Saving Lives or Saving the Economy - False Choice?

[Turbo29]

Yes, testing many many people will be required. Testing for the virus and also testing for antibodies. Fauci: There might be "merit" to the idea of coronavirus immunity certificates https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/coronavirus-pandemic-04-10-20/h_22356f654296c004330e2149b8afd5eb

So if they open up the economy in the next couple of months, and let's say 10% of the people refuse to get tested and are out in public with everyone else, are you going to go to out to church, sporting events, stores, restaurants with the potential asymptomatic carriers?

I'm not a risk taker myself.

That's fine. You can hunker down at home. Doesn't mean everyone else has to give up their rights.

 

[Gumby]

MOD NOTE: Please calm down. I think we've seen the split in opinion and there is no need to flog a dead horse. Minds will not be changed. Thank you.

 

[RetiredAt55.5]

That's fine. You can hunker down at home. Doesn't mean everyone else has to give up their rights.

So what if you're asymptomatic yourself, and you cause other people to get sick and maybe die.

You're 'ok' with that?

They don't have a basic right to life?

 

[RobbieB]

There is no shortage of humans on the earth. Why protect them? Not an endangered species.

 

[Just_Steve]

So what if you're asymptomatic yourself, and you cause other people to get sick and maybe die.

You're 'ok' with that?

They don't have a basic right to life?

This could get interesting.

 

[RetiredAt55.5]

MOD NOTE: Please calm down. I think we've seen the split in opinion and there is no need to flog a dead horse. Minds will not be changed. Thank you.

I'm out. I don't want to cause the thread to get closed.

 

[Retire2013]

No. I will be avoiding group gatherings like the plague, and wearing whatever PPE I can when out for essentials for months or longer. I think I’ll be wearing mask, gloves and eye protection when out for quite a while.

+1

 

[Sunset]

companies could also want, as part of your employment background check, proof that you are not contagious or have immunity. It's not just the government that would be draconian about this. In fact, the government is more probably safer than private industry regarding privacy concerns.

I've worked at a bunch of jobs where drug testing was mandatory.
I see Covid-19 as the same.
If you are clean, you get to work or be hired.

I'd want the same rules for flying or cruises or trains or buses (shared space).

<edit> Note: I posted this while only seeing the first page. I'm not suggesting anyone be forced to get tested, just like I'm not forced to get a passport or secure drivers license, I just cannot fly without one or the other soon.

 

[Ian S]

I've worked at a bunch of jobs where drug testing was mandatory.
I see Covid-19 as the same.
If you are clean, you get to work or be hired.

I'd want the same rules for flying or cruises or trains or buses (shared space).

<edit> Note: I posted this while only seeing the first page. I'm not suggesting anyone be forced to get tested, just like I'm not forced to get a passport or secure drivers license, I just cannot fly without one or the other soon.

+1 It'll be voluntary but there's no constitutional right to board an airplane or enter a store so it may make everyday life a little bit of a nuisance for those who refuse a test but will save the lives and health of the rest of us.

 

[Closet_Gamer]

I don't think an immunity pass is viable.

Let me get this right...I have to get sick in order to participate in the economy?

Anyone who hasn't been sick is a second class citizen?

Where do I sign up to get sick? Seriously, there would have to be Covid kissing booths.

Like so many ideas we see in corporate America, this looks great in some statistical analysis on a powerpoint chart, but its completely unworkable in the real world.

I think they will have to switch the economy back on, and then we will deal with rolling shutdowns that are in some ways similar to brown outs when the electrical grid faces too much strain. In this case, the we will be looking at load on the, now fortified, healthcare system. They will measure this through random disease and antibody testing to understand when a given city is hitting a tipping point for the disease to scale again.

The development of effective therapies would then raise the bar on when you'd need a brown out because the concurrent load on the healthcare system would fall.

 

[atmsmshr]

The First Amendment outlined

Freedom of Religion, Speech, Press, Assembly, and Petition
Passed by Congress September 25, 1789. Ratified December 15, 1791. The first 10 amendments form the Bill of Rights

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The power to take quarantine measures is reserved to the states under the 10th Amendment. In 1824, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in Gibbons v. Ogden drew a clear line between the federal government and the state governments when it came to regulating activities within and between states.

Marshall’s reasoning set the precedent that police powers are reserved to states for activities within their borders (with some exceptions). Those police powers include the ability to impose isolation and quarantine conditions. Marshall wrote that quarantine laws “form a portion of that immense mass of legislation which embraces everything within the territory of a State not surrendered to the General Government.”

The federal government has important quarantine powers. Under section 361 of the Public Health Service Act, the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services has the power to take measures to contain communicable diseases from foreign countries into the United States and between states. The CDC acts on behalf of the Secretary in these matters.

Federal public health and welfare statutes also give the federal government authority to isolate and quarantine persons with certain diseases, based on an executive order issued by President George W. Bush in 2003. The federal government also has a seldom-used power to impose large-scale quarantines. For example, the federal government issued isolation and quarantine orders during the Spanish Influenza pandemic in 1918 and 1919.

But under the Constitution, individuals have rights in quarantine and isolation conditions. Under the 5th and 14th Amendment’s rights of Due Process and Equal Protection, public health regulations used to impose such conditions can’t be “arbitrary, oppressive and unreasonable.”

https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendment/amendment-i

 

[Tiger8693]

Drug testing for work, is not the same as not being able to work due to a health condition. This is what some on the thread are talking about with respect to slippery slope.

 

[Midpack]

No. I will be avoiding group gatherings like the plague, and wearing whatever PPE I can when out for essentials for months or longer. I think I’ll be wearing mask, gloves and eye protection when out for quite a while.

Sadly I agree regarding large gatherings for a long while, though I’m fairly confident Covid-19 would not kill DW or I. We have tickets to 2 concerts and 4 plays between now and year end, and we go to free concerts almost every weekend in a Summer - I doing we’ll do any of that this year unless something changes significantly. Very sad.

DW and I are now wearing masks and keeping our distance when we go shopping or the like. We also carry hand sanitizer. We’re seeing more and more masks every time we’re out.

And there’s a significant minority of people and workers who aren’t observing social distancing, wearing PPE or refraining from touching surfaces - I think they’re just not thinking more than consciously doing so.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

I am all for countrywide testing mandatory or otherwise. It should be at no cost to the those being tested, i.e. funded by the treasury. I would sure like to know if I was susceptible to infection before I actually get the virus. Once tested and cleared one should receive a "pass". Those with antibodies should get a different pass. Those who choose not to get tested can do so, their choice, but certain venues should not let folks who do not have a pass into them. Those with an antibody pass should have no or less restrictions. But it will never happen as the cost will be deemed too high.

Also if and when there is a Vaccine, one should also get a pass. All this assumes the virus does not just "go away" which seems very unlikely.

"The good of the masses outweigh the needs of the few" - Spock.

My worry is, assuming it all dies down, there will be folks walking around with antibodies, non symptomatic folks, those with mild cases. When we all go back to normal those who are still vulnerable will potentially be exposed and become sick, some may even die. Myself and DW could be one of those unless we get tested.

 

[Car-Guy]

So far just over 500,000 people have been confirmed to have had the virus in the US. There are about 330,000,000 people in the US.... Even if twice as many people have had the virus as confirmed (or even 3 or 4 times the number of confirmed) that's not even close to 1% of the population. You can do the math too.

Unless there are a lot of people with some sort of natural immunity, I'm not sure testing to see who is immune will help very much at this point. Maybe in a year or so but by then we should have treatments and/or vaccines.

 

[Tiger8693]

"The good of the masses outweigh the needs of the few" - Spock.

If only it were a tv show, or a Star Trek utopia that we actually lived in.

 

[donheff]

This seems like an academic argument. Such a program. voluntary or mandatory would require a massive national effort. Do any of us sniping back and forth believe that such an effort is forthcoming? Not going to happen.

On the other hand, in the absence of a credible national program, once stay at home orders are lifted businesses could start imposing their own idiosyncratic rules. That could become a contentious battle ground.

 

[MRG]

We are only in the first inning. We could come out shortly and maybe things go back to normal. That could happen, I mean the Easter Bunny visited today so anything is possible.

More likely, IMHO, we see multiple waves of this like the flu that took out my great grandparents 3 and 5 years after the first pandemic in 1890. I'm guessing by 2023-2025 people are going to be a lot more willing to do whatever it takes to survive.

 

[JustCurious]

So if they open up the economy in the next couple of months, and let's say 10% of the people refuse to get tested and are out in public with everyone else, are you going to go to out to church, sporting events, stores, restaurants with the potential asymptomatic carriers?

Yes.

I do not think we should so easily lay down and give up our fundamental constitutional rights for which our forefathers fought so hard. If I am too afraid to go out then I have the right to stay home, but the government should not force me to stay home.

 

[gauss]

So what if you're asymptomatic yourself, and you cause other people to get sick and maybe die.

You're 'ok' with that?

They don't have a basic right to life?

Okay - I will bite, in a respectfully fashion so as to keep the thread going.


So the question that I see here is: "Who has primary responsibility for protecting an individuals health/safety/life?"

The answer could be the asymptomatic carrier as @RetiredAt55.5 implies, or the answer could be the vulnerable person who's life is on the line.

You could drill this down one level deeper and ask why is the vulnerable person vulnerable to begin with? Are cumulative behavior choices at root of the vulnerability?

I am not arguing for one side or the other, but rather trying to peel back the skins of the onion to make folk's assumptions more visible.

-gauss

 

[JustCurious]

On the other hand, in the absence of a credible national program, once stay at home orders are lifted businesses could start imposing their own idiosyncratic rules. That could become a contentious battle ground.

Private businesses have the right to set up their own rules, within reason, and the public has the right to accept or reject those rules, but I do not think we should accept the government restricting our freedom to associate and move about.

 

[mpeirce]

As we talk about various measures for this disease, you also have to consider other diseases.

There are various, pretty bad existing diseases. Should you also have mandatory testing for them? Consider tuberculosis - pretty bad and pretty contagious. There are others.

What about upcoming diseases and mutations of existing diseases? What if next years influenza includes a nasty strain.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

As we talk about various measures for this disease, you also have to consider other diseases.

There are various, pretty bad existing diseases. Should you also have mandatory testing for them? Consider tuberculosis - pretty bad and pretty contagious. There are others.

What about upcoming diseases and mutations of existing diseases? What if next years influenza includes a nasty strain.

We should proceed and address such things one at a time, with rational decisions (and mandates/rules) that are good for the whole population, not just small group. A Pandemic cannot really be put into the same category.

 

[mpeirce]

We should proceed and address such things one at a time, with rational decisions (and mandates/rules) that are good for the whole population, not just small group. A Pandemic cannot really be put into the same category.

I'm just saying that we need to consider future consequences of current actions and precedents.

 

[Willers]

I find the Sweden experiment very interesting given their unique approach. As of yesterday they have had 899 confirmed deaths. Given a population of a little over 10 million, that is a .009% death rate (also currently a 0.1% infection rate). In the end it might be a good comparison to the approaches other counties are taking.