Study: Lockdowns had little or no impact on COVID-19 deaths (2 Viewers)

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

Star bellied sneetches sunburn, regular sneetches do not.   The solution is to make all sneetches wear sunscreen.  An alternate solution is proposed that only star bellied sneetches should have to wear sunscreen. 

Making a claim that it is a more difficult problem, or “the problem changes significantly”, to protect star bellied sneetches if they are the only ones required to wear sunscreen is a logical fallacy.   

"A problem caused by a specific policy" goes away if the policy goes away. Your analogy to a fictional problem based on a non-communicable medical ailment is less than irrelevant. 

 

[PhillipPhoto]

"A problem caused by a specific policy" goes away if the policy goes away. Your analogy to a fictional problem based on a non-communicable medical ailment is less than irrelevant. 

Not if the alternate policy in place already addresses that problem.  And it's called an analogy, I simplified it down hoping you'd be able do connect the dots.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

This is incredibly dishonest of you.

Here's the full quote from me: 
 

"To me the most interesting part of the transcript was when the author said that the Declaration was "the same pandemic plan we follow for decades in respiratory pandemic after respiratory pandemic, as recently as 2009 with the H1N1 flu pandemic."  Personally, I'd rather have medical and public health efforts design responses that take into account the nature and severity of the actual disease we are fighting rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, especially since H1N1 killed 12,000 Americans and COVID has killed about a million and counting. Maybe your priorities are different."

The paragraph is about which people and factors we want to include in policymaking. The "COVID has killed a million and counting" statement was very obviously to contrast it with H1N1, in an effort to criticize the one-size-fits-all approach to dealing with respiratory disease proposed by the GBD. Why did you cut my quote to make it seem like I was saying something I wasn't? 

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

Not if the alternate policy in place already addresses that problem.  And it's called an analogy, I simplified it down hoping you'd be able do connect the dots.

Do you think that once a person gets COVID they can't give it to other people? Because that's the only way the analogy makes any sense at all.

 

[PhillipPhoto]

Do you think that once a person gets COVID they can't give it to other people? Because that's the only way the analogy makes any sense at all.

Think of star bellied sneetches as covid vulnerable and the sun as covid.    Does that help?

 

[moleculo]

Do you think that once a person gets COVID they can't give it to other people? Because that's the only way the analogy makes any sense at all.

this is an inherent problem - the anti-mitigation crowd focuses completely on individual results and completely neglects impact to society at large, whereas the pro-mitigation crowd focuses on societal impact at expense of individual liberties.

the sunburned sneetches analogy only works under the assumption that the very bad thing is not transmissible.

 

[Battersbox]

This is incredibly dishonest of you.

Here's the full quote from me: 
 

"To me the most interesting part of the transcript was when the author said that the Declaration was "the same pandemic plan we follow for decades in respiratory pandemic after respiratory pandemic, as recently as 2009 with the H1N1 flu pandemic."  Personally, I'd rather have medical and public health efforts design responses that take into account the nature and severity of the actual disease we are fighting rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, especially since H1N1 killed 12,000 Americans and COVID has killed about a million and counting. Maybe your priorities are different."

The paragraph is about which people and factors we want to include in policymaking. The "COVID has killed a million and counting" statement was very obviously to contrast it with H1N1, in an effort to criticize the one-size-fits-all approach to dealing with respiratory disease proposed by the GBD. Why did you cut my quote to make it seem like I was saying something I wasn't? 

You were implying that he cares less about people than you do, therefore his opinions and arguments are less valid than yours.

It's was a low-blow and unhelpful.  Not a big deal, people have been reverting to the 'you don't care about people dying!!!' argument throughout the past 2 years, but later you then got huffy over me putting words in your mouth (which I wasn't intentionally trying to do). Just seems a bit hypocritical. Like you were spoiling for an argument.

 

[moleculo]

I've already drawn my own conclusions, before the declaration was even published.  Your second link is addressed in the Full Measure episode I linked to.  Proof it was actively smeared as they go to you.  

Information and critical thinking.

Want an example?  Anybody that knows anything about OSHA rules for mask wearing for airborne particulates knows that cloth masks made out of used t-shirts does nothing.  Zero, zilch.  October - yeah that was about the same time as Fauci was double cloth masking. You remember that right?

Apply similar well thought out logic to the hospitalizations and death demographics at the time.  It was painfully obvious that we needed to protect the elderly and vulnerable while restrictions on the young and healthy was just going to kick the herd immunity can down the road likely causing more suffering and deaths.  We can all see how that played out. 

Drawing conclusions about a study before the study is published is not a shining example of critical thinking.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

Think of star bellied sneetches as covid vulnerable and the sun as covid.    Does that help?

Yes, it helps me realize that you don't understand COVID at all. Either that or you don't understand how sunburn works. Let's figure out which one: do you think people can get sunburn from other people?

 

[PhillipPhoto]

Drawing conclusions about a study before the study is published is not a shining example of critical thinking.

lol, that's not what I said.  I drew my own conclusions before the study was published.  The fact that my conclusions aligned with the study pretty well just reinforced my own conclusions.  That's a prefect example of critical thinking.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

You were implying that he cares less about people than you do, therefore his opinions and arguments are less valid than yours.

It's was a low-blow and unhelpful.  Not a big deal, people have been reverting to the 'you don't care about people dying!!!' argument throughout the past 2 years, but later you then got huffy over me putting words in your mouth (which I wasn't intentionally trying to do). Just seems a bit hypocritical. Like you were spoiling for an argument.

I was 100% not implying that at all. I was sarcastically implying that the other poster would did not want "medical and public health efforts design responses that take into account the nature and severity of the actual disease we are fighting" but instead preferred the " one-size-fits-all approach" articulated in the GBD. The US death tolls for H1N1 and COVID were simply an illustration of the flaws with that approach. If you read it again I think you'll see that.

I don't know why you all had a different interpretation. Maybe I wasn't clear. Maybe you all are just conditioned to assume someone you disagree with calls you uncaring in this context. Maybe it's both. I dunno. Hope this clears it up though!

 

[PhillipPhoto]

Yes, it helps me realize that you don't understand COVID at all. Either that or you don't understand how sunburn works. Let's figure out which one: do you think people can get sunburn from other people?

More ad hominem arguments?  You take the cake for bad faith debate.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

More ad hominem arguments?  You take the cake for bad faith debate.

It's not ad hominem. You analogized an infectious disease with sunburns, and I'm trying to figure out why someone would do that.

 

[PhillipPhoto]

It's not ad hominem. You analogized an infectious disease with sunburns, and I'm trying to figure out why someone would do that.

 And it's called an analogy, I simplified it down hoping you'd be able do connect the dots.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

Analogies only work if the things are analogous.  Preventing sunburn and preventing an infectious disease are not analogous.  I'm just trying to figure out why you think they are.

 

[PhillipPhoto]

Analogies only work if the things are analogous.  Preventing sunburn and preventing an infectious disease are not analogous.  I'm just trying to figure out why you think they are.

Think of sunscreen as your mask.  And staying out of the sun as social distancing.  Analogies are comparable to something else in significant respect, not ALL respects or they would be the exact same thing.  You picking up on one single thing runs contrary to that definition.  Almost as if you're being disingenuous.  

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

Think of sunscreen as your mask.  And staying out of the sun as social distancing.  Analogies are comparable to something else in significant respect, not ALL respects or they would be the exact same thing.  You picking up on one single thing runs contrary to that definition.  Almost as if you're being disingenuous.  

That "one single thing" is that COVID is contagious, which is basically the entire rationale behind virtually every preventative measure taken since March 2020. You can't make analogies that ignore the fundamental nature of the thing you're analogizing.

 

[JIslander]

That "one single thing" is that COVID is contagious, which is basically the entire rationale behind virtually every preventative measure taken since March 2020. You can't make analogies that ignore the fundamental nature of the thing you're analogizing.

I think Tony's had too much sun.  

 

[PhillipPhoto]

That "one single thing" is that COVID is contagious, which is basically the entire rationale behind virtually every preventative measure taken since March 2020. You can't make analogies that ignore the fundamental nature of the thing you're analogizing.

Sure you can.  I just did.  That difference has no effect on the logic.  Your fallacy of it being difficult to protect the vulnerable as compared to protecting everyone anyway isn't dependent on the source of the harm.  But if it helps switch it out in my analogy.  Would you like me to do that for you?:

Star bellied sneetches get the flu, regular sneetches do not.   The solution is to make all sneetches get a flu shot.  An alternate solution is proposed that only star bellied sneetches should have to get a flu shot. 

Making a claim that it is a more difficult problem, or “the problem changes significantly”, to protect star bellied sneetches if they are the only ones required to get a flu shot is a logical fallacy.  

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

Sure you can.  I just did.  That difference has no effect on the logic.  Your fallacy of it being difficult to protect the vulnerable as compared to protecting everyone anyway isn't dependent on the source of the harm.  But if it helps switch it out in my analogy.  Would you like me to do that for you?:

Star bellied sneetches get the flu, regular sneetches do not.   The solution is to make all sneetches get a flu shot.  An alternate solution is proposed that only star bellied sneetches should have to get a flu shot. 

Making a claim that it is a more difficult problem, or “the problem changes significantly”, to protect star bellied sneetches if they are the only ones required to get a flu shot is a logical fallacy.  

Good point. I suppose you can. It just suggests that your analogy is bad and that you have no grasp of the thing you're analogizing.

I'm not sure what else to say, my friend. You continue to deny the fundamental nature of contagious diseases and how that drastically alters the public health response, and I'm not interested in banging my head against a wall trying to explain it.

 

[PhillipPhoto]

Good point. I suppose you can. It just suggests that your analogy is bad and that you have no grasp of the thing you're analogizing.

I'm not sure what else to say, my friend. You continue to deny the fundamental nature of contagious diseases and how that drastically alters the public health response, and I'm not interested in banging my head against a wall trying to explain it.

As if we didn't already know if you were being disingenuous or not. I changed the analogy to use a contagious disease for you. Your logic still fails.  

 

[supermike80]

The only reason.  And I mean the only reason I was OK with the shutdowns was to alleviate pressure at our hospitals.  That's it.  Other than that I thought the shutdowns went way way way too far.  (remember we couldnt even buy vegetable seeds at the grocery store in Michigan) 

There was a mass frenzy related to this.  I still believe a big portion of it was political, because of the guy in office.  But I also think we massively overreacted looking back.   

 

[moleculo]

lol, that's not what I said.  I drew my own conclusions before the study was published.  The fact that my conclusions aligned with the study pretty well just reinforced my own conclusions.  That's a prefect example of critical thinking.

it's a perfect example of hearing only what you want to hear, and excluding anything you don't.  It's actually a pretty perfect example of the opposite of critical thinking.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

As if we didn't already know if you were being disingenuous or not. I changed the analogy to use a contagious disease for you. Your logic still fails.  

The analogy still failed, because almost everyone can get (and more importantly, almost everyone can transmit) COVID. 

If you'd like to talk about the best policy solutions if all sneetches could get the flu, and while some sneetches were far more likely to get sick and die from the flu than others, the less vulnerable sneetches could still very easily give the flu to the more vulnerable sneetches who then get sick and die even as the person who gave it to them recovers quickly, then we'll have ourselves a workable analogy! Not sure why we'd need to analogize at that point, but that's OK.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

This is the perfect example of a non-scientific talking point.  Are there vulnerable children and educators, of course.  Is it enough to throw the baby out with the bath water, absolutely not.  Protect the few that are vulnerable while the VAST MAJORITY go about their lives without unnecessary restrictions.

When you go back and do a postmortem of the current discussion you're having, notice what happened here.  You started off with a perfectly fine, eminently defensible position.  My guess is that most people probably share the view you're expressing, especially now that everybody has access to vaccination and can take good steps to protect themselves from covid without asking anything from anybody else.

Then you made an analogy, which created an opportunity for a bad-faith poster to nitpick your analogy instead of engaging with your underlying argument.  People on the internet tend to struggle with analogies under the best of circumstances.  If you give the wrong person an opportunity to change the subject away from an argument that they're probably losing into a war of attrition about whether your analogy was absolutely spot-on perfect or not, they're always going to choose the latter.

You don't necessarily have to follow that guy down that rabbit hole if you don't want to. 

 

[moleculo]

The only reason.  And I mean the only reason I was OK with the shutdowns was to alleviate pressure at our hospitals.  That's it.  Other than that I thought the shutdowns went way way way too far.  (remember we couldnt even buy vegetable seeds at the grocery store in Michigan) 

There was a mass frenzy related to this.  I still believe a big portion of it was political, because of the guy in office.  But I also think we massively overreacted looking back.   

I think it's important to remember that different areas had vastly different responses.  You couldn't buy vegetable seeds and I think that's too far.  For me here in SC, there were no mask mandates and I don't think things went far enough.

I also want to say that I agree that the only reason for the shutdowns were to alleviate pressure on the hospitals.  We did that, for the most part.  The shutdowns were successful.

 

[JIslander]

I know people who died from COVID that would not be put in a "vulnerable" category. 

 

[supermike80]

I know people who died from COVID that would not be put in a "vulnerable" category. 

Same with the flu, a cold, etc etc.  So what's your point?   

 

[JIslander]

Same with the flu, a cold, etc etc.  So what's your point?   

You know someone who died from a cold?

 

[supermike80]

You know someone who died from a cold?

No...That also doesn't mean it didn't happen.   

 

[JIslander]

No...That also doesn't mean it didn't happen.   

I'm sure someone died from a piano falling them too (didn't have argue this before??)

 

[PhillipPhoto]

it's a perfect example of hearing only what you want to hear, and excluding anything you don't.  It's actually a pretty perfect example of the opposite of critical thinking.

You missed the part where I came to my own conclusions on my own.  I continue to mostly hear Fauci & Co. versions of the story.  That's a bigger part of the problem as I'm just one person regardless of what you want to say about me.   Do you agree with this?:

Among the reforms Bhattacharya says are needed is putting a firewall between public health officials who make policy decisions and the funding that scientists receive so the money cannot be used to suppress scientific discussion or to blackmail researchers into silence.

Link

If not, why not?

 

[supermike80]

I'm sure someone died from a piano falling them too (didn't have argue this before??)

Still don't get your point really.  But I am 100% sure that has happened too.  

 

[PhillipPhoto]

The analogy still failed

  Agreed.  It failed to get through to you, 100%.

 

[PhillipPhoto]

When you go back and do a postmortem of the current discussion you're having, notice what happened here.  You started off with a perfectly fine, eminently defensible position.  My guess is that most people probably share the view you're expressing, especially now that everybody has access to vaccination and can take good steps to protect themselves from covid without asking anything from anybody else.

Then you made an analogy, which created an opportunity for a bad-faith poster to nitpick your analogy instead of engaging with your underlying argument.  People on the internet tend to struggle with analogies under the best of circumstances.  If you give the wrong person an opportunity to change the subject away from an argument that they're probably losing into a war of attrition about whether your analogy was absolutely spot-on perfect or not, they're always going to choose the latter.

You don't necessarily have to follow that guy down that rabbit hole if you don't want to. 

100%.  Lesson learned with Tobias.

 

[John123]

When you go back and do a postmortem of the current discussion you're having, notice what happened here.  You started off with a perfectly fine, eminently defensible position.  My guess is that most people probably share the view you're expressing, especially now that everybody has access to vaccination and can take good steps to protect themselves from covid without asking anything from anybody else.

Then you made an analogy, which created an opportunity for a bad-faith poster to nitpick your analogy instead of engaging with your underlying argument.  People on the internet tend to struggle with analogies under the best of circumstances.  If you give the wrong person an opportunity to change the subject away from an argument that they're probably losing into a war of attrition about whether your analogy was absolutely spot-on perfect or not, they're always going to choose the latter.

You don't necessarily have to follow that guy down that rabbit hole if you don't want to. 

I know, right?  I make one caveman analogy and this guy on the interwebs takes it totally out of context and moves the conversation to a discussion about insurance. 

 

[JIslander]

Still don't get your point really.  But I am 100% sure that has happened too.  

My point is "vulnerable" keeps getting thrown out like this small subset of people whom we only needed to protect from COVID, everyone else needn't worry. .  I am saying that in my circle of family and friends, I know people who would not be considered "vulnerable" yet died from COVID.

 

[supermike80]

My point is "vulnerable" keeps getting thrown out like this small subset of people whom we only needed to protect from COVID, everyone else needn't worry. .  I am saying that in my circle of family and friends, I know people who would not be considered "vulnerable" yet died from COVID.

Great.  So same reply.  Same with the flu.  So what?

 

[JIslander]

Great.  So same reply.  Same with the flu.  So what?

  

ITS NOT THE SAME.   You just admitted you knew of nobody who died from a cold or flu.  Me neither.  

 

[supermike80]

  

ITS NOT THE SAME.   You just admitted you knew of nobody who died from a cold or flu.  Me neither.  

I still dont understand.  Are you saying you only count deaths when it's someone you know?  Otherwise it doesn't happen?   Nothing you are saying is making any sense.  Are you now saying people don't die from the flu too?

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

When you go back and do a postmortem of the current discussion you're having, notice what happened here.  You started off with a perfectly fine, eminently defensible position.  My guess is that most people probably share the view you're expressing, especially now that everybody has access to vaccination and can take good steps to protect themselves from covid without asking anything from anybody else.

Then you made an analogy, which created an opportunity for a bad-faith poster to nitpick your analogy instead of engaging with your underlying argument.  People on the internet tend to struggle with analogies under the best of circumstances.  If you give the wrong person an opportunity to change the subject away from an argument that they're probably losing into a war of attrition about whether your analogy was absolutely spot-on perfect or not, they're always going to choose the latter.

You don't necessarily have to follow that guy down that rabbit hole if you don't want to. 

Nope.

The flaw with the analogy was obviously the same as the flaw in the larger argument- it fails to consider any potential transmission as a result of policy beyond the initial one. If you want to argue for less restrictions in schools because not many kids die of COVID, you HAVE to address the counterargument that the kids would give it to old or otherwise vulnerable people, or the kids would give it to other people who could then give it to old/vulnerable people, or the kids would give it to someone else who gives it to someone else who gives it to someone else who gives it to someone else, who then gives it to an old/vulnerable person. Because that's how infectious diseases work

This IMO is the fundamental divide between the two sides on COVID, as @moleculo so adeptly pointed out here. The terrible analogy isn't just a terrible analogy- its failure illustrates why the argument it seeks to support is flawed and also shows the divide between the two "sides" pretty clearly. That's where I was trying to go with this discussion. 

Sorry to hear you think I'm a "bad-faith poster" and the "wrong person."  I always gave you the benefit of the doubt back in the day, guess it wasn't mutual.

 

[JIslander]

I still dont understand.  Are you saying you only count deaths when it's someone you know?  Otherwise it doesn't happen?   Nothing you are saying is making any sense.  Are you now saying people don't die from the flu too?

1) if you don't want to believe the science that COVID was more deadly than a cold/ flu, that's on you --

2) I'd be willing to bet my circle of COVID experience  (deaths known) is not unlike many others, than perhaps yours, of course.   That is, it wasn't just the vulnerable that were taken down ---

 

[John123]

1) if you don't want to believe the science that COVID was more deadly than a cold/ flu, that's on you --

2) I'd be willing to bet my circle of COVID experience  (deaths known) is not unlike many others, than perhaps yours, of course.   That is, it wasn't just the vulnerable that were taken down ---

It wasn't "just the vulnerable", but a very large percentage were in those high risk categories.  I didn't think this was even up for debate at this point.  And we also know that the lockdowns and other measures taken at the height of Covid had an extremely detrimental effect on people, including higher suicides attempts/success, depression, other health issues not being treated resulting in deaths/illness, etc.....And that is without considering the economic effects.  And the question is whether the lockdowns and other measures taken caused more harm than good. 

 

[supermike80]

1) if you don't want to believe the science that COVID was more deadly than a cold/ flu, that's on you --

2) I'd be willing to bet my circle of COVID experience  (deaths known) is not unlike many others, than perhaps yours, of course.   That is, it wasn't just the vulnerable that were taken down ---

1)  I don't understand the point of this but Ok

2) Again, I conceded this a number of times.   It didn't just affect the vulnerable.  However the vulnerable were far more affected. 

OK?

 

[PhillipPhoto]

Nope.

The flaw with the analogy was obviously the same as the flaw in the larger argument- it fails to consider any potential transmission as a result of policy beyond the initial one. If you want to argue for less restrictions in schools because not many kids die of COVID, you HAVE to address the counterargument that the kids would give it to old or otherwise vulnerable people, or the kids would give it to other people who could then give it to old/vulnerable people, or the kids would give it to someone else who gives it to someone else who gives it to someone else who gives it to someone else, who then gives it to an old/vulnerable person. Because that's how infectious diseases work

This IMO is the fundamental divide between the two sides on COVID, as @moleculo so adeptly pointed out here. The terrible analogy isn't just a terrible analogy- its failure illustrates why the argument it seeks to support is flawed and also shows the divide between the two "sides" pretty clearly. That's where I was trying to go with this discussion. 

Sorry to hear you think I'm a "bad-faith poster" and the "wrong person."  I always gave you the benefit of the doubt back in the day, guess it wasn't mutual.

All those are taken into account in the implemented policy.  There is no reason except for lack of understanding that the new policy just defines WHO instead of EVERYONE.  

Bad policy - mask all kids because of grandma.

Good policy - make sure grandma is protected and isolated.  If kid wants to go see grandma make sure he masks for a week prior at school and tests negative prior to heading over to grandma's house.  They both can wear masks during the visit as a secondary precaution and if they want to use cellophane for hugs that's up to them.  

Oh, so grandma is vaccinated now?  Why the hell are we still masking kids in school?

 

[JIslander]

It wasn't "just the vulnerable", but a very large percentage were in those high risk categories.  I didn't think this was even up for debate at this point.  And we also know that the lockdowns and other measures taken at the height of Covid had an extremely detrimental effect on people, including higher suicides attempts/success, depression, other health issues not being treated resulting in deaths/illness, etc.....And that is without considering the economic effects.  And the question is whether the lockdowns and other measures taken caused more harm than good. 

The ones I knew who died were NOT in a high risk category and also not as a result of lockdown induced affects, which isn't in the same ballpark.

 

[Toby2ElectricBugaloo]

All those are taken into account in the implemented policy.  There is no reason except for lack of understanding that the new policy just defines WHO instead of EVERYONE.  

Bad policy - mask all kids because of grandma.

Good policy - make sure grandma is protected and isolated.  If kid wants to go see grandma make sure he masks for a week prior at school and tests negative prior to heading over to grandma's house.  They both can wear masks during the visit as a secondary precaution and if they want to use cellophane for hugs that's up to them.  

Oh, so grandma is vaccinated now?  Why the hell are we still masking kids in school?

This is exactly the same logical mistake I've been referencing over and over. It only evaluates transmission to one level.

What about the people the kid gives COVID to? Can they give it vulnerable people? What about a person that gets COVID from the person who got it from the kid, can they also transmit it? Do people who work with vulnerable people have go into total isolation too? If not, what happens when the kid who got COVID at school runs into an orderly from the nursing home at 7-11? These are the questions I never saw answered or even contemplated by the "open up" crowd back in the day. 

FWIW I think we're passed all this stuff now that there's a vaccine and the numbers are more under control. I'm glad the schools are now open, and I'd prefer if kids weren't wearing masks any more although I don't think it's a big deal. I just hate the idea that the previous measures were somehow overkill or unhelpful, especially if the basis for that position is analysis that doesn't go past one level of transmission. 

 

[JIslander]

1)  I don't understand the point of this but Ok

2) Again, I conceded this a number of times.   It didn't just affect the vulnerable.  However the vulnerable were far more affected. 

OK?

Last time -- 

1) you seem to be insinuating COVID is no more deadly than a cold /flu? -- The science / pandemic #'s disagrees

2) ok -- yes, it DIDN'T just affect the vulnerable --phew, thank you --  see Sweden

 

[supermike80]

Last time -- 

1) you seem to be insinuating COVID is no more deadly than a cold /flu? -- The science / pandemic #'s disagrees

2) ok -- yes, it DIDN'T just affect the vulnerable --phew, thank you --  see Sweden

1) Again.  I don't understand your point.  I am not disputing that.  Still don't get it

2) Of course it didn't.  We all know that.

 

[PhillipPhoto]

This is exactly the same logical mistake I've been referencing over and over. It only evaluates transmission to one level.

What about the people the kid gives COVID to? Can they give it vulnerable people? What about a person that gets COVID from the person who got it from the kid, can they also transmit it? Do people who work with vulnerable people have go into total isolation too? If not, what happens when the kid who got COVID at school runs into an orderly from the nursing home at 7-11? These are the questions I never saw answered or even contemplated by the "open up" crowd back in the day. 

FWIW I think we're passed all this stuff now that there's a vaccine and the numbers are more under control. I'm glad the schools are now open, and I'd prefer if kids weren't wearing masks any more although I don't think it's a big deal. I just hate the idea that the previous measures were somehow overkill or unhelpful, especially if the basis for that position is analysis that doesn't go past one level of transmission. 

There are no whatabouts.  Each situation is handled exactly as I explained on how you would protect grandma.