Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[chewybrian]

The Economist has an updated (up to today) table of what it calls "Excess deaths since country’s first 50 covid deaths". It lists Great Britain with 399 per 100,000 population, and Japan with 243. This seems to show that this alternative method also says that Japan did a much better job managing the crisis.

[Lagayascienza]

That is an interesting article, Chewybrian. It seems to indicate that death rates from COVID and excess death rates are highest in countries that did not enforce lockdowns and mask mandates. I note the following:

"Some Nordic nations have experienced almost no excess deaths at all. The exception is Sweden, which imposed some of the continent’s least restrictive social-distancing measures during the first wave."

Of former republics of the Soviet Union, only Belarus suffered substantial excess mortality in early 2020, after introducing almost no constraints on daily life. A second wave in late 2020 affected the entire region. Russia now has one of the world’s largest excess-mortality gaps.

"Malaysia and the Philippines had “negative” excess mortality—fewer deaths than they would normally have recorded, perhaps because of social distancing."

"A handful of rich countries elsewhere publish regular mortality data. They tend to have negative excess mortality. Australia and New Zealand managed to eradicate local transmission after severe lockdowns. Taiwan and South Korea achieved the same outcome through highly effective contact-tracing systems."

[Sy Borg]

The most COVID deaths per million happened in Peru? Why? A chronically underfunded health system didn't cope with increased cases. The situation is more complex than is generally claimed, and I'm wary of being wise after the event. At the time, I was all for following the science and general OHS approaches, but I am not convinced everyone was playing with a straight bat. The involvement of Dr Fauci in coronaviruses in Wuhan, yet those who claimed that COVID came from the Wuhan lab that was in fact devoted to secret projects involving gain-of-function experiments with coronaviruses was labelled a conspiracy theorist.

What else were people gaslit about? I'm not sure I trust Big Pharma to provide unbiased studies.

[Fried Egg]

I was answering a claim that Japan had dealt with COVID worse than UK.

No, I was answering your claim that Japan's covid response is so much superior than the UK's by pointing out that the cumulative excess mortality rate since 2020 isn't much different from the UK's. Let's be clear though, I'm not in anyway saying the UK response was good. Only not as bad as was initially through by many when judged in the fullness of time.

To be honest, given the inability to post links and citations for statistical claims on this site, I think these discussions are best kept to philosophical discussion and argument.

"Some Nordic nations have experienced almost no excess deaths at all. The exception is Sweden, which imposed some of the continent’s least restrictive social-distancing measures during the first wave."

Talk about cherry picking facts to suit their argument. Norway, Sweden and Denmark all three enjoyed by far the lowest cumulative excess mortality compared to the rest of Europe and all three had comparatively less harsh lockdown restrictions than the rest of Europe. Yes, Sweden had the least restrictive covid response in Europe and nearly the best excess death statistics in Europe.

[Lagayascienza]

We must be reading different sets of data. I would be surprised if the quotes from The Economist's which I posted above are incorrect. But, as you say, the inability of non-paying users here to link to external sites makes comparison of data sources difficult.

What I am fairly certain of is that countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan and S Korea where there were lockdowns, mask mandates, contact-tracing and high rates of vaccination, also had low rates of infection and death and almost no, or even negative, excess mortality.

You seem to want to call into question the measures taken in these countries and to argue that they were, in hindsight, excessive and ineffective. However, I don't agree that that is what the statistics are telling us.

[Fried Egg]

We must be reading different sets of data. I would be surprised if the quotes from The Economist's which I posted above are incorrect. But, as you say, the inability of non-paying users here to link to external sites makes comparison of data sources difficult.

I'm not saying the Economist published outright falsehoods (although I haven't seen the article you refer to), but from what you said it sounded like they were framing the results in ways to make a particular point (and in a way that supported a particular view).

What I am fairly certain of is that countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan and S Korea where there were lockdowns, mask mandates, contact-tracing and high rates of vaccination, also had low rates of infection and death and almost no, or even negative, excess mortality.

Sweden's example is definitely an anomaly to be explained because it had one of the least restrictive covid policies in the world and yet is one up there among the best in terms of excess mortality.

However, I think we're only beginning to see and understand many of the negative impacts of lockdowns, partly because so few people are even asking the questions. For sure, I can understand why most countries felt they had to act quickly and didn't have time to even attempt a full cost/benefit analysis of lockdowns (and other measures) but we should certainly be trying to look at those questions now so we can learn for the future.

[Fried Egg]

I wish I could post the chart I generated from the "ourworldindata" website on cumulative excess deaths (since January 2020). I included Australia, South Korea, Taiwan, New Zealand and Sweden.

It's interesting because although Sweden was much higher than all the others until early 2022, they all then quickly overtook Sweden (with the exception of New Zealand that remains exceptionally low). As of 31 December 2023, The figures were:

South Korea - 85,450 (last reported data was 01 October 2023)
Taiwan - 38,760
Australia - 34,786
Sweden - 20,273
New Zealand - 563

New Zealand's data is certainly exceptional but it one of the most isolated countries in the world.

Don't get me wrong, the UK and the USA were both much worse than any of these but my point stands that Sweden does not fit in with the narrative that the strictest lockdowns lead to the best outcomes.

[Lagayascienza]

We must be reading different sets of data. I would be surprised if the quotes from The Economist's which I posted above are incorrect. But, as you say, the inability of non-paying users here to link to external sites makes comparison of data sources difficult.

I'm not saying the Economist published outright falsehoods (although I haven't seen the article you refer to), but from what you said it sounded like they were framing the results in ways to make a particular point (and in a way that supported a particular view).

What I am fairly certain of is that countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan and S Korea where there were lockdowns, mask mandates, contact-tracing and high rates of vaccination, also had low rates of infection and death and almost no, or even negative, excess mortality.

Sweden's example is definitely an anomaly to be explained because it had one of the least restrictive covid policies in the world and yet is one up there among the best in terms of excess mortality.

However, I think we're only beginning to see and understand many of the negative impacts of lockdowns, partly because so few people are even asking the questions. For sure, I can understand why most countries felt they had to act quickly and didn't have time to even attempt a full cost/benefit analysis of lockdowns (and other measures) but we should certainly be trying to look at those questions now so we can learn for the future.

Yes, if/when another virus of the COVID-19 type comes along we may, from what we have learned this time around, be able to take a more targeted approach to protect those who are more vulnerable whilst allowing the less vulnerable more freedom of movement.

However, if a different sort of virus we knew little or nothing about came along, and if it were highly contagious and had a high fatality rate, and for which a totally new type of vaccine would need to be produced, then we would need to do the same as we did with COVID-19 until we got an understanding of whether only specific cohorts were vulnerable or at high risk. This would all take time and we would need to listen to the scientists again - the microbiologists, the epidemiologists, etc.

If it were a highly contagious virus that killed everyone equally we'd be stuck. Until we understood the virus, quarantining cases and restricting social contact might be our only defense against such a pathogen until science gained an understanding of it, of how it was transmitted and what type of vaccine might work against it.

If this happened, I suspect the loony libertarians and anti-vaxers would again come out of the woodwork pretty quicky to call the science into question and promote their own nonsense and their quack cures. But science is our best defense and source of information on such matters. Only later, once the dust settles after an epidemic, can we start to tease out the details and think about how approaches to future epidemics/pandemics might be improved.

[Fried Egg]

However, if a different sort of virus we knew little or nothing about came along, and if it were highly contagious and had a high fatality rate, and for which a totally new type of vaccine would need to be produced, then we would need to do the same as we did with COVID-19 until we got an understanding of whether only specific cohorts were vulnerable or at high risk. This would all take time and we would need to listen to the scientists again - the microbiologists, the epidemiologists, etc.

Well, yes, but it comes back what I mentioned previously. There is no such thing as the science. Especially when it is something new and different that comes along. What I mean by that is that there are different scientific points of view and they should all be heard with dissenters not dismissed out of hand in order to foster the sense of a consensus that is stronger than there actually is. In other words, we need to listen to all the scientists and not those that have a predetermined "correct" view.

This is another thing that I think was generally handled pretty poorly during the covid pandemic. I can understand the concern about outright misinformation out there but the actions taken to eradicate it and present one clear and simple message went too far and even served to fuel conspiracy theorists.

However, if a different sort of virus we knew little or nothing about came along, and if it were highly contagious and had a high fatality rate, and for which a totally new type of vaccine would need to be produced, then we would need to do the same as we did with COVID-19 until we got an understanding of whether only specific cohorts were vulnerable or at high risk. This would all take time and we would need to listen to the scientists again - the microbiologists, the epidemiologists, etc.

If it were a highly contagious virus that killed everyone equally we'd be stuck. Until we understood the virus, quarantining cases and restricting social contact might be our only defense against such a pathogen until science gained an understanding of it, of how it was transmitted and what type of vaccine might work against it.

If this happened, I suspect the loony libertarians and anti-vaxers would again come out of the woodwork pretty quicky to call the science into question and promote their own nonsense and their quack cures.

There are always going to be extreme nutcases out there. But it was a problem that you couldn't even voice a concern about the vaccines without being called an "anti-vaxer". In other words, there needs to be room for proper discussion and reasonable doubt.

[Lagayascienza]

Fried Egg, the figures you gave are raw figures for cumulative excess mortality.

Excess mortality includes not only those who have died from COVID-19, but also deaths from all other causes over an above what we would expect to see under normal (non-pandemic) conditions.

Australia's total deaths from COVID is 24,414 and the excess deaths over and above those caused by COVID itself is 10,372. When these figures are added together we get the overall figure of 34,786 which you gave.

These are raw figures. But we would need to see these figures in percentage terms against percentage figures for other countries, and compare the lockdowns and other measures taken by each country, in order to get an accurate picture of whether those countries who instituted lockdowns etc. had a higher or lower excess death rate than those who did not.

That is, we need to look at the deaths from COVID and other causes which, together, are over and above what we would normally expect for each country. Then we could make a meaningful comparison.

The raw figures posted (see below) do not allow us to make meaningful comparisons between those countries listed with other countries such as the UK, the USA etc. which had less strict lockdowns, etc.

South Korea - 85,450 (last reported data was 01 October 2023)
Taiwan - 38,760
Australia - 34,786
Sweden - 20,273
New Zealand - 563

[Lagayascienza]

...there are different scientific points of view and they should all be heard with dissenters not dismissed out of hand in order to foster the sense of a consensus that is stronger than there actually is. In other words, we need to listen to all the scientists and not those that have a predetermined "correct" view.

Sure, there is mainstream science, and then there are the fringes. At the best of times, much less in an emergency like COVID, ordinary people not trained in microbiology, epidemiology etc. can not be expected to weigh up fringe views against that of the mainstream consensus scientific view. In an emergency, all they can do is go with the consensus of established scientists trained in these specialized fields. That is the correct, sensible, and indeed the only, thing people can do in an emergency like COVID and to do otherwise would be folly. It's only when the dust settles after a pandemic that we can start to look at views in more detail to see whether anything those on the fringes said was reasonable.

[Fried Egg]

Regarding the subject of the vaccine mandates and, quite timely for this discussion, there is a study just published (by National Academies) provides evidence of a casual relationship between the mRNA vaccines (i.e. pfizer and moderna) and myocarditis.

So yes, you can argue that the risks of covid outweigh the risks of these side effects, and I'd agree for most people this is probably true. But it definitely undermines the justification for making a vaccine mandatory. Especially when you are in a very low risk category for covid.

And again, you can say that's all very well with the benefit of hindsight but back at the time they had to do all they can to try and contain the virus. The problem with this argument is that in the early days supplies of the vaccines were very limited and countries were fighting over supplies. It would have been far more efficient to target the most vulnerable rather than insisting those already at low risk had to take it when they didn't want it.

[Lagayascienza]

Vaccines are only effective in controlling a pandemic if a large percentage of the population is vaccinated.

I agree that in the early days when the vaccines were in limited supply, it made sense to give them to the most vulnerable first. And that is what happened in Australia. Moreover, no one here was forced to have the vaccine. However, the vast majority of people were lining up for it long before there was enough available for everyone. And the fact is that, while the elderly and those with certain health conditions were more vulnerable to COVID, they weren't the only ones who were dying. COVID could also kill young, healthy people.

Therefore it made sense to to most people to have the vaccine. And so they did. And that's good. The vaccines are not 100% effective but they substantially reduce the risk of infection and they greatly reduce the severity of the disease and it's associated mortality. And new versions are being developed all the time as new variants of COVID emerge.

I am pretty certain that, at my age, had I not been vaccinated I would have died from COVID, or at least have become very seriously in and in need of hospitalization. As it was, my illness was very mild - about the same as a slight cold. I tested positive for about 10 days and that was the end of it. Thank goodness for vaccines and science.

[Fried Egg]

Vaccines are only effective in controlling a pandemic if a large percentage of the population is vaccinated.

Since these vaccines were more about reducing the severity of infection and less about preventing transmission, the above doesn't hold true as much as it does with vaccines for other illnesses (that are far more effective in reducing transmission). i.e. the benefits you of the vaccine do not depend so much on others taking it.

We can quibble on exactly how effective vaccines are at reducing transmission but if, as you say, Australia didn't have a vaccine mandate (and didn't need one) then we're not really disagreeing because I'm not arguing against vaccines, only against the mandates (for those places that had them).

[Pattern-chaser]

There are always going to be extreme nutcases out there. But it was a problem that you couldn't even voice a concern about the vaccines without being called an "anti-vaxer". In other words, there needs to be room for proper discussion and reasonable doubt.

It was a time, for a short time, when we were too busy fighting to save 1000s of lives, when dissent was unproductive and, quite frankly, unacceptable. And for that short time, it was not tolerated. Purely as a matter of prioritising the saving of lives. It was necessary. Briefly.