The Corona Crisis

Skepticism General Skepticism
61

Here’s a fine old bit of hypocrisy to kickstart your lockdown midweek.

Some people embarked on a project to use their own skills and resources to sew some protective facemasks to aid the “flatten the curve” initiatives in their own small way. Participants would provide the material, thread, ribbon, etc., plus their time and effort, as well as their sewing machines and overlockers to make the masks. A PDF template/pattern was distributed to all the volunteers so that the masks would be made to a specific minimum standard.

The idea was that they would then approach an upmarket seller to sell the masks for R100.00 apiece to a middle class/wealthy clientele. The proceeds of the sales would be donated to mask-making initiatives operating in townships and informal settlements using unemployed locals and where the manufacturing costs are around R20.00 a mask. This translates to a gearing of about 5:1—that is, one upmarket mask enables the manufacture of five more.

So far, so good, so noble.

One of the proposed upmarket sellers is a pharmacy franchise that pushes a strong line of homoeopathic and “natural” remedies, alongside giving consulting space to several varieties of CAM humbug, such as iridology, chakra manipulation, and reflexology.

Here cometh the hypocrisy.

When asked if the franchise would support this worthy initiative, the franchise operator’s straight-faced response was that they regretfully couldn’t because “the masks aren’t medical grade, and [they] can only sell products that are proven to be medically effective.”

Yes, sometimes truth really is more facepalmy than fiction.

'Luthon64

62

Well, yeah, but, name me a pharmacy these days that doesn’t have a “no prescription bullshit” aisle…

63

It’s business, simple as that. But would all such pharmacies refuse to participate in such a worthy project, because of such a bullshit reason?

Pity Mefiante cannot tell us which upmarket franchise, so I can make a point to avoid them in future.

64

Actually, the design of the masks included a pocket for holding a disposable filter element, which was brought to the attention of the operator. With the filter element inserted, the masks would pass medical muster, so the cited reason is doubly bullshit.

Well, I can tell you that it’s not Clicks or Dis-Chem. Nor is it any of the dispensaries that some of the big supermarket chains now have at some of their large outlets. AFAIK, the franchise has only two outlets, both of which are located in affluent areas in the northern reaches of Joburg, so you’re very likely avoiding them already.

'Luthon64

65

I actually can’t remember when last I was in any pharmacy in the first place. I’m not one for constant buying of medication.

66

Now I don’t know about actual implementation, because imho the government’s communication about this stuff has been… sketchy (I’ll digress later…), however: Anyone else finding it strange that they seem to be basing their alert levels on absolute number of infections? Gauteng is, allegedly, at high alert because it has more infections than the middle of the free-state. But, couldn’t that also mean that in rural areas the proportion of infections could be much higher but being overlooked because the population density is lower?

I do understand that population density is probably a significant risk-factor that makes Gauteng (and other metro’s) probably uniquely exposed to fast transmission rates. But to me these repeated affirmations that Gauteng is “worst hit” seems very naive.

67

More weasel words ahead, I confess. IN MY OPINION the president is using this crisis as a political point scoring exercise. It’s working spectacularly well: Social media is awash with praise for how great a job he’s doing. What is making my brow furrow is the way that information doesn’t seem to be flowing from the point of conception, but is being funneled into his now-frequent public addresses. This is not how the party has typically communicated with the public in the past. It may actually be a breath of fresh air… But it seems more that information is held back and delayed so that more people tune in to his little love letters to the public for some shine.

He’s also using very vague language at times. In last night’s address he underscored the need not to go to pubs or taverns, and took pains to explain that sales of tobacco will commence. Sale of alcohol? Not a word. Why just omit that? Just a mistake? Trying to appease Cele?

The same was the problem around the sale of food vs hot food. Some minister seems to issue a decree without lawful backing. All the businesses, law firms and media go into a frenzy for a week trying to understand what the hell it means and who is getting sued when finally that change is gazetted post-fact. And even then the reasoning unclear and the minister has to issue a statement to clarify.

The worst part, however, is how Cyril just drops the “oh and also simultaneously we’re going to completely transform the entire economy” into his speech and calls it a day. What possible economic ramifications and divestment could just the idea of that specter and uncertainty cause? Guess we’ll have to wait and see.

There’s a lot of work that needs to be done in terms of communication from the Govt.

68

Apparently they will provide more clarity on the details on Saturday. Thus far it is indeed vague: they did not even tell us clearly whether school will reopen or not.

So for the moment I’ll not speculate, and just wait until tomorrow.

The different levels of alert might not be a bad idea in principle, because presumably they can eventually start applying it to individual cities and even neighborhoods. Wherever there is a bad outbreak, you apply a higher alert, but it allows the rest of the country’s economy to more or less function.

I see some potential problems with the idea. For one thing, Johannesburg, more or less, IS South Africa’s economy. Shut it down, and it makes little difference whether people in Koekenaap can keep their curio shop open.

Another problem is that I suspect that from 1 May, they are no longer going to be able to keep the situation under control. As it is, in many areas, people are already completely disregarding the shutdown. They have no choice - they are hungry. In their place I’d have done the same. Lift the lockdown partly, and no one will pay any further attention to it. I for one will start doing my morning walks again, whether I’m allowed to or not.

We can’t really go on like this: another few months with no economy, and we are going to have more children quite literally die of hunger, than old folks die of the virus. I am trying hard not to be callous here. All of us have people in the most-at-risk group close to us, and being in my mid-fifties, I am by no means out of any and all danger myself. But I fear the whole thing is what it is; it could be that there simply ins’t any good outcome here, whatever we do now.

Nonetheless, I think Ramaphosa is sincere, and he inspires some confidence as a man who listens to his advisors, and will do what he can to steer us through the rough waters (even though he is about as good at putting on a face mask as Zuma is at reading big numbers).

As for “complete transformation of the economy,” almost everyone will agree that it is long overdue. The disagreement is about which form it should take. It could be that he’ll use the whole mess as an excuse to nationalize everything. But it is also possible that he’ll start pushing rational economic policies, and blame it on the virus. The thing is, we’ll probably need loans from the IMF now, so to some extent economic policy will be out of the ANC’s hands, which may well turn out to be a good thing.

69

I don’t have a hat, but if I did, I’d eat it if this were the case.

70

Darwin’s going to be working overtime again…

And I have a feeling they’re not going to be able to keep the lid on the lockdown:

71

We could have predicted this:

A whole legal industry being wiped out and replaced with more underground gangsterism.

72

Perhaps not quite as serious as losing our alcohol industry, but still… :slight_smile:

73

Honestly, I had no idea making alcohol was as easy, fun, and creative as it is. AND CHEAP! Hell, I’ve even watched a distilling video, I’ve never even considered it before and I’m not even much of a drinker. Given the prevalence of people saying they’re turning to home brewing… our alcohol industry is going to be in a heck of a lot of trouble.

74

Lots of people will be too lazy. But if your neighbor happens to sell, at a fraction of the price you pay at the liquor store…

75

Now with 100% less tax? :-X

76

Possibly some good news, but perhaps our resident number crunchers will want to take a sharp and skeptical look at it:

77

Oh my, judging by most of the readers’ comments, that site looks an awful lot like a haven for Google-accredited armchair experts and pontificators, those sorely afflicted with Dunning-Kruger impairments. No doubt, it will not be long before one of them with an unusually pronounced bent for conspiracies will hit upon the idea that SA’s lockdown is a ruse cooked up by the evil government so that it can later step in as The Saviour, complete with halo and pearlescent flowing white robes, to rescue the country, and all this to retain and consolidate political power. I’m actually surprised that no-one has put this forward yet.

So much for the niceties. While some of the criticisms appear to be valid—most particularly that regarding a lack of transparency regarding the model(s) used that inform(s) government policy (which Vegter’s article does raise but where diligent individual research would have provided ample detail)—the crux is that there is at present a great deal of uncertainty about many of the factors relating to the pandemic. Aforesaid armchair specialists are all too keen to fill such gaps with made-up certainties that might sound reasonable but for the most part don’t hold up under scrutiny. Moreover, such harping and carping is counterproductive because it distracts the real experts from doing what they should be doing, namely sharpening up knowledge relevant to the problem.

Erring on the side of caution is a good strategy in the face of significant uncertainty. We often do this on our own quite naturally, but tend to resent it when it’s imposed on us externally. As far as I can see, that’s actually the real issue here, and people like to construct narratives about the economy and supposed detriments in order to bolster their rationalisations about why it’s high time that lockdown is ended.

The bottom line is that there aren’t any problems with the numbers, rates, statistics, data, or calculations. They seem to present a powerful case for relaxing restrictions. The problem is that this position is underpinned by a broad brace of assumptions that are not known to be correct. We simply don’t know at this stage how the genie will behave once it’s let out of the bottle completely, so we’d best try to keep it there until we have a clearer picture. It is precisely this cautious approach that has led to SA’s government being lauded repeatedly by numerous relevant local and foreign expert organisations—which praise is voiced for very good reason and which it would be foolish to ignore.

'Luthon64

78

In support of my earlier contentions. The article should be required reading—for everyone! The money quote: “A lack of expertise becomes problematic when it’s combined with extreme overconfidence, and with society’s tendency to reward projected confidence over humility.”

'Luthon64

79

Well, however it may be, they just shot their chances of the public being behind them in the face. Every smoker in this country just shouted out on social media as one person. This is going to get hairy.

80

Yup, it was pretty shortsighted. My landlady works in the tobacco industry and she has a startling and credible hypothesis: the people who signed petitions to keep the ban in place are almost all involved in the illegal tobacco industry. Of course they want it to remain illegal - that’s how they are making their money.

As for the article, I posted it because Ivo Vegter is usually quite sharp. But he’s also an ultra-libertarian, and thus tends to oppose anything and everything governments do, in kneejerk manner. (That website looks to me like a libertarian think tank). If I were in his shoes I’d think twice before acting in such confident manner, because the jury is still out, and he might end up with serious egg all over his face, before long.

In any event, if we don’t know the correct course of action is extreme caution rather than overconfidence, I would think. If you don’t know whether the revolver is loaded, you don’t play Russian Roulette with it.