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UK: The Fight against COVID-19: An Update from Dr. Jay Bhattacharya
A month ago, I interviewed Dr. Jay Bhattacharya just as the COVID-19 crisis was shuttering the economy and governments were ordering citizens to shelter at home. In that interview, Dr. Bhattacharya mentioned that he himself would soon be conducting tests for COVID in Santa Clara County, California, one of the most active hotspots in the country. Today Dr. Bhattacharya returns to discuss the results of that study and one currently under way in partnership with Major League Baseball. We also discuss some signs of hope, and specifics about how the economy can be restarted safely and efficiently. Dr. Bhattacharya also gives some (unsolicited) advice to Dr. Anthony Fauci, California governor Gavin Newsom, and president Donald Trump.
Recorded on Zoom on April 17th, 2020.
Published in General
Thank you for another excellent interview with Dr. Bhattacharya. I appreciate his calm, intelligent assessment.
I have one question regarding the population testing he performed. There is a subset of the population that I suspect was not included in his study, and that is schoolchildren. I read a paper published at the National Institutes for Health a few years ago that talked about how novel influenza viruses would spread through the school population very quickly, because that cohort tends not to practice good hygiene and is considered a “high contact” population.
So I am wondering: how likely does it seem that the virus may have spread more widely through this untested population, and could that significantly increase the overall infection rate?
Great interview. Thanks!
Thanks, Peter!
zero children have died from covid-19
Fantastic interview.
That doesn’t mean they don’t spread the disease, which was Henry’s point.
It will get harder and harder to keep in mind that this information was not available when the lockdowns were implemented worldwide. We are headed for a world of hurt economically and it will be tempting to forget in eagerness to blame. Especially under the shadow of rising socialism, that’s a dangerous impulse. Social unrest needs no more kindling.
On the other hand, we should be better prepared for uncertainty about epidemics. It won’t always be possible to make well informed decisions. In the wake of these lockdowns, we will have a helpful if harsh understanding of their effects. We can include that knowledge in future decision making.
I should have but did not listen to President Trump’s speech on re-opening our economy. In all of the bits and pieces I have heard there was not a mention of the strong possibility of a second wave occurring after we go back to work. It is very important for the President to acknowledge that fact very publicly so people will be prepared and even expect that to happen. We shut down to flatten the curve and prevent overwhelming our hospitals and health care system. We did not shut down to eliminate the contagion. Somehow the original purpose has morphed into something unachievable. We are now comfortable that our hospitals can withstand the volume of sick people needing admittance. That is why we are moving to re-open our economy–also because we will die if we don’t–not because we have conquered the virus.
Peter Robinson is the reason I joined Ricochet and he remains the best interviewer of the most important topics. Thanks.
I just watched this video this morning and tried reading Claires letter.
I just could not get through her hysterics it was just insane her, belief that this virus was killing at the rate of one in 20.
I know two people effected by the virus. An old person from my Church passed away. And my friends stepson of 38 got his leg infected and they had to amputate.
If this thing were killing people at the rate of 5 percent, there would be Soldiers in the streets to prevent wide spread looting.
Supposedly smart people behaving like raving lunatics is really getting to me.
The video mentions something else. This shutdown is also killing people. And we need to talk more about that.
what is your point? children spread the disease? what’s next, the sky is blue? 2+2 = 4?
By closing down schools we have effectively delayed or prevented herd immunity.
Is there anyone who can’t spread the virus?
Please enlighten me @mendel
The import of this information is not to punish the politicians for imposing a lockdown, but to punish the politicians who insist on maintaining a lockdown.
Everyone makes mistakes. Important question is do we learn from mistakes or double down on stupidity
Actually, my point — which was purely speculative — was this:
The paper I referenced was The Shifting Demographic Landscape of Influenza. What it suggests is not merely that school children spread influenza but that, in the early phases of the spread of a new strain, school children are disproportionately infected. That is, they represent the primary demographic in the early phase, with a greater disease prevalence than you’ll find in the general population.
I mention that because, assuming Dr. Bhattacharya’s study did not include school children, it seems possible that the study might actually understate the percentage of the population that has been infected. This would be so if school children were infected at a greater rate than the general population.
This has nothing to do with the risk to school children (which is apparently very small). It simply helps us better understand the denominator in the fatality/infection ratio and therefore helps us better project the range of potential total fatalities.
I agree. There will be time to distribute the blame later.
I think that what seemed obviously necessary a month ago is not obviously necessary today, and will seem obviously excessive two weeks from now.
first, a coronavirus is not the same as an influenza virus.
second, if children are disproportionately infected, the denominator will increase which means infection and case fatality rates would decrease
third, @mendel, you are not a mind reader… don’t quit your day job
Peter & Dr. Jay,
These interviews and reading The Great Influenza have focused my thinking while stuck at home in Los Angeles.
My husband & I are working from home, but I have a brother who is filing for unemployment for the first time in his life and a sister who has taken a 25% cut in pay. The economic harm is real.
Peter, thank you for your clarifying questions that highlight the entire scope of this pandemic.
Dr. Jay, thank you for your illuminating answers and for conducting your testing. We need real data to go into the models to inform policy decisions. May God bless you for your dedication.
Eric Garcetti must be recalled
Absolutely true. However, there seems little reason to believe that the same effect would not be observed with both viruses, given that they are both spread through contact and expired particles. It’s genetically novel, but that doesn’t mean it’s fundamentally unlike every other respiratory virus.
That’s precisely my point, that if the school-age population has a greater prevalence than the general community, then the denominator is larger and the disease is less dangerous than even Dr. Bhattacharya’s numbers show. I don’t think we are in disagreement here, CrytoGuy.
It’s possible that I was unclear in my first post. When I asked, of this potential differential transmission in school children, “could that significantly increase the overall infection rate?” what I meant was: could that make the actual measure of the number of people infected larger than Dr. Bhattacharya projected? In other words, could that mean that the denominator is even larger than he thinks? I probably shouldn’t have used the word “rate,” since I’m thinking of the total infected population, not the rate of re-transmission.
I get it, I agree
This novel coronavirus is a respiratory virus and may not be so novel after all
I was offended that @mendel spoke on your behalf incorrectly and unnecessarily
We are all adults or pretend to be
p.s. the other cryptocurrencies are nonsense including Ethereum
I’m printing this comment and putting it on my wall. Thanks, I Walton.
As @roblong said in his interview with Nick Gillespie on Reason, the reason why @peterrobinson is a great interviewer is preparation.
Law talk and John Yoo persuaded me to join Ricochet. Who knew that John could be so persuasive ?
Is the March 27 recording date correct ? I think this interview is more recent.
This was a great interview. Thank you Peter, and thank you Doc B.
I dissent from some of the comments above. I agree that we didn’t have as much information a month ago when the shutdown decisions were made, but in my estimation, we knew enough that we should have realized that lockdowns were bad policy.
Why didn’t I say so before? I did say so before, on March 14, here.
It was clear from the initial Imperial College London report that the lockdown strategy would merely delay the inevitable. The ICL death estimate was probably 5-10 times too high (it was 2.2 million), but more importantly, it made clear that lockdowns would merely delay the inevitable.
Why didn’t I say so before? I did say so before, on March 2o, here (comment #30).
My purpose is not to pat myself on the back, which is pointless. My point is to note that the facts necessary to establish that the lockdowns were a bad idea have been evident from the outset. What has been lacking, in my estimation, is the fortitude — or perhaps callousness — to face those facts.
I disagree with one thing that Doc B said in this regard. He said (at 39:30): “So the question is what do we do about it? I mean, it’s like, we’re going to have to learn to live with it, in some sense. If it’s a 1 in 1,000 risk of dying from getting it, we could learn to live with it. If it’s 3 in 100, maybe not.”
Even if it’s 3 in 100, if there’s nothing feasible that can be done — nothing that won’t do far more harm than good — then we have to learn to live with it anyway.
Or, quite frankly, we could hide in our houses like children, and pull the covers up over our heads in bed, and pretend that the monster can’t get us. Until we starve, or get kicked out of our house for not paying the rent or mortgage. Oh, and while doing so, we can pretend that we’re being heroic, like Jonah Goldberg did in his latest column at NR (here).
It is good news that it appears to be much closer to 1 in 1,000 than 3 in 100 — but then, we knew that the 3 in 100 was a serious overstatement a month ago, as we knew that there were a large number of undetected cases (though we didn’t know quite how many, and we have a better idea of this figure now).
I was actually contemplating a post about Jonah Goldberg’s column titled “Brave, brave Sir Robin Goldberg.”
Maybe something about the British reference makes me think of C.S. Lewis. We have too many men without chests, and even if we had enough men with chests, too many women wouldn’t listen to them anyway.
Copy and paste error from the template we use to post the show on YouTube. This interview was recorded yesterday (April 17th) afternoon.
Now fixed. Thanks for the catch.
April 16
update: never mind, see blue yeti
Jonah Goldberg is bad news. His commentary gets worse each day.
you need a checklist
If that was true, I would expect more governors and local politicians to have dissented. Some were elected for their focus on economics and have not been prone to groupthink. It’s difficult to imagine that everyone was fooled.
In any case, the economic repercussions of so many lockdowns and disruptions around the world are not all predictable. There are “unknown unknowns” coming. It will be months yet before some of those surprise effects are manifested.
I did a post on it, but in my walk this morning I saw 25 people violate quarantine. Its over whether the government and doctors want to admit it.