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Covid-19: HK News - Long Holiday Thread

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  1. #91

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    Quote Originally Posted by merchantms:
    People cannot live trapped inside of their homes indefinitely. We need to all accept that life is now waves of “normal” and waves of restrictions. I’m sick of the handwringing about people going for fresh air and a meal after weeks of nothing to do. We are months into this in HK, the rest of the world is weeks in. Governments in the West will wake up to the reality that “stay at home forever” is not a sustainable policy either.
    I guess you have to congratulate Italy then, for being so ahead of the curve with that conclusion

  2. #92

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    Quote Originally Posted by justjoe86:
    I guess you have to congratulate Italy then, for being so ahead of the curve with that conclusion
    Not sure about Italy but the reason I used “normal” in quotes is because that means masks, temperature checks, and increased hygiene standards. But yes we will have periods of relaxation and periods of restriction.

    Some people in HK seem to have a delusion that if we all stay home for 2 weeks then we can go back to how life was before the virus. It’s not going to happen. Not least because lots of people still have to work every day. Borders are closed to most of the world now but our friends up North aren’t going to stay away from HK indefinitely.
    justjoe86 and Mr Chips like this.

  3. #93

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    Quote Originally Posted by justjoe86:
    I'm just intrigued that everyone on geoexpat seems to trust the HK figures whilst simultaneously calling mainland Chinese figures bullshit.

    Meanwhile the tests done in HK are extremely low, with the exception of everyone coming through the airport, which have seen tests/million rise from 700 to 13000 in a few weeks, most of these testing airport arrivals.


    So how exactly do we know how many "cases" there are which aren't "imported" if they're not being tested? The airport tests have had a 1/90 positive rate which is very low by any country's standards. But if you throw enough shit at a wall some of it will stick, and then you get these figures which suggest it's only imported and local transmission is over. Works very well politically for Carrie Lam and her buddies to blame it all on those filthy Europeans and Americans.

    I'm not sure why I feel like a conspiracy theorist alone with this cynicism. Perhaps it's because I came through HKIA just over 2 weeks ago and stood in the extremely long queue of asymptomatic people standing 2m apart in their N95 masks, waiting to receive their wristbands and test kits, and thought this is a great idea... but shouldn't they also be testing a sample of the asymptomatic general public to at least make a fair comparison? I than sat at home in quarantine for 2 weeks with my negative test result, contemplating the whole thing and wondering how it is so easy to use highly biased numbers to support whatever hypothesis you want and convince the vast majority.
    Wow there are many things I disagree in this statement. First, China has been lying from the start and medical professionals and journalists were silenced or have disappeared there for trying to report. There's no evidence that this is being done in HK, the medical professionals stood up to the government and certainly don't appear repressed. There is still some free press in HK and the mechanism for silencing journalists during this crisis is not obvious. None have been reported missing or have claimed harassment. HK may be going in China's direction but it's still a far cry from what's over the border.

    As to tests in HK being very low, your theory again doesn't make that much sense because they compare well with most countries and arrivals in HK have been only a few hundreds a day for a while now. If there was significant transmission in the community, we would see some more hospital admissions particularly in light of the fact that we are far from being in hard lockdown. Your number of asymptomatic carriers is taken completely out of thin air as this is not known. Sound logic says that if there were large numbers of asymptomatic carriers, some of those would eventually translate into hospital admissions or visits and positive tests. The idea that thousands of infected people roam around with nothing happening makes no sense.

    As to the statement that Lam and her cronies are blaming transmission on foreigners coming to HK, that is even more ludicrous since the only ones allowed to come back to HK are HK residents and most of those returning are not westerners. A large number of these returnees were students who are not europeans or americans.

    The vision you propose is one viewed through your eyes and definitely not one that I share and not based on too many solid facts.

  4. #94

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    Quote Originally Posted by merchantms:
    Not sure about Italy but the reason I used “normal” in quotes is because that means masks, temperature checks, and increased hygiene standards. But yes we will have periods of relaxation and periods of restriction.

    Some people in HK seem to have a delusion that if we all stay home for 2 weeks then we can go back to how life was before the virus. It’s not going to happen. Not least because lots of people still have to work every day. Borders are closed to most of the world now but our friends up North aren’t going to stay away from HK indefinitely.
    Yeah I agree with you. It's the second paragraph's sentiment I was referring to when I said it'll lead to complacency if people start to think it's been eradicated. The only reason it has been reasonably contained is precautions. It's still out there and can spread fast whenever given a chance. It won't go away completely and we are going to have to adapt our lifestyles to some extent. But then again HK was already somewhat in that state since SARS, with people wearing masks when sick etc. I expect the whole world will be going more in that direction after this.
    Mr Chips likes this.

  5. #95

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    Quote Originally Posted by merchantms:
    People cannot live trapped inside of their homes indefinitely. We need to all accept that life is now waves of “normal” and waves of restrictions. I’m sick of the handwringing about people going for fresh air and a meal after weeks of nothing to do. We are months into this in HK, the rest of the world is weeks in. Governments in the West will wake up to the reality that “stay at home forever” is not a sustainable policy either.
    I am sure there is a middle ground less than being stuck indoors indefinitely but more than a free for all and I hear and read of many governments working on that. It is difficult and will take time but very far from impossible.
    Tyresmoke likes this.

  6. #96

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    Quote Originally Posted by justjoe86:
    I'm just intrigued that everyone on geoexpat seems to trust the HK figures whilst simultaneously calling mainland Chinese figures bullshit.

    Meanwhile the tests done in HK are extremely low, with the exception of everyone coming through the airport, which have seen tests/million rise from 700 to 13000 in a few weeks, most of these testing airport arrivals.


    So how exactly do we know how many "cases" there are which aren't "imported" if they're not being tested? The airport tests have had a 1/90 positive rate which is very low by any country's standards. But if you throw enough shit at a wall some of it will stick, and then you get these figures which suggest it's only imported and local transmission is over. Works very well politically for Carrie Lam and her buddies to blame it all on those filthy Europeans and Americans.

    I'm not sure why I feel like a conspiracy theorist alone with this cynicism. Perhaps it's because I came through HKIA just over 2 weeks ago and stood in the extremely long queue of asymptomatic people standing 2m apart in their N95 masks, waiting to receive their wristbands and test kits, and thought this is a great idea... but shouldn't they also be testing a sample of the asymptomatic general public to at least make a fair comparison? I than sat at home in quarantine for 2 weeks with my negative test result, contemplating the whole thing and wondering how it is so easy to use highly biased numbers to support whatever hypothesis you want and convince the vast majority.
    You look at the death rate. The deaths are hard to hide and hard to fake (particularly in a place like HK). If we had a bunch of "unknown" carriers out there, our death rate would have spiked. It didn't. Therefore its unlikely there is a pool of untested positive people. Unlike many other countries such as Philippines, which has a huge death rate per known case. It also highlights that the actual death rate is likely to be much closer to the 1 or 2 percent seen in high testing places like Germany and South Korea than the low testing estimates.

  7. #97

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    Whatever decisions are taken, they are guaranteed not to be perfect and all will have significant downsides. One of the premiers in Canada issued a statement a few days ago talking about reopening schools in early May. His rationale being that kids are less at risk and parents can't return to work easily if kids are forced to stay at home. On the other hand, he announced that all summer festivals were canceled until August. You can imagine that this ignited some debate...


  8. #98

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    Quote Originally Posted by Aramis:
    Wow there are many things I disagree in this statement. First, China has been lying from the start and medical professionals and journalists were silenced or have disappeared there for trying to report. There's no evidence that this is being done in HK, the medical professionals stood up to the government and certainly don't appear repressed. There is still some free press in HK and the mechanism for silencing journalists during this crisis is not obvious. None have been reported missing or have claimed harassment. HK may be going in China's direction but it's still a far cry from what's over the border.

    As to tests in HK being very low, your theory again doesn't make that much sense because they compare well with most countries and arrivals in HK have been only a few hundreds a day for a while now. If there was significant transmission in the community, we would see some more hospital admissions particularly in light of the fact that we are far from being in hard lockdown. Your number of asymptomatic carriers is taken completely out of thin air as this is not known. Sound logic says that if there were large numbers of asymptomatic carriers, some of those would eventually translate into hospital admissions or visits and positive tests. The idea that thousands of infected people roam around with nothing happening makes no sense.

    As to the statement that Lam and her cronies are blaming transmission on foreigners coming to HK, that is even more ludicrous since the only ones allowed to come back to HK are HK residents and most of those returning are not westerners. A large number of these returnees were students who are not europeans or americans.

    The vision you propose is one viewed through your eyes and definitely not one that I share and not based on too many solid facts.
    Re paragraph 1. I agree with all of this.

    Re paragraph 2. Tests jumped from 700/million to 13000/million when they started testing everyone at the airport. This means numbers are still low with the exception of this new policy which is a very focused group. So in terms of testing the general public as a whole, numbers are still low.

    Re paragraph 3. Well it's a fact that new cases are primarily from returnees. I'm just saying a key reason for this is the focused testing. If you test, you will get positives. If you don't test, you wont.

    Yes I agree it is primarily my own hypothesis based on what I've seen. I just don't feel like the figures we see in tables are a fair reflection of the HK population. Luckily people are wearing masks, washing their hands, and being quite careful, so it is still being contained. But if you think there is nobody out there with the virus, I'd be very surprised if you're correct. In Italy they did some testing for antibodies and found a very high percentage of people had previously had the virus and developed antibodies without being aware. Of course this was a region with extreme cases but I would expect a low percentage (bit significant absolute number) of any population to have the antibodies if tested now. And yes this is speculation not fact, but I expect there will come a time when it is tested. So let's see.

  9. #99

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    Quote Originally Posted by hullexile:
    I am sure there is a middle ground less than being stuck indoors indefinitely but more than a free for all and I hear and read of many governments working on that. It is difficult and will take time but very far from impossible.
    HK is not a free for all. The biggest social distancing factors are closure of schools (since January) and WFH for most workers who can (since February). A beach trip or a hike are drops in the bucket.

    And as mentioned for many HK residents the park is safer than their home as far as social distancing goes if they live in a huge public housing estate or subdivided flats.

    People are tired of the virus’ impact and looking for someone to blame. That’s all this is.

  10. #100
    Quote Originally Posted by justjoe86:
    I'm just intrigued that everyone on geoexpat seems to trust the HK figures whilst simultaneously calling mainland Chinese figures bullshit.

    Meanwhile the tests done in HK are extremely low, with the exception of everyone coming through the airport, which have seen tests/million rise from 700 to 13000 in a few weeks, most of these testing airport arrivals.


    So how exactly do we know how many "cases" there are which aren't "imported" if they're not being tested? The airport tests have had a 1/90 positive rate which is very low by any country's standards. But if you throw enough shit at a wall some of it will stick, and then you get these figures which suggest it's only imported and local transmission is over. Works very well politically for Carrie Lam and her buddies to blame it all on those filthy Europeans and Americans.

    I'm not sure why I feel like a conspiracy theorist alone with this cynicism. Perhaps it's because I came through HKIA just over 2 weeks ago and stood in the extremely long queue of asymptomatic people standing 2m apart in their N95 masks, waiting to receive their wristbands and test kits, and thought this is a great idea... but shouldn't they also be testing a sample of the asymptomatic general public to at least make a fair comparison? I than sat at home in quarantine for 2 weeks with my negative test result, contemplating the whole thing and wondering how it is so easy to use highly biased numbers to support whatever hypothesis you want and convince the vast majority.
    Local asymptomatic cases in the general public are caught via tracing. Such was the case when they quarantined 100 police officers or the entire bar cluster. Thinking that somehow random asymptomatic people on a large scale are running around among the general public is not supported by evidence.

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