Thank you....yeah, if you didn't hear NOW the governors of the surrounding states(around NY/NJ and one other state) are quarantining anyone who leaves said states and comes into theirs. The president was asked(afaik) by them and/or others to lock our states(NY/NJ & one other) down but he said no.

(Also thanks for the links....if I have some time in a bit i'll be looking at them along with other new info on the situation)

The thing is, though, that it's a far cry(as you likely know) between reading about and seeing pictures/film of such things and living through them......and yes, many of us likely knew that it was possible such or similar would happen again some day, but still a good number of the current generation seem to have not bothered even making basic preparations for such(supply buying and stocking, having plans ready of what to do in some emergencies, etc).

I admit I didn't do enough myself, but I tried to at least have enough food/water/some other things ready in case any emergency hit......while even some of my family sort of "laughed" such preparing off here and there.
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I am around that age as well, but I don't think you and I should worry too much.....from what I read and heard(from official sources) the rate of death/serious sickness from this for our age bracket(if one has a good immune system) is under 0.5%(of deaths) & 15 or so%(of serious illness cases).

There is something to that, but I would add that it is also the result of being disconnected from the planet that we are dependent on to sustain our lives. This is unnatural and contributes to feeling alienated and disempowered, which causes many of us to withdraw further and further to escape from what is essentially a catch-22.

People would get it over time(not intentionally of course) and become immune(to varying degrees) to the current strain(s), then they would have antibodies to the strain(s) in their blood.

Also from what i've read they(doctors) can TRANSFER some of those recovered people's blood(via transfusions)(with the antibodies for some covid strains in it) to an elderly or vulnerable person who isn't sick to give them some immunity(from whatever strain the recovered person had antibodies against).

A vaccine could take anywhere from 18 months(if everything went right, which is highly unlikely) to 10+ YEARS(as said in the video Kai2 linked a bit back in the thread). Since we cannot lock everyone down for that long we need to find other ways to protect as many as we can as long as we can and mitigate the problems caused by this sickness.

It's more like they(govts) are trying to slow it enough so that people will still get sick(by accident of course), BUT the hospitals can handle it better and save more/most lives in the process instead of everyone getting sick at once & having the world's medical support networks start to break down.

The problem(imo) is that no country took it seriously enough and locked down everything from "day one"......if we did that we'd likely have not needed to resort to things like herd immunity as much(if at all).
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Herd immunity wouldn't mean letting everyone get sick all at once.....it'd be people doing proper safety steps to stay healthy while letting the virus work it's way more slowly through the populations.....that way less people would need to be hospitalized and eventually a bunch of people would become more or less naturally immune(to whatever strain(s) they had been sick with).

Also as I said before, their blood can be used in some cases(by doctors) to very likely impart that immunity to those who need it most(via transfusion by medical professionals).

I think there are some people who want to drag this out indefinitely because the people at the apex of power have zero exposure to what the general population is experiencing. Market fluctuations, shortages, even crashes have no adverse impact on them. They are "too big to fail", and this is not the 1%. It is the 0.1%. Perhaps even the .01%. The economic disparity in the 1% is far greater than what you see in the 99%, and I think this is why policy cannot be changed more than marginally by means of voting. The only people who are allowed to show up on the ballots are those who are willing to sell out.

So I think this will drag out, and a great many will needlessly die, but this really isn't a new phenomenon. It is fairly common for those not privileged enough to live in the First World.

What we need are masks and disinfectant. And leadership. That would be sufficient to get this under control enough that it would die out. But they are nowhere to be seen at present.

We could always go with the advice of the smart gremlin from Gremlins 2: "Buy plenty of canned food and shotguns**". o.0

(**For protection only, obviously)

The biggest problem with herd immunity -- if it's even possible with COVID-19 -- is that the rate at which it would need to spread is so slow... that our economies would need to be silent for so long... that the economic devastation would be far worse than the disease.

While I hope we do not see this, I keep feeling that...

... after the virus has been beaten (either minimized or eradicated), governments are going to look at the massive bills they generated and take that money out of their respective systems. I can hear "We can't afford ____" used over-and-over again. Seeing the German finance minister commit suicide today over the economic stakes of this pandemic was a dose of reality.

Cuomo is cutting medicaid. Trump sent the masks we had overseas. They want us dead.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnEAl4QEtjU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfyVDydFETo
https://www.state.gov/the-united-states-announces-assistance-to-combat-the-novel-coronavirus/#nav__primary-nav

I don't know about you but I'm getting seriously pissed off.

Not so much, imo, if we did the basic precautions(distancing/hand washing/etc) where/when needed and otherwise resumed some "business as usual"(while maybe also keeping the more vulnerable parts of the population more safe in some way).

But yes, it makes me think that that at some point we'll all have to make tough choices

Times are tough & likely will be for some time, and I worry about some things surrounding all this as well. That said, I don't think such things are the answer(self harm) and that we should try to keep our spirits up more than overly worry/be depressed/etc......imo morale is a major key in beating this(in as much as we can beat it, I mean).
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I am with some things as well, but now is not the time to be leveling blame too much(it can be counterproductive in the current situation), imo.

We should be focusing on keeping people's morale up, helping the sick and those in need, staying safe and well & making sure our loved ones do as well, etc.

You're going to get the thread locked with that kind of stuff.

You sound like a prisoner that's been beaten down and had his spirit broken.

A few pages back a mod clearly stated "Any further political discussions will get the thread locked, last warning".
You don't need to ruin the thread for everyone else out of sheer narcissism.

Interview with Dr. Fauci (US) on COVID19

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfcJecd6jtE

We have people in power openly suggesting that it's OK to sacrifice the elderly so billionaires can squeeze more money out of the economy, and you're worried about a thread on a game store? What the hell is wrong with you???

I've never been so disgusted in my entire life. Never.

Not my fault, go complain somewhere else. However, you really should learn some self-restraint, because many people don't want this thread to get locked, and it will, if there's an extended political discussion again.