Thread by @leashless

What people don't understand about #covid, in 4 tweets.

1) The virus will spread until it can't. Distancing we can do now, tests, contract tracing software, masks, vaccinations all come in time. But let it spread, and it will.

Treatment does not stop spread: different issue.

2) Best available data says 1.5% fatal, heavily weighted towards the old. R3+ means >50% infected in time. USA = 2.7 million dead.

Treatment gets the fatality rate down. Distancing, masks, vaccines get the infection rate down. Two different problems. Now let's talk about economy

3) The economy has been dead since 2008. Furthermore, it was incompatible with climate change, or basic "don't use slave labor" morality. And, like, 40m on food stamps.

All the resilience had been stripped out of the American economy since 2008. Oceans of debt and no healthcare.

4) Likewise, the political system has been dead for some time too. Nobody *actually* believes this is democracy do they? ted.com/talks/lawrence…

Now you add a pandemic: politics breaks, economy breaks, healthcare breaks. It was dead already.

Now what? What will you do about it?

wsj.com/livecoverage/c… washingtonpost.com/gdpr-consent/?… thenation.com/article/archiv… en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opioid_ep… washingtonpost.com/gdpr-consent/?… politico.com/news/2020/03/2… forbes.com/sites/amiyatos… theguardian.com/world/live/202… and so on.

It's an endless litany. Endless endless endless. Root and branch.