03-21-2020, 08:34 PM
(03-20-2020, 08:42 PM)ijmorlan Wrote:(03-20-2020, 08:26 PM)MidTowner Wrote: No, that could not work here. It is not possible to restrict people to our homes.
If it becomes necessary, it will probably be possible.
Note that the Ezra Ave. party wasn’t just small this year — as far as I can tell from reports, it didn’t happen. My impression is the police didn’t even turn away that many people. Why? Because enough people got a clue to make a difference. Similarly, if we really got to the point where the only safe option would be for everybody to stay home unless they are specifically authorized, it would be because people were dying from the disease and almost everybody would understand that it was necessary and would trust the recommendation from the medical officer.
I don’t know what is going to happen, but if it turns out that the current state will continue for many months then I would prefer to have a short period of time during which we would ensure that everybody is stocked up, then a 3-4 week period of time during which literally nobody leaves the house except as specifically authorized by the emergency authorities (so roughly speaking emergency services, utilities, and patients going to the hospital). Theoretically, this should be a foolproof method of stopping the disease: current cases would go through whatever is going to happen, and there would be essentially no new cases. After 3-4 weeks anybody who was infected would be over it, one way or the other.
I don't think that's realistic for a lot of reasons. I think that the list of people whose roles are essential is much longer than that- there are many government services that can't be paused, and plenty of manufacturing and private sector services that needs to continue. Among them, it would be impossible to eliminate contagion entirely, and so this period would probably need to last longer than three or four weeks.
Even if we're just talking about bare necessities, how long would it take us to undertake distribution of three to four weeks (or longer) worth to every household? Who would organize that, and carry it out?