…and notes on the American response:
In the approval of new medical tools (drugs, laboratory tests, and medical devices), our system — including direct federal and state regulators and our civil liability regime — massively prefers safety (avoiding sins of commission, if you will) to the introduction of new technology that might save lives. We don’t put a feather on the “safety” side of the scales, we weigh it down with an anvil, and are thereby far more willing to commit the sin of omission (doing nothing) than commit the sin of approving a technology that is dangerous or ineffective.
Voters, politicians, government officials, and the press overwhelmingly favor the “safety paramount” approach of the United States. Unfortunately, the highly deliberative manner of the American approach becomes dangerous in a rapidly spreading pandemic. Much as the media and citizens wish it were otherwise, we cannot change our system, or even our bureaucratic impulses, suddenly. Even if lives depend on it.
There is no way to know how many millions of lives both the caution of the FDA in approving drugs (requiring “effectiveness,” and not just safety), and the federal junk-science approach to nutrition have cost us over the decades.
[Update a while later]
Related, and (speaking as a boomer) darkly amusing:
Good job, team! The FDA is forcing the CDC to double test for the virus. Because, you know, testing was going so smoothly and rapidly, and we knew who had it.
[Saturday-morning update]
She shoots, she scores.
[Update a couple minutes later]
Bernie: “We must seize the means of toilet-paper production!”
[Update a few minutes later]
Globalization may be the biggest victim of the virus. It was definitely insane to put China on the critical path of our drug production.
Your link is broken.
Fixed now, sorry.
The blurring of the line between “safety” and “efficacy” is, I think, at the heart of a lot of this abuse. There is an argument on both sides of the issue about checking “safety” — but for the sake of discussion, grant that there is a legitimate government interest in assuring drug and medical device “safety”. Stretch the point and assume further than there is reason to make that a Federal responsibility. But surely, there is no comparable argument for banning products of unproven “efficacy”. Regulating the claims they make in advertising, perhaps. But experimental therapies and devices that are “safe” can be left to the market to find out what is “effective”
I’m sure the class-action lawyers would love that. You’re right, but need tort reform first.
I suggest you read this article: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/us/coronavirus-testing-delays.html
The government ‘rules’ greatly delayed action.
We need to know the tests are accurate. People are freaking out over the number of tests but it doesn’t matter how many tests you do if they results aren’t accurate. By all means, we should reduce the regulations hampering the release of new tests but if the tests don’t work, they are useless.
People are also comparing the number of tests South Korea has done with how many we have done as if that means something. South Korea has more interaction with China and had more cases earlier than the USA. Testing isn’t about hitting some enthusiasm hurdle. We need to test people who are showing symptoms and people they have had contact with. The testing numbers should reflect that and not some arbitrary number the idiot media thinks we need to hit.
Looking at it this way, testing large number of people means its a big problem and if we need to test fewer people, that means the sensational hysteria isn’t accurately portraying what is happening. I’m not surprised that our media would portray something that is good as something that is bad.
Now, more than ever, we need a responsible media but they can’t suck it up and act professional even in the midst of a pandemic.
The obvious lesson, yet again, is that the larger a bureaucracy is, the less responsive, agile, and intelligent it is.
It’s an apples and oranges comparison to look at, say, S. Korea, Taiwan, and especially Singapore and compare them to our own federal government. They are, by virtue of their population size, far more akin to US states.
The testing delays and other boondoggles stemmed mainly from excessive centralization. Trump did step in to fix this, but it took him too long IMHO. This should have been spotted and fixed sooner. Likewise, his travel bans are both good, and tardy; they should have been enacted sooner. Overall, I’d give him a B minus on his handling of this virus mess.
On the other side of the aisle, though, they denounced the travel bans, shrieked xenophobia and racism, and were the ones who created the overcentalization problem in the first place. They have also massively politicized the situation, as well as held up needed emergency legislation (such as legislation regarding respirators) to play partisan politics (Like Pelosi trying to ram federal funding for abortions into the coronavirus legislation). Their utter hypocrisy (seen most recently on their collective freak-out over “Wuhan Coronavirus”, calling it racist – when they’d been using the term themselves.) I’ll be charitable and give the D leadership and Biden a D minus on their actions.
As for a vaccine, it’s a year away if we go by the usual procedures, even though several already exist. It’s testing, of course, that’s the delaying factor. Not just the double blind tests, but the long term observation for any possible side effects. The common sense approach is to cut some corners, on the basis that the risk of doing so is less than the risk of not doing so. Getting this done will take some political courage, to say the least. I’m not fully confident that Trump will do it, but I like the odds a heck of a let better with him in the oval office than a senile dolt like Biden, who has shown he cares far more out the lefty optics (calling the China travel ban xenophobic, for one) than reality.
Ahh, the media said it was those dastardly Republicans trying to put things in the bill to prevent federal money going toward abortion. Looks like the coordinated PR op of the DNC and media was a success.
“boomer remover”
Identity politics encourages an “us vs. them” mentality, which makes it easy to return the favor and to stick it to ’em by making sure they’ll be paying for “boomer” Social Security and Medicare payouts for the rest of their comfy lives. (Nelson Muntz laugh here.)
The disease is mostly killing Silents, not Boomers. The deaths in Italy, for example, are mostly people over 80.
I saw an 2014 article about the massive numbers of Chinese illegals in Italy, about 30,000 just in one town. They’re working in garment sweat shops pumping out the usual Chinese clothes, which of course get to carry the “Made in Italy” EU label.
This is apparently a huge under-the-radar thing, and probably explains why Italy went down first and hard shortly after the virus appeared in Wuhan. I would image that someone who doesn’t buy designer clothes might have a theory about why nobody in the press reported that there might be some connection between the outbreak and massive numbers of Chinese companies and Chinese illegals in Italy, and whether all the EU labeling, labor, and immigration policies are really on the up-and-up.
George, I can personally attest to this.
I spend a lot of time in Italy (though not in the past year), usually going for a month to six weeks, and staying in rural areas, not tourist areas. I noticed a lot of Chinese in some areas, especially southwest of Venice – the epicenter of Italy’s outbreaks. I also saw a lot of Chinese working at street vendor stalls, especially those selling shoes, purses, and other leather goods in the hill towns of Tuscany, Lombardy, Venetio, etc. This is a very focused invasion; mainly just a few areas, just a couple of industries. And that makes it orchestrated.
When I heard of the outbreak in Wuhan, I also thought of how these Chinese newcomers were already resented in Italy, due to being there to steal these industries. I thought it would not end well; political correctness by officials would result in the obvious risks being not addressed.
This was not under-the-radar to the local Italians where it began, I can assure you – a great many already resented the Chinese, and so would see this risk as they have seen others. It was EU driven political correctness on high (and in the Italian government) that turned a blind eye – and set Italy on a course for disaster.
When this is over, I think there will be a reckoning on many things.
There’s an opening for states to step in and provide medical tests not approved by FDA for in-state use. They should be able to win a constitutional test.
Dear Young-uns: It won’t kill “Boomers,” it’ll kill your grandma and grandpa. And if you think that’s okay, maybe they can do the rest of us a favor and kill you before they go…