General / Off-Topic The safest place

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Why is Germany's mortality rate so much lower than Italy's? Most of your post goes to showing their exemplary prevention measures which are commendable, but doesn't speak to why the mortality rate is so different. Curious as to what people think the reason is for that discrepancy. My common sense theory is that there's a big difference between who (demographically speaking) has caught the virus in Germany vs Italy.

Italy has the eldest population in Europe, they are also very social and very close to each other, not only at family level, but in neighborhood.
Most of the people that died in Italy, iirc about 90%, were 70+ years old also with pre-existing conditions.
A quote that is a week old already is saying:
Lombardy’s president, Attilio Fontana, made a similar point in an interview last week. “All the deaths we’ve had are either very old people or very sick people,” he said.

So this is one reason for the high number of deaths in Italy.

The other could be how the reporting was done.
If someone in terminal phase, that would have died in one month maybe, contracted the disease and died - will it be reported a Covid-19 death? Or will it be reported as a development of the current (deadly) illness and not counted towards Covid-19 statistics?

Edit: Ofcourse, tight quarantine protocols and a higher degree of social responsibility is the best approach in containing it... but that works only in the very beginning
 
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I think for all the armies of the world, including the United States (especially at the time).

There's genuine volunteering, there's being volunteered, there's volunteered unwillingly to avoid being a social pariah, there's conscription, penal soldiers and there's even child soldiers hooked on drugs.

Most of its not that glamourous really.

The brave people who fought probably wouldn't appreciate being used as an example of why we shouldn't all hoard toilet paper since they probably didn't have any.
 
@Good Whiskey ok have it your way, I take it back; panic away my friend.
Where did you get this idea that I'm panicking? I mean, feel free to quote where I say "Holy crap, I'm freaking out shmitin' mah pants here!" All I did was point out that I'm shocked at just how badly this is being handled by everyone. And don't be mad simply because I've pointed out that some of the jingoistic nonsense I see here is reminiscent of a Hollywood movie about war as opposed to the harsh realities of it, most of which are utterly devoid of heroism.
 
There's genuine volunteering, there's being volunteered, there's volunteered unwillingly to avoid being a social pariah, there's conscription, penal soldiers and there's even child soldiers hooked on drugs.

Most of its not that glamourous really.

The brave people who fought probably wouldn't appreciate being used as an example of why we shouldn't all hoard toilet paper since they probably didn't have any.
There's the mischaracterization of my point that I've come to know and love about you, Stigbob:)
 
I want to believe in heroism of a few elite soldiers on the beaches. But not the majority of the soldiers.

In your country that was probably true...

In the US during WWII most served with honor, bravery, and distinction and viewed their service as their Patriotic Duty. There was also a clear understanding of why we were fighting in that war.

Unfortunately, that good will was squandered by poor leadership during Korea, to some extent, and completely in Vietnam. We are also in peril of repeating that mistake if we don't disengage from many of our current global conflicts.
 
While we're at it, let's take shots at the Danes and the Poles and Austrians and the Italians too. Certainly those filthy neutral Swedes and their ilk.

Don't even get me started on the Swiss.
Swiss stealing our chocolate. Hiding it in those rediculous looking gold bars. we know what's up!

Just blazing my own trail.

Army toilet roll doesn't actually wipe, it spreads.

Well, atleast in a sense, it gets it's intended result! ><

Speaking of neutral countries like the swiss. They have a lot of natural barriers. I wonder how safe those locations are. Them and Iran have lots of mountains and probably little intake of outsiders too...
 
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Well, atleast in a sense, it gets it's intended result! ><

Soldiering 101 learn to identify (and remove the twigs from) comfy types of moss. Much better than the issue stuff which (not kidding) doubles as tracing paper for duplicating maps.

British-24-Ration-Packet-TP-Can-opener-sm.jpg


Speaking of neutral countries like the swiss. They have a lot of natural barriers. I wonder how safe those locations are. Them and Iran have lots of mountains and probably little intake of outsiders too...

Iran's getting it quite badly apparently, returning pilgrims from the popular shrines are testing positive a heck of a lot.
 
Italy has the eldest population in Europe, they are also very social and very close to each other, not only at family level, but in neighborhood.
Most of the people that died in Italy, iirc about 90%, were 70+ years old also with pre-existing conditions.
A quote that is a week old already is saying:
Lombardy’s president, Attilio Fontana, made a similar point in an interview last week. “All the deaths we’ve had are either very old people or very sick people,” he said.

So this is one reason for the high number of deaths in Italy.

The other could be how the reporting was done.
If someone in terminal phase, that would have died in one month maybe, contracted the disease and died - will it be reported a Covid-19 death? Or will it be reported as a development of the current (deadly) illness and not counted towards Covid-19 statistics?

Edit: Ofcourse, tight quarantine protocols and a higher degree of social responsibility is the best approach in containing it... but that works only in the very beginning

Could you post to a source for the "Italy has the eldest population in Europe" statement ? Because, when I reasearched age distribution, it did not at all look like that .
 
Could you post to a source for the "Italy has the eldest population in Europe" statement ? Because, when I reasearched age distribution, it did not at all look like that .

Have not checked it myself. Is the claim untrue?
 

Have not checked it myself. Is the claim untrue?

Indexmundi is preatty clear to me...


Italy dropped the Ball really early, which is one of the chief reasons so many people die(d) there . Seems to me people wanting to make demographics the reason is some kind of smokescreen .
 
Have not checked it myself. Is the claim untrue?

It is statistically speaking nonsense. Given the low number of deaths involved at the moment, the extent of efficient testing and correctly diagnosing cause of death result in uncertainty as to the actual mortality rate far beyond the less than two percentage-points difference currently reported.

FWIW: The median age in Italy is 45.4 years, in Germany its 45.9 years.
 
It is statistically speaking nonsense. Given the low number of deaths involved at the moment, the extent of efficient testing and correctly diagnosing cause of death result in uncertainty as to the actual mortality rate far beyond the less than two percentage-points difference currently reported.

FWIW: The median age in Italy is 45.4 years, in Germany its 45.9 years.

Again: it seems pretty clear that CoViD - 19 mainly kills elderly, sick and weak people . But the chief reason for Italy having SO many people die in SUCH a short timespan is their Healthcare System having been totally overwhelmed, to the point where they simply are not able to treat everyone critical . They had to start triaging days ago . By now, there are reports of people claiming the government has told them to not respirate people above the age of 60 .
 
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Just received confirmation that Germany apparently learned from Italy - which effectively ran out of mechanical Ventilators that are required after intubation - and effective next week preemptively orders all our national Hospitals into crisis mode with emphasis to boost this very capability.

In a nutshell, all non-essential or non-critical planned surgeries will be canceled/postponed while the Hospitals re-organize their Installations to up-scale their ICU capacities to the maximum possible ahead of time.
Public gatherings and events will be effectively canceled entirely (currently less than 1000 are still permitted, although not recommended), social interactions are advised to be avoided by all means possible.
(oddly, they haven't been able to agree to uniform closure of Schools/Universities etc. yet, but that's just a matter of time)

Local Sitrep : just wearing a basic face mask and gloves still triggers unfriendly to hostile response from unaware/unprepared civilians.
Still an amazing amount of clueless citizens walking around in a "condition yellow" town with known infections.
I assume the hostile behavior will soon increase due to stress/psychology of those still in denial.
But so far, simply ignoring them works out best - no point in starting discussions with such people, only risks making things worse. Shopping not a fun thing to do right now.

PS.
Personally in many decades haven't seen German policymakers run on such a high clockrate. Ever.
A few months back in the past, I would have deemed such a thing a downright impossibility. They know very well what's coming and gotten the memo - which is very good.
 
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And in other news, we're closing shop in Belgium. Personal timeline:

1) Three weeks ago, after increasingly growing worried, I asked my department's coordinator about the existence of contingency plans, and in particular about when we would decide to close doors to spread infection. He had no clue what I was talking about. My colleagues said I should watch less movies.
2) Two weeks ago my uni officially stated they were 'considering the possibility an infected person might potentially enter Belgium at some point in the future.' (this despite at least one confirmed case weeks earlier). The contingency plan was 1) an e-mail address where you could make it known if you got infected, and 2) a web page with info, which incorrectly copy&pasted WHO guidelines and stated that 'the best way to prevent infection is prevention'. Yes, that is indeed what words mean.
3) 48 hours later another infected person was detected.
4) A few days ago an e-mail was send out that we probably should prepare for distance learning or whatever. We have a bunch of different apps, hardly anyone uses them.
5) Yesterday we send an e-mail that our 'contingency plan of distance learning was activated'. We, of course, do not have the capacity to provide all or even close to half our lessons that way; our 'plan' is little more than a vague notion that it would be cool to do some hi-tech stuff or something. Only a fraction of our teaching staff has any experience with it.
6) Hours ago our government, or whatever it is that is currently is our 'acting government', closed all schools for the coming weeks.
7) The game of 'hot potato' or 'I am just following orders' has begun. Nobody has any clue what the legal and financial ramifications are of anything we are doing, so people are mostly terrified of being held responsible for whatever the future holds. They don't seem to realize that upper management and senior positions are mostly held by ancient dinosaurs, and that the odds of all of them surviving this are approximately zero.

Meanwhile, the Dutch PM stated we should not stockpile food, there is no reason for alarm and food stores will remain open. In contrast, I have finished slowly stockpiling over the last two months (slowly, so not to impede others purchases by emptying shelves) so I can isolate myself as much as humanly possible. Apparently the PM still does not grasp the question is not 'can I buy food in the coming months?' but rather 'how can I do my best to reduce infection rate in the coming months?'.

Infuriating, all of it. Oh well, my new piano arrived, I can finish up on a pile of reports from home and have plenty of booze to entertain my noggin'. [/rant]
 
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