safe by throwing violators to the police, even if they're your neighbors. So what if you've lived by them for years, if they put you at risk, call the police and have them dealt with.

More importantly though, HUNDREDS of people were actually fined (and this was many many months ago). Do you think that happens if the population is simply community-driven like you say? Yes, the population is community-oriented to an extent, but it's made possible because they systematically crush anyone who refuses to fall in line. This isn't a matter of "help your neighbor so we all get through this". This is a matter of "I'm going to get through this, and if you're going to mess that up, I'm throwing you to the dogs".

This same mindset effectively occurred large-scale across the entire country to make up their foreign response. This is literally a matter of "screw the rest of the world, but Vietnam is NOT going to have this happen".

From the very start of the virus, the Vietnamese government quite literally closed borders to China, and Vietnamese business owners posted signs openly indicating that Chinese individuals were not welcome. Do you think this would EVER occur in a Western Nation? This would be like Trump banning Chinese individuals, and the entire country backing him and cheering while he did it. It does not happen.

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Now that you have this information (which I absolutely know you did not before I posted them here, or you wouldn't have remotely said something so ignorant), we can summarize some details of Vietnam's response:

- Mandatory Military-controlled quarantine quarters for anyone entering the country, or anyone suspected of having the virus. This is IMPOSSIBLE in democratic western nations. They would immediately scream "dictatorship".

- Imprisonment for breaking quarantine, refusing to close a business, or spreading fake information. Contrast this with the US, where gym owners and restaurant owners literally refused to close without consequence, anti-lockdown protests occur every week, and fake news is spread on the daily.

- Fines equivalent to 5-10 years of the average annual wage for refusing to wear a mask, hiding your coronavirus status, inhibiting virus control efforts, or spreading fake information.

- Orders to report your neighbors to the police if they engage in any violation.

- Military and police personnel patrolling the area.

- Propaganda posters posted on every street to induce a Nationalistic "us against the world" response in Vietnamese citizens".

- Highly Xenophobic response towards the Chinese, enacted by the government and backed by nearly the ENTIRE population. Contrast this with Europe and the US, where Trump says something like "China Virus", and the entire country is up in arms.

From your other posts about this situation, you are clearly a progressive individual from the US or Europe, and while I may agree with some of your progressive views, it is very clear to me that you do NOT understand a single thing about the culture in almost ANY Asian nation.

The reason responses in China and various South East Asian nations succeeded were a combination of authoritarian rule, and intense nationalism and xenophobia. Vietnam's governmental response was to mobilize the military and criminalize any action that could spread the virus. Vietnam's response across the population was to engage in intense Xenophobia and Self-Preservation. Chinese people were mistrusted. People coming from foreign countries were mistrusted (and reported if necessary). Neighbors breaking rules were reported. The Vietnamese people take the view that every other country is a hell-hole packed with the virus, but we're better than them, so we'll make sure it won't happen here.

The US and Europe CANNOT do this, because

1) The populations love their freedom enough that they are bluntly non-compliant without government intervention. The anti-lockdown protests in the US, Spain, Germany, etc. are enough examples of this.

2) The progressive nature of the societies ensure that harsh measures cannot actually be taken by the government. Look at all the Black Lives Matters protests. Thousands gathered together to spread the virus. If this happened in Vietnam, the military would break it up, arrest and imprison the instigators, and fine them all 100 million VND. Look at the people refusing to shut down their gyms. In Vietnam, the owners would be fined 100 million VND, arrested, and imprisoned.

3) Nationalism is dead. Half the population actively hates the country at any given time, so it will never comply, and because of that, the countries can never mount a fully unified response.

Vietnam, China, and Singapore are one-party states. Thailand is a monarchy. There is NO situation where a unified response can be inhibited by progressives protesting the treatment of foreigners by the government, or conservatives protesting how the government is infringing on their freedoms. Dissenters were systematically purged (yes, purged) long ago.