You have no reason to believe that their son wants to be there in person. The son may share their parents' safety concerns
And claiming that coronavirus poses "no danger" is simply untrue. You can claim that the danger is over-stated, but young adults can and do get COVID-19
True, but while infected with mild (or no) symptoms, they may also unknowingly spread it to university employees, townsfolk, or their parents while visiting for the weekend.
So even assuming that the personal danger is acceptable (which isn't a given; 300 deaths sounds like a horrible and avoidable tragedy to me) death figures among healthy 20-somethings don't capture the full risk of keeping a university open.
"So even assuming that the personal danger is acceptable (which isn't a given; 300 deaths sounds like a horrible and avoidable tragedy to me) death figures among healthy 20-somethings don't capture the full risk of keeping a university open."
Well now you're shifting the goalposts.
The comment was that the students are at risk. Someone shows you that they're not at risk, and you pivot to danger to "townsfolk".
Here's the thing: those students don't just disappear, and they don't stop interacting with other college-aged students, townsfolk and employees simply because they're not at school. And if you want to protect parents, shipping their kids off to live on their own seems like a better way to do that than to have those kids living at home.
(As far as "avoidable tragedies" go: during the same period that those 300 kids died of covid, literally thousands died of all other causes. More died of accidents than died of Covid. I think it's time to admit that your sense of concern is mis-calibrated.)
> The comment was that the students are at risk. Someone shows you that they're not at risk, and you pivot to danger to "townsfolk".
Assuming they're not stupid, evil, or politically conservative, the students are probably concerned about the risk of spreading the illness and the attendant harm that could cause, as well as what it could do to themselves.
This argument seems strange to me. Only 300 people have died because of the policies that were put in place. Relaxing those policies will increase that number.
Now there could be debate about whether that new number is "acceptable" or not. But we shouldn't use the success of the quarantine-like policies to argue that quarantine-like policies are unnecessary.
"Only 300 people have died because of the policies that were put in place. Relaxing those policies will increase that number."
This is an assumption, and it's a bad one. The paucity of deaths in young people is true around the world, regardless of lockdown policy. Sweden, for example, does not have a higher proportion of young people dying.
Yes, it is an assumption. Unfortunately, this situation is unprecedented, so everything we do has to be an educated guess. I would also note that you followed it up with an assumption of your own ;)
It is well established that physical distancing limits the spread of virus transmitted via respiratory droplets. If you refute that, I would require significant peer-reviewed literature on your side. https://academic.oup.com/jid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/inf...
It is also irrefutable that contracting COVID-19 carries risk - especially for high-risk individuals with comorbidities (yes, even young people)
Combined, I don't see how you can come up with a hypothesis where getting people together would somehow be equally as safe as keeping people apart.
Again, this is just one aspect that policy makers have to consider. There is also the economy, mental health, etc. I think having those discussions is very interesting - how much should we protect our health vs our way of life? There are very valid arguments against continuing the shut-down.
But acknowledging that social practices directly impact virus transmission is a necessary step to have meaningful discussion.
> It is well established that physical distancing limits the spread of virus transmitted via respiratory droplets. If you refute that, I would require significant peer-reviewed literature on your side.
The study you provided does not support your claim that physical distancing works as it is implemented in the US (6 feet of separation).
> We found that the evidence base for current guidelines is sparse, and the available data do not support the 1- to 2-meter (≈3–6 feet) rule of spatial separation. Of 10 studies on horizontal droplet distance, 8 showed droplets travel more than 2 meters (≈6 feet), in some cases up to 8 meters (≈26 feet).
It's also likely Covid is spread by aerosols. There needs to be more research but it is very likely based on the details of superspreader events.
500 children die of influenza in the US each year. COVID is far less of a threat to young people. We have to make tradeoffs and having kids in college and not at home with parents and grandparents is a good solution
The CDC estimates total deaths from influenza in 2019 was 34,200.[0]
173,000 people have died in the USA this year from Covid 19 and the toll is rising.[1] that’s more than the total number of cases (22,000) in Australia. We got 10% the population of the USA and 0.2% of the deaths.
With all due respect, the USA has the worst Covid 19 rates in the entire fucking world. It is a travesty. You guys can say what you like, but your plan is literally killing people.
And specifically to your point: Do you think kids teach themselves? Kids are part of families, kids are taught by adults, kids catch busses driven by adults, kids meals are cooked by adults. The death rate of kids is irrelevant. Since kids can still spread the disease, they should be isolated like everyone else.
You have the highest absolute death rate and the 8th highest rate per capita. Do you realise your list is literally the list of worst hit countries in the world?
Look a bit further down... Australia 17.2, Vietnam 0.26, Thailand 0.84, New Zealand 4.5. Indonesia, with a comparable population to the USA but far more densely populated - and far poorer - is just 23.9.
The USA, richest country in the world, reserve currency of the world, has the 8th worse death rate in the whole world. That is vile. Meanwhile, your moron in chief is pointing to New Zealand and saying it’s out of control there because they had an “outbreak” of 9 cases. 9!
That’s roughly how many new cases the USA has every 18 seconds.
There is no excuse for what’s happened in the USA.
Was he obese? I only ask because many of the younger patients have comorbities that make them vulnerable to many diseases. And vaccines don't work as well for the obese either.
EDIT: *infinitesimal danger