BrasatoAlBarolo wrote: ↑Thu, 6. Aug 20, 08:52
In Europe cases are rising again, especially in France, Belgium and Spain: they opened too early, and these are the consequences.
Question, what kind of opening would be classified as "not" opening too early?
Unless you have a magical way to test every single person living in a country, and every single person turn up negative. And at the same time, either close your border or quarantine/testing every single person come across while assuming you're not missing a single person crossing illegally. Only if somehow all those condition hold, you will have a rise in case anytime a country re-open, no matter how long you're going to wait. And if a simple rise in case is the only qualification needed to put the label of "open too early". Even SE Asian countries which often hold as the golden standard for COVID-19 responses are not exception to this. That's why you keep hearing about cases going up and down over there, even Vietnam after re-opening started detecting new cases after like ... 49 straight days being in the clear.
It has been often mentioned, and while being also acknowledge at times but I feel they are also often forgotten or brushed aside for a more ... negative narrative. The points of social distance/lock down were not to eradicate, or totally stop new spread (we half a year passed the point of that being possible), but to slow down the spread both to help the health care system to keep pace and to buy time before a more effective/permanent measures can be discovered. So a rise in new cases doesn't mean opening too early, but further consideration are: did you re-open when your case load still high and new case were still on the up, did you re-open before new health care infrastructures are in place to prepare for new load ...etc... For example, by the time Colorado re-open, our new cases load were on the way down, our healthcare were never at capacity, and on top of that we added like 5000 new beds into our hospital (with many of that ICU and lvl2 care). Of course, as we re-opened our case loads start going up again, but I wouldn't say Colorado opened 'too early'.
The reason I point this out because the 'opening too early' is a narrative that I think being used too callously in many places. Yes, there are cases you can clearly see as negligence, but the reality is government in most places are simply dealing with a shit reality. The pandemic is like predators circling the air, and our communities are like the preys holding our breath underwater. The windows places reopen to me is like when we think it's safe to surface and have a gap of air, if we see danger then we would dive again, and we can certainly make both good and bad timing for that. Frankly I expect the open-close-open-close cycle to be the new norm until a more permanent solution is reached and it would be better for people to 'appreciate' this is the new realities and not necessary due to some evil ulterior motives. Sure, ideally we should hold our breath for as long as necessary, but no matter how good one is at holding your breath the fact is you can keep holding your breath forever.
