The last couple months has done more damage than good to me. I'm that type of person who'll lose muscle quickly if stops working out for mote than 2 weeks.
It's not about you. It's about everyone else.
How can someone be so selfish and self-absorbed that they think their "muscle mass" is more important than the health of hundreds or thousands of other people?
I know this question may violate some HN policy, but I can't help but ask: What's wrong with you?
> I know this question may violate some HN policy, but I can't help but ask: What's wrong with you?
There have been times in the past where I've made HN comments that were meant as constructive criticism to another HN user. But my accidental tone ruined any chance of my comment being helpful. @dang was gracious enough to provide me detailed feedback [0], and it seems to be working for me.
"Staying healthy" can be done with zero equipment and no gym membership. If you think otherwise, then your goal isn't to "stay healthy", your goal is to show off at gym bunnies. And no, your showing off and vanity is not a choice you get to make during a pandemic. Tough.
Sadly, this is the source of your downvotes. For so many (even here on HN of all places), it's all about ME. My freedom. My choices. My comfort. My convenience. My need to eat at that restaurant or buy that ranch dressing. My absolute right to do squats next to some random person at a gym. Anything that gets in the way of my freedom to do every little thing I want to do any time I want to do it is bad.
We're not talking about genocide here or shredding the constitution. We're talking about sensible and temporary public health policy. But no, I just have to go get my hair done.
I am neutral towards your comment, but I feel you're judging me for my beliefs and opinions, even though you don't know where I come from and what's important for me.
There are several decent ways to keep oneself in good shape for a few months while gyms are closed. Insisting this is a big, important problem for you while also (apparently) not taking advantage of those options means the way you're presenting yourself in your comment doesn't look so great, to put it mildly.
I am taking advantage of the other options, and I am in good shape (well, lean and slender xD). But I can't really replace the gym and the swimming pool with the other options.
Also, I am not concerned how others perceive my beliefs because I know what works for me, so to each their own.
How did "do three things to prevent mass death" (distance, mask, wash hands) become "we're all going to die anyways so i'll keep doing whatever I want thank you."
Well, when did "flatten the curve to avoid overwhelming the health system" become "lets close gyms, churches, salons, non-chain stores indefinately but keep open Home Depot, Walmart, liquor stores, pot shops?" Or allowing gatherings for one political viewpoint as ok, but gathering for another as 'selfish and dangerous'?
There's plenty of inconsistency to go around. Add in different perceived risks and different risk tolerances, and what u see as necessary can be seen as narcacism by others.
On the face of it the rules are very simple: stores selling essential goods are allowed to stay open, others must close. So taking each of those:
Home Depot - construction industry is essential
Walmart - groceries are essential
Liquor stores -- groceries are essential
Pot shops -- pharmacies are essential
Gyms -- recreation is not essential
Churches -- culture is not essential
Salons -- culture is not essential
Non-chain stores -- don't have groceries, therefore not essential
Political gatherings -- opposed by the opposite side, nothing has changed
Now you can quibble with some of the categories, but the rules aren't inconsistent. They do just happen to benefit the powerful corporations, surprise surprise.
But specifically we went from "avoid overwhelming the health system" to "let's do the things that stops people from continuing to die". And those things involve avoiding human contact unless it is essential, mask wearing, and social distancing. It's not crazy that our government is asking us to do things that make us less likely to die. You know, unless you're a seatbelt truther.
Narcissism is usually associated with self flattery or egocentricism, as opposed to selfish self-determinism/control (unless in the form of performant displays of anti-lockdown value-signalling).
COVID inspired woke-scolding is more narcissistic.
That's one trait of narcissism, the main one is thinking that the world begins and ends with you. A virus doesn't begin and end with you (by definition), so any argument about self-determinism/control is a red herring meant to distract from what is happening. Wearing a mask isn't about you, the same way that a virus isn't interested in infecting one host. It about communal safety, not yours.
> COVID inspired woke-scolding is more narcissistic.
I have a feeling you would say the same thing with or without a deadly virus ravaging your country.
It's been a while since I've seen mention of actuarial analyses of the pandemic vs lockdowns. Could millions of people with muscle atrophy cause more economic harm?
Lockdown doesn't mean muscle atrophy. You can still do a lot at home even without equipment. Besides, if you want to continue to assume it causes muscle atrophy, then compare a population with muscle atrophy to a population with (likely) permanent organ damage due to a vascular disease (covid).
That's the first article that shows for googling [covid-19 vascular disease].
Basically my understanding of the current understanding is that COVID-19 is better thought of as a disease that can cause blood clots, particularly in several organ systems, particularly in the lungs -- you start getting blood clots in your lungs and consequently can't breathe very well.
Early days yet, but medical professionals are seeing cases of myocarditis that appears to follow COVID. Whether or not this leads to ling-term damage is unknown, but myocarditis isn't generally something you ignore.
Wow, sounds pretty serious. I experienced some of those symptoms in March after a particularly bad respiratory infection. Perhaps it's time to get an antibody test.
Could millions of people with muscle atrophy cause more economic harm?
Who cares? Why is "economic" harm so important?
I'm really tired of people saying "But what about the economy?" I really don't care. I care about my health and the health of my family members. If some artisan dog biscuit company goes out of business, so be it.
The "economy" is just our way of measuring what people do for themselves and others all day. "Some artisan dog biscuit company" is someone else's lifelong work and dream, not just a number in a spreadsheet. Minimizing may make you feel better about selfishly demanding everyone turn their lives off, but it's not an accurate representation of the world.
I'm really tired of people saying "But what about my health?" I really don't care. I care about my job and the businesses of my family members. If some work from home keyboard jockey gets sick because they left their house instead of locking themselves inside, so be it.
If muscle mass or fitness is a concern, work out at home. Or outside. Ride a bike, go for a run, do some pushups. Pick up large rocks. Buy a squat rack or rowing machine. Go climb a mountain.
Access to a gym is absolutely not required to maintain fitness.
This same argument can be made about any infectious disease season. The only difference is a matter of degree. This virus is probably ~5 times as bad as the flu so we should spend ~5 times as much to mitigate the externalities. Not ~500 times as much like we have.
I fear that after this every time there's a bad flu season we will see this same shit again because "think of the most vulnerable among us, you're literally killing them!!"
no the problem is that severe COVID cases take up space in the hospital for a long time, so it's relatively easy for cases to snowball, people to be unable to admitted into hospitals at capacity, and then for lots more unadmitted people to start dying because they can't get treatment. which is what happened in Wuhan.
There are rare long-term side effects from many infectious viruses. Anyone who gets pneumonia from anything will be down for the count for a while, but they'll get better, and that isn't unique to this virus. And myocarditis (the heart inflammation people are talking about) is a side effect of all sorts of viral and even bacterial infections (wikipedia lists basically every common human virus as a cause), it will normally get better on its own, although in rare cases it can cause issues.
None of this is new! This coronavirus is a novel coronavirus, not a magical one. It has effects that are in line with other viral illnesses in humans. It's just a bit more virulent than them. It's a matter of quantitative difference, not qualitative difference.
Possible permanent smell/taste loss? Possibly permanent reduction in lung capacity?
There is a qualitative difference as well. The lingering side effects of the Lyme-causing bacteria is on a level apart from what happens when you get food-poisoned.
You’re right, I’m an economist, not a doctor. So I look at the world in terms of trade offs. And the trade offs western societies have made with this virus are so unlike the trade offs made with any other infectious disease in recent memory that it makes me concerned about what the new trade offs will be going forward.
1. The tradeoffs are mostly US-only, other western societies had the political will to prevent unemployment and evictions. This is not intended to mean "US bad, others good", just that the tradeoffs are not objectively there, but instead mostly a result of societal decisions (e.g. France had 1% lower unemployment in June 2020 than in June 2019 https://countryeconomy.com/unemployment/france?sc=LAB- )
2. Sweden tried this route. They now have the deaths plus the economic fallout (-6% GDP, just like the locked down neighbours Denmark and Norway), mostly due to the international interconnectedness (collapsing supplier chains etc.)
More specifically, other western societies had the political will to prevent all the people who weren't working and were being paid by the government at less than their normal wage from counting towards the unemployment stats - generally some sort of furlough scheme where on paper they were still employed by their original company. Still meant they weren't working, with no guarantee there'd be jobs for them to go back to, but it sure looked better on the stats. (At the cost of arbitrarily screwing over people who for whatever reason couldn't take advantage of furlough and ended up actually-unemployed.)
The US tried something a little like this with forgivable loans to pay businesses' paychecks, but the trouble is they did this after rolling out an unemployment boost that left less well-paid people better off than if they were employed, so it was a little difficult to convince business owners who didn't want their employees to try and murder them in their sleep to take it up.
I wouldn't be so quick to proclaim Europe's victory over this virus. With what's happening in Spain, and now France and Germany, this may be a European "Mission Accomplished" moment in another month.
that's what's known as the "slippery slope" argument. The response to this virus is just so shocking that oh wow, what if this is the new norm? It's not at all. this virus is not "the norm", this is a 100 year event. don't hurt your head on that slope!
Heh, despite the fact that you are being rude to me I'll still answer in good faith because the distinction is important.
If we are spending hundreds of times as much mitigating a virus five times as bad as common illnesses (yes a once in a century event) are we now going to spend dozens of times more money/effort mitigating the flu every year? If yes then we will see lockdowns like this regularly going forward. If no, then the vast majority of the response to COVID is an emotional overreaction, not rational risk mitigation/pricing in externalities.
I will say in mid-March, when things looked quite different based on our limited knowledge of the virus, that the response wasn't entirely unwarranted. But we've known for months that this isn't nearly as bad as feared. It isn't the second coming of smallpox. Yet we still have most of the restrictions and shaming from March, even to this day.
> If we are spending hundreds of times as much mitigating a virus five times as bad as common illnesses
how do you quantify "five times as bad" ? if I run my car into a brick wall at ten miles an hour, vs. 50, one event damages my car the other kills me. is that "five times as bad"?
> are we now going to spend dozens of times more money/effort mitigating the flu every year? If yes then we will see lockdowns like this regularly going forward.
no, why would we? the flu does not overwhelm hospitals [edit: the 2018 flu season comparison is a counterpoint but there is no argument this is anything on the scale what covid has done in places like NYC], cripple the entire medical system such that thousands of patients are left to die in hallways and parking lots, and spread exponentially to kill hundreds of thousands of people within just a few months.
> If no, then the vast majority of the response to COVID is an emotional overreaction, not rational risk mitigation/pricing in externalities.
you have made no argument to support this case.
> I will say in mid-March, when things looked quite different based on our limited knowledge of the virus, that the response wasn't entirely unwarranted.
what exactly "looked quite different" ? the main things that were known in march, e.g. spreads exponentially, r0 is something like 2 or 3 if steps aren't taken, has a 20% hospitalization rate, has a high death rate for those hospitalized which has improved somewaht but that is predicated on the fact that hospitals are availble, are still true.
There were a lot of tweets from people who work in public health about the argument you're making. "If people said we overreacted, then we will know we did our job". That's how it works when you prevent a horrible thing from going out of control. People who for whatever reason don't seem to understand what happened will crow about how unnecessary that was. Can you see how this looks to anyone who is actually trained in this area?
flu may not kill as much as covid or spread as fast as covid but still thousand of people die every year, so somehow that is acceptable without lockdown ?
that's a disingenuous argument because the scale and breadth of the 2018 flu season vs. what covid continues to do are not in the same league at all, by an order of magnitude (see below). there was not a global lockdown for the 2018 flu season I recall, there will not be one for a future flu season of similar magnitude, and the point remains that it's a logical fallacy to suggest the covid lockdown represents the action that would be taken for a 2018-style flu season because there is simply no comparison.
yes because the hospital system was not overwhelmed to the extent that it would be with an unchecked coronavirus. The nationwide overwhelming of hospitals with covid is with lockdowns and mask wearing throughout the nation. if steps had not been taken, the death toll would be approaching the millions by now, not just for covid cases but for all kinds of untreated emergencies.
Without the lockdown the the hospital system are not overwhelmed, at least no more overwhelmed than what happen in the past.
Due to lockdown the hospital are furloughing, lying off nurse, freeze hiring.
Just look at Sweden where they didn't lockdown.
Doesn't mean I say we should not take any step. Step to make vaccine still has to be done, improving treatment still have to be done, increasing health care capacity still have to be done.
> You’re right, I’m an economist, not a doctor. So I look at the world in terms of trade offs. And the trade offs western societies have made with this virus are so unlike the trade offs made with any other infectious disease in recent memory that it makes me concerned about what the new trade offs will be going forward.
I would hope economists would make judgements based on more than aping what happened "in recent memory," but somehow I'm not surprised. IIRC the last time we had major pandemic like this, gathering places were closed (like now), social distancing was done (like now), masks were worn (like now), and some people chafed against the restrictions and decided that it was better to endanger others (like now).
Any flu that clogs your lungs and gives you a fever can give you long term lung or neurological damage. I've seen little to nothing that suggests covid is uniquely dangerous in this regard.
It's not about you. It's about everyone else.
How can someone be so selfish and self-absorbed that they think their "muscle mass" is more important than the health of hundreds or thousands of other people?
I know this question may violate some HN policy, but I can't help but ask: What's wrong with you?