We’re Not Ready for the Next Epidemic (2015)

[scarmig]

And "How to respond to COVID-19":

https://www.gatesnotes.com/Health/How-to-respond-to-COVID-19

[bamboozled]

"In any crisis, leaders have two equally important responsibilities: solve the immediate problem and keep it from happening again. "

First line here got me.

In the past, I think this is what was expected of leaders; However, in 2020? It feels like the definition needs to be updated.

I'm not so sure what people expect of leaders these days. I remember what was expected of leaders, now look at the type of leaders that are getting elected and see if that first sentence makes sense.

Maybe in 2020, leaders are supposed to just tell you what you want to hear.

I'd even argue that it's poor leadership that got us here in the first place. Yes there is a virus, yes it is spreading, could it have been handled better? Most likely.

[robomartin]

What frustrates me is how hard it is to make people understand this is a very serious matter.

R0 = 2.2 and CFR = 2.5%

It only takes ten minutes on Excel to understand the potential horror those numbers represent.

How do you communicate this to an audience that is mathematically inept to the point that calculating tip at the restaurant is hard work?

The best I’ve come up with is to say that, starting with one person, under ideal conditions, this could infect the entire world population in a month. OK, yes, ideal conditions, I know. How else do you drive the point about exponential/geometric growth?

I’ve had the conversation with a few people. It’s amazing to me how many of them were completely dismissive.

Is it that hard for average folks to understand? Ignorance is bliss?

[sky_rw]

I've been trying with earnest to wrap my head around the answer to your last question. I saw the writing on the wall 4 weeks ago when the initial numbers started coming out and the cell phone videos of the CCPs response leaked through the firewall. I've been telling my friends and family what these numbers mean and what the implications of this are both medically and economically. The response I get is either "Stop watching fox news", "if it was really that bad big companies would be freaking out", "its just a flu", etc.

I've come to the conclusion that, at least in the suburban USA, our lives are just so routine and comfortable that most of us cannot fathom any circumstance that would change it. We relegate such thoughts to the realm of fantasy with zombie movies and the like. It's either business as normal, or a situation you have no hope to prepare for so why bother. Not a mindset I share, likely because I didn't grow up with the guarantee of core needs.

4 weeks ago people would say "why would I keep a stock of n95 masks" like we used to all say "why would you bother locking a cockpit door".

[satya71]

I can't imagine the simulation is simple enough to do in Excel. The R0 is good measure in the beginning when almost no one is infected, and there are no quarantines. Quarantines are happening and once a cluster is infected and can be isolated, R0 doesn't matter. Simulating all this is extremely hard.

Yes, the disease has potential to be devastation. Whether devastation actually happens is still very much an open question.

[pintxo]

The NYT has a really good chart [1], comparing R0 and CFR of the current virus to various historical epidemics.

I use it to explain friends and family the potential significance.

[1] https://nyti.ms/38Xc1ho

[askafriend]

I mean, we're humans. Not machines. Welcome to the grand experiment - buckle up for the ride!

[tpmx]

CFR numbers vary wildly.

[Bombthecat]

It's the same response to climate change. Talk shit until its too late.

[orkohunter]

Please edit and add [2015]

[drenginian]

Instead of preparing, Trump disbanded the US pandemic response service.

[arthens]

They really need to either moderate comments on the blog post or disable them altogether.

[tc313]

(2015)

[joe_the_user]

Paywalled

[trevyn]

Bill Gates’ blog is paywalled? What? Did the link change?

[sombremesa]

This is far too optimistic. Where is the hard data that a vaccine could (even in a completely sunshine and rainbows scenario) be "ready" as early as June? The best I've been able to estimate is 18 months. This includes manufacturing and supply of course - a vaccine is useless if you can't get it to people at reasonable cost.

[rodneyg_]

I see what you’re saying. I can see speed being a factor... and maybe I’m uninformed... but I’m 99% sure in a true pandemic cost will not be a factor.

[retsibsi]

Did you mean to comment on the other Gates article, 'How to respond to COVID-19'? In that he says candidate vaccines "could be ready for larger-scale trials as early as June", not that they could be mass produced so soon.

[_81nf]

Pasted from below, "Without getting lost in the details, the company who the US government is funding to develop the vaccine (Moderna) uses a new technology that will likely become the next generation platform for vaccines. Instead of providing to your body the "Wanted" poster with a picture of the virus, it sends the PDF to the cell which then prints its own "Wanted" poster. This makes the response much more predictable, controllable, and robust--your body believes your own cells more than foreign shit from the outside. Since 2015, Moderna has already tested this idea in humans and shown it to be safe with 6 other viral targets (H7 and H10 Flu, Zika, CMV, hMPV/PIV, and Chikungunya). In all of these human studies, it has detected antibodies at protective levels against the target virus. So in terms of safety, we are likely already there. This is why Tony Fauci is willing to accelerate so fast. Thinking forward, maybe the US govt will fund manufacturing at risk. Just start making it at scale, right now. Moderna's current capacity is unknown based on their earnings call last week, but back of the envelope math of the mRNA process puts production capacity in the millions of doses per month without additional build-out. That's enough to start with US health care workers and the vulnerable (>70yo, Immunocompromised, etc) within 6 months if needed."

[thephyber]

Trump was in a press conference this week with health officials who claim there is a potential vaccine already in the pipeline, but it takes 4-6 months and 11 months for the next 2 rounds of testing (which does not include the possibility that it doesn’t work and doesn’t include the manufacturing ramp up time). If nCoV19 is seasonal, it likely won’t be ready for the next 2 cold seasons.

[torgian]

Vaccines have already been developed, but testing can take months.

[sky_rw]

FWIU Step 1 is developing a vaccine, Step 2 is making sure it's safe for humans in both the short and long term. It appears that step 2 is the obscenely time consuming part. Keep in mind we still don't have a safe SARS vaccine after..what..15 years?