Archive Link

This is such a bullshit headline that hides the actual underlying problem.

40 percent of COVID-19 pandemic deaths in 2020 would have been averted if America's mortality rate was equivalent to other wealthy peer nations

What actions from the Democrat controlled government have changed course at all from Trump's policies? None.

Nothing would be different, except people would be somehow even more accepting of a half million dead in the USA.

  • star_wraith [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    4 years ago

    Hell even if Bernie won in 2016, the number of deaths wouldn't be much lower. I'm sure if Bernie had complete freedom to enact the policies he'd like to, then yeah there'd be a lot fewer deaths. But the point is he doesn't, and the death toll is due to our antiquated and completely fucked up system that prevents us from taking any real actions to stop something like COVID - because our system was designed by capital and exists to serve the interests of capital, not the people.

    • asaharyev [he/him]
      hexagon
      ·
      4 years ago

      Yep.

      "muh states rights" and the weak federal government would have neutered any attempt to stem the spread

      But shitlibs like Biden are showing that they aren't even willing to fucking try to do anything, and it's so frustrating.

  • Chapo_is_Red [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    4 years ago

    Very skeptical of this claim.

    Lot of European states are doing nearly as bad or worse than the US in terms of covid deaths per capita. Including UK, France, Italy, Portugal among others.

    Edit: some of the actual content of article is pretty good at being critical of US systems. Maybe this is good article to share with Trump hating libs?

      • Chapo_is_Red [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        4 years ago

        They compared to the other g7 nations: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the UK. Japan is doing a lot of heavy lifting for the other ones (Japan's deaths per million are only in the double digits, everyone else is much worse by an order of magnitude).

        Using the data on Worldometer:

        The average deaths per million of Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Uk (no Japan) is 1154.2 and the US is 1455 which is 26% bigger.

        If we rank order the G7, the US is only the 3rd worst behind Italy and UK. France is doing a little better than the US. Canada and Germany significantly better, with only Japan being a complete outlier in it's exceptional performance.

        Do we think Italy or UK would have had less deaths if Trump were their head of state?

        • radicalhomo [he/him]
          ·
          edit-2
          4 years ago

          I dug a little more and the report seems to be looking at unnecessary deaths, among many other factors. America is also much less densely populated than Europe and I assume has some inherit advantages to fighting a pandemic.

          The report is here if you want to critique it, but it seems very accurate and is from one of the best known medical journals: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)32545-9/fulltext

          Obviously Trump is not solely to blame for this though. I think Dems would have handled this somewhat better but still pretty shittily. Really the vast majority of deaths could have been avoided in most western countries if it weren't for the terrible systems as a whole. Vietnam is densely populated with 100 million people and literally only had 35 deaths.

          • Chapo_is_Red [he/him]
            ·
            4 years ago

            Interesting, I'll have to take a look at the full report.

            Thinking about it more, there's a going to be a lot of data coming out of this pandemic for public health researchers to look at.

    • Pezevenk [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Yeah this is dumb. Almost all wealthy countries did horribly except like 5 or so.

  • DetroitLolcat [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    I definitely think you get like, a decent number of fewer deaths if you had a bog standard lanyard lib in the white house but COVID-19 would still have been one of the largest mass death events in US history regardless.

  • congressbaseballfan [she/her]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Ok, this won’t be a popular opinion, but a Clinton admin would have probably mirrored What Trudeau did in Canada - government subsidezes wages, direct payments, etc. but with brutal austerity once it was over.

    A Clinton government would have been competent. We’d also be at war with Iran and probably a few other countries though. At least sanction warfare.

    • CarlTheRedditor [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Plus, Clinton probably wouldn't have in front of cameras everyday with encouraging people to not take the virus seriously, saying it's just the flu, children are immune, masks don't work, etc.

      On the other hand, certain segments of the population would be even more firmly in the plandemic/hoax/fuck-you realm simply because it's Clinton telling them to stay inside.

    • asaharyev [he/him]
      hexagon
      ·
      edit-2
      4 years ago

      The US hasn't mirrored Canada in any other aspect of their governance, except the attempted extermination of native populations and rabid destruction of the earth to extract fossil fuels, so I'm unsure why we would follow them on public health. Especially since we already have eschewed and demonized their response to healthcare being a human right.

      Obama and Clinton had the opportunity to follow Canada's example on healthcare and decided that profit was more important. This would be no different. And we will see that under Biden. Just as we have seen it in states with Democrat governors.

    • TheModerateTankie [any]
      ·
      edit-2
      4 years ago

      Direct payments and subsidized wages? I sincerely doubt it. Pelosi outright rejected those ideas early on, as a matter of principle.

      We probably would have taken it more seriously to begin with. Which would have helped. But anything short of doing a proper lockdown with contact tracing and mass testing, followed by strict quarantines anywhere the virus is detected, is going to eventually lead to large uncontrollable outbreaks.

      • congressbaseballfan [she/her]
        ·
        4 years ago

        Remember that Clinton is a neoliberal centrist, whereas Obama and Biden are center right. The neoliberal playbook in this case is direct payments and subsidies to keep the economy afloat followed by severe austerity. Trudeau and Johnson are following this playbook, and will follow through with the austerity as conditions improve. Clinton would have had an eye towards how history would remember her in the moment and swung her ideology accordingly. Don’t forget how vain she is.

        • Chutt_Buggins [he/him]
          ·
          4 years ago

          Remember that Trudeau is a minority government propped in part by our NDP, unlike how a Clinton admin would exist.

          If Trudeau was a majority govt, we wouldn't have had the response we did. So in america, they'd care even less about trying to do something.

    • star_wraith [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      The GOP-led Senate would have blocked all of those wage subsidies and payments though.

    • Moosegender [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Yes. A Clinton government would’ve ripped up the nuclear deal and assassinate their top general.

  • jilgangga [doe/deer]
    ·
    4 years ago

    "Other wealthy peer nations" seems like a fucking low bar when it comes to COVID-19 ...

  • DasKarlBarx [he/him,comrade/them]
    ·
    4 years ago

    when compared to the death rates in other G7 nations (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom). Comparing the U.S. COVID-19 mortality rate to this peer group, the U.S. would have seen 40 percent fewer deaths in 2020 if its mortality rate was comparable.

    Could it be that every one of those countries has some form of universal healthcare? No. It must be orange man bad.

  • Gay_Wrath [fae/faer]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Lol isn't the DEMOCRAT governor of NY trying to open schools again? But yeah it's all trump's fault.

    like we can definitely lay a large portion of the unpreparedness at trump's feet - lack of initial supplies as he de-funded the pandemic response team and he veto'd the post office's plan to send masks to people.

    But every single politican ghoul would still have done this anti-science "we'll just kinda close down but allow open dining and church gatherings and school" thing because they're more beholden to The Line and wouldn't be wiling to close the economy. I mean shit, they're not even willing to give us a monthly stipend or a single 2k check even with dems taking over all of federal branch.

    Also most states would still be fucked beyond belief because they are not required to listen to the fed government on any of this so far. Like, federally, they can't set state law like this other than some guidelines.

    • asaharyev [he/him]
      hexagon
      ·
      4 years ago

      The Democrat governor of NY is trying to open stadiums for pro sports again. To the fucking moon, I guess.

  • AntifaCEO [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Keyword for all these sorts of articles is COULD. Sure, it COULD have gone done to 0 even. I COULD win the lottery, such a filler word that means and adds nothing