American Politics Discussion Thread

[Gustaran]

3rd paragraph of the linked article:

It's not clear how much chloroquine the man ingested, and Banner Health said he and his wife ingested a version of the chemical that's used to clean aquariums.

Better headline: "Woman's husband dies, warns to consult doctor before ingesting cleaning product"

Better article about this incident: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/20...ing-death/

You make a good point. I admit it would certainly be unfair to solely blame Trump for some moron ingesting a cleaning product.

At the same time, I can somehow understand people trying to get their hands on the drug and attempt to self-medicate. Given the current economic situation and depending on insurance status, people may refrain from "ask your doctor" because they can't really afford it at the moment.
That's why I think it's dangerous if the president publicly declares that a drug is powerful and safe, when this is in no way certain. Some people will take Trump literally, because they believe his claims that he is very knowledgeable.

[Bobchillingworth]

Unfortunately, I don't think it's a binary choice between millions of deaths and economic catastrophe; I imagine the former (with widespread panic and millions more seriously ill) would naturally lead into the latter.

That said, I'm also having a tough time seeing how the country locks down for 6 more months or whatever.

[Bobchillingworth]

the US health care "system" is simply not designed to provide the sort of mass, universal care required to protest the entire population from a pandemic.

Who does?

Darrell

No million+ population healthcare system in existence today, universal or otherwise, could protect everyone at all times from the possibility of catching the virus. If we had universal healthcare though we'd very likely be better equipped to implement the "let it spread quickly to acquire herd immunity ASAP" strategy without mass shortages of medical equipment, millions of preventable deaths, people refusing medical care for fear of bankruptcy, etc.


Of course we'd also need a competent administration and some sort of national paid sick leave mandate.


TBH, while one hopes that just maybe we might learn some lessons about how fucked up our healthcare system is going forward, there aren't any particularly good options in our present circumstances. Seems like the fallback strategy is praying that the virus isn't actually as dangerous as evidence suggests it is, which is less a national plan of action and more wishful thinking.

[GeneralKilCavalry]

Although the US healthcare system is absurd, I think this is less a reflection on the healthcare system but rather on the underfunding of the CDC, FEMA, and other disaster response organizations. We haven't learned the lesson from Katrina, Swine Flu, or Hurricane Sandy.

People are just not prepared, economically or psychologically, for disasters.

At the same time, the inability to quickly retool factories and force production of necessary goods is yet another endemic failure of the US economy.

[DaveV]

So, our famously empathy-challenged President is willing to let a bunch of people die if it improves his chances of reelection. The irony is that the people most likely to die fall right into the MAGA demographic (older, less likely to be insured, less likely to be well educated). I wonder how long it will take his brain trust to figure out that wrinkle...

[Miguelito]

Trump didn't think this was a big deal, but it provided a handy stick to ban Chinese travel, and the Democrats didn't think this was a big deal and they figured he was only pushing it because he already didn't like the Chinese.  No one big saw this coming.

Wasn't the whole Democrat Hoax thing about the Dems supposedly blowing the issue out of proportion inorder to damage Trump? So how did they at the same time act like it wasn't a big deal?

[ipecac]

Singapore seems to have, by far, done the best job.

Darrell

Hot 'n Humid is the way to go.

waves

The weather, being extremely small and having a compliant population helps a massive amount, though the population density is a risk factor.

[ipecac]

The modern world is not prepared for emergencies. Many households don't have savings to tide them over a rainy period, neither do many of the biggest business or corporations have sufficient funds (since they spend it all on buybacks), neither do healthcare systems (whether universal or otherwise) have enough of the medical equipment or medical staff to deal with devastating pandemics that we know happen every century or so.

Big Daddy government to the rescue!

[ipecac]

They’ve also used technology and organization to track contacts from infected patients. Data driven is the way to go.

Things are efficient and data-driven.

Consider this completely unverified claim

By the early 2000s, the agency ceased running certain types of operations in the Southeast Asian city-state, because of the sweeping digital surveillance there. The Singaporeans had developed a database that incorporated real-time flight, customs, hotel and taxicab data. If it took too long for a traveler to get from the airport to a hotel in a taxi, the anomaly would trigger an alert in Singaporean security systems.

Of course, I have no comment about such things.

[ipecac]

What is established, however, is the use of surveillance that could be considered intrusive in China, Korea, and Lombardy, to monitor known patients and do contact tracing.