[lug] CANCELLED: Boulder Linux User's Group - March Meeting - Boulder Linux Users Group - Mar 12, 2020

[Stephen Queen]

The cost in lives of resource shortages is difficult to measure. The cost
in lives of this "pandemic" is somewhat predictable. Nations that run out
of resources have a tendency to go to war with their neighbors. If
transportation personnel quit driving their trucks, trains, and ships then
food and other resources will run out in many locales. What will be the
human cost of that? Each worker contributes to the economy in some way else
they would not get economic compensation. Some types of jobs can go for a
period of time without being completed, but eventually it will slow the
whole economy. What if the grocery store workers quit stocking shelves. A
week or two is inconvenient. Several months of no groceries will have a
human cost. What if the power line workers quit fixing power outages. What
is the human cost there? What if tire manufacturers quit making tires. In
several months a significant number of other shortages will appear because
trucks, fire engines, ambulances, and other essential transportation
vehicles will not be operational. What will be the human cost there? I can
go on and on. Sure cancelling a LUG meeting seems reasonable, cancelling
normal life will have a high human cost as well. The problem that must be
solved is to find a reasonable balance before the costs overwhelms us.

On Tue, Mar 17, 2020 at 5:45 AM madscientistatlarge <
madscientistatlarge at protonmail.com> wrote:

> Every suggestion I've heard of for Measures in the U.S. has come with a
> time frame.  Watch interviews with CDC people and other experts.  The idea
> of the restrictions is to SLOW the spread, so that hospitals are not as
> overwhelmed and not so many people die.  NO, it won't change the number of
> people eventually sickened, It's about changing the shape of the curve, not
> the area under the curve.  The vaccines, are all at least a year off,
> Assuming initial testing yields positive results.  We live in a wonderful
> age, the beasty has already been sequenced but vaccines are still a tricky
> thing to develop.  Any one paying attention knows that even people who have
> been quarantined on military bases have broken quarantine in a few cases.
> Hopefully there will be few who are so irresponsible.  I've worked for
> morons who expect staff to show up sick, so they can get everyone else
> sick, it's a terribly stupid mindset.  If you are fearful the solution is
> knowledge and understanding, not beating your' gums together, repeating
> bogus rumors and out right lies that some media outlets, and pundits are
> dumb enough to say outloud to an audience.
>
>
> Sent with ProtonMail <https://protonmail.com> Secure Email.
>
> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
> On Tuesday, March 17, 2020 5:31 AM, Davide Del Vento <
> davide.del.vento at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Well, that's about it. Oh, in case anyone is wondering about U.S.
>> jurisprudence in this regard:
>>
>> https://reason.com/2020/03/11/would-italian-style-lockdowns-to-curtail-the-spread-of-coronavirus-pass-legal-muster-in-the-u-s/
>> Just in case that breaks: http://tinyurl.com/tdal4ju
>>
>
> Thank you, thank you. I really needed to know this, and I am glad to learn
> that it's very unlikely that they'd pass Italian-style laws here in the
> USA. Thanks!
>
> PS (my last intervention, and then I'll shut up, I promise): one thing
> that I've not heard from the pro-restrictions camp, is for how long you
> want these restrictions to last. It's one thing to say "let's have
> (voluntary) restriction to keep the number of cases below medical
> facilities capacity" (and I support that). It's another thing to say "let's
> have (mandatory) restrictions to keep the numbers of cases to the absolute
> minimum" (and I hate that). Because this epidemic will not be stopped by
> restrictions (Randall had covered this very topic in an absurd "what if"
> chapter in is book https://www.amazon.com/dp/0544456866 -- it is about
> the common cold, but other than that is exactly the topic we are
> discussing). The pandemic will be stopped when a large swath of a
> population becomes immunized, either by catching the disease or by a
> vaccine. In either case, my understanding is that it will take about a
> year, and perhaps more.
>
>
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