Article in CNN re a MIT-lead study for the NAS: Grocery stores and universities should reopen first, new research suggests
Direct link to the Proceedings of the NAS Article: Rationing social contact during the COVID-19 pandemic: Transmission risk and social benefits of US locations
Very frustrating! Academic authoritarians playing God. It’s not even clear that we should have closed everything down. Protect the most “mature” – ahem! (like you and me) and the sick (hopefully not you and me) and let the rest take care of themselves. Death rates of those under 45 are about 1 in 100,000. Compare, for example, to fatality rate from car accidents: ~11 in 100,000. And recent studies suggest that the excess death rate due to the economic closures will be roughly the same or somewhat larger than that directly due to Covid-19, and will affect the poor disproportionately. To our politicians – if you believe that Black Lives Matter, open up now!
I disagree with letting the rest take care of themselves. Government should have a role in contributing to the health of the public.
Perhaps – but no more than what they do for a normal flu season – which this is for all but the most susceptible.