This is a very informative article on the situation in Italy concerning the corona virus:
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/worl...italy/ar-BB11qA65?li=AAgfYrC&ocid=mailsignout
But let's crunch some other numbers.
The media can throw up statistics that seem more massive than they really are. And yes, almost 500 people dying just from the corona virus in Italy in ONE day is a big deal. But let's put this in a little bit more perspective. Humans die, all the time. Especially the elderly. In 2017 (I assume a reasonably random/average year) in Australia, approximately 290 people aged 75 or over died....each day. 290! Yes, our world population is 7.2 billion, which means that every day a lot of humans are born, and a lot of humans die.
Australia's population is 24 million. Italy's is 60 million. So we need to times 290 by 2.5, which gives us 725 elderly deaths per day, CV or not. In fact, this average is probably higher because Italy has an aging population and a higher percentage of smokers.
It is logical to think that many of those who are unfortunately currently being killed by the CV, would have died rather soon anyway.
But isn't anyone dying before their time a tragedy? Yes it is. But now we come to my point of discussion (yes, this will be a TLDR piece....if you even made it this far LOL). It is the battle of the lesser of two evils, or the lesser of two combined groups of evils.
Some (please add others that I will be forgetting) of the arguments for greater restrictions in the face of this pandemic:
I am imagining for a moment that I am 80 years old. Let's say that I only have one month to live, if all goes well. So if the CV virus takes me earlier, then that isn't a big deal, is it?
Not really. But what about other factors? What about what happens in the process of my death?
Because life is largely about this: The attempt to increase pleasure, and the attempt to reduce pain. That's it. Pure and simple.
I would imagine that dying from the CV could be much more painful for the victim then what dying in one's sleep would be. It could be an extremely painful death. This needs to be taken into consideration.
There is also the factor of over run hospital systems, which has a negative flow on effect to societies in far more ways than I can imagine. But in Italy right now things are bad. Very bad.
There are a small - but significant - percentage of younger people who suffer from serious medical conditions, who, if the CV gets to them, will almost certainly be killed. This is actually more serious than the elderly, because these are people losing potentially, 20, 50, 80 years of life. And although they may not have the fitness to be able to dance at Belgrave like you and me, they can still derive happiness in other ways.
The deaths of people before their time has a great negative impact on those people that are close to them, and because this virus spreads like the flu, will also result in a lot of self-blame for such deaths.
Now for some (please add others that I will be forgetting) of the arguments for lesser restrictions in the face of this pandemic:
Potential economic meltdown. Depending on how long lockdowns go on for, some businesses might never return, and given that these will be mostly small businesses, we could be living in a world where the rich are even richer and more powerful than before - and as someone else has very correctly pointed out - and a weakened middle class.
Economic downturn leads to more crime, which will also lead to more deaths (as well as a lower quality of life). The extent of this will probably vary depending on the stability of the country. Australia might be able to survive a longer lockdown than Brazil. In fact, that is almost certainly so.
Less performing/viewing of sport/art, and less people working, leads to an unhappier society, and again this will lead to more violence. There will be an increase in suicides. Which can actually be discussed in a similar way to the elderly dying as a result of the CV. Because in some cases of suicide, perhaps that person was a ticking time bomb, and may have killed themselves six months later when something else tipped them over the edge. Either or either, this is all another point of discussion.
Short summary: How many more deaths of the elderly will there be in 2020 vs. 2019? Maybe there will not be THAT many more. Although no matter the outcome of that, there will always be the arguments that we should have restricted our lives more, or less.
What if elderly deaths increase by 25%, but suicides double? What if crime doubles? For now I think that lockdowns (or close to that) is the way to go, but the question is, how long can we all survive that?
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