{"id":4984,"date":"2020-04-03T15:18:46","date_gmt":"2020-04-03T21:18:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rayharvey.org\/?p=4984"},"modified":"2020-04-03T17:17:14","modified_gmt":"2020-04-03T23:17:14","slug":"how-excessive-regulation-ignited-covid-19s-spread-what-is-the-better-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rayharvey.org\/index.php\/2020\/04\/how-excessive-regulation-ignited-covid-19s-spread-what-is-the-better-way\/","title":{"rendered":"How Excessive Regulation Ignited COVID-19\u2019s Spread & What Is The Better Way"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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When the history of coronavirus is written, the heroic work of Helen Y. Chu, a flu researcher at the University of Washington, will be worthy of recognition.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This infuriating account comes from LeapsMag.com<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In late January, Chu was testing nasal swabs for the Seattle Flu Study to monitor influenza spread when she learned of the first case of COVID-19 in Washington state. She deemed it a pressing public health matter to document if and how the illness was spreading locally, so that early containment efforts could succeed. So she sought regulatory approval to adapt the Flu Study to test for the coronavirus, but the federal government denied the request because the original project was funded to study only influenza. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aware of the urgency, Chu\u2019s team bravely defied the order and conducted the testing anyway. Soon they identified a local case in a teenager without any travel history, followed by others. Still, the government tried to shutter their efforts until the outbreak grew dangerous enough to command attention. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Needless testing delays, prompted by excessive regulatory interference, eliminated any chances of curbing the pandemic at its initial stages. Even after Chu went out on a limb to sound alarms, a heavy-handed bureaucracy crushed the nation\u2019s ability to roll out early and widespread testing across the country. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention infamously blundered its own test, while also impeding state and private labs from coming on board, fueling a massive shortage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The long holdup created \u201ca backlog of testing that needed to be done,\u201d says Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease specialist who is a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 In a public health crisis, \u201cthe ideal situation\u201d would allow the government\u2019s test to be \u201csupplanted by private laboratories\u201d without such \u201ca lag in that transition,\u201d Adalja says. Only after the eventual release of CDC\u2019s test could private industry \u201cbegin in earnest\u201d to develop its own versions under the Food and Drug Administration\u2019s emergency use authorization. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a statement, CDC acknowledged that \u201cthis process has not gone as smoothly as we would have liked, but there is currently no backlog for testing at CDC.\u201d  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, universities and corporations are in a race against time, playing catch up as the virus continues its relentless spread, also afflicting many health care workers on the front lines. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hospitals are\u00a0attempting to add<\/a>\u00a0the novel coronavirus to the testing panel of their existent diagnostic machines, which would reduce the results processing time from 48 hours to as little as four hours. Meanwhile, at least four companies announced plans to deliver at-home collection tests to help meet the demand \u2013 before a startling injunction by the FDA\u00a0halted<\/a>\u00a0their plans.\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

[Read the rest of the article here<\/a>.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And why hasn’t Taiwan shut down its economy? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Geographically, it’s very close to the Chinese mainland, and yet relatively few people in Taiwan have been infected. The same is true of Singapore and Hong Kong. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How did Taiwan and the others — South Korea included — achieve this? It wasn’t<\/em> through coercion and force but just the opposite: by allowing the free flow of knowledge and the voluntary action that this knowledge fosters — more informed people able because of this to more wisely choose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Javier Caram\u00e9s Sanchez<\/a> and William Hongsong Wang<\/a> recently wrote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“At the moment in Taiwan, the infection has been\u00a0completely contained despite being one of the countries with the highest risk of suffering a pandemic, given that the\u00a0Republic of China<\/a>\u00a0(ROC) is very close to the Chinese mainland (the People\u2019s Republic of China\u00a0(PRC)). Until January\u00a0there were flights between Taiwan\u2019s capital, Taipei, and the epicenter of Wuhan, China.\u00a0However, as of March 21\u00a0there were only 153 infected<\/a>\u00a0at the same time that\u00a0Europe, far away from the Chinese mainland,\u00a0has more than ten thousand\u00a0affected by the coronavirus. However, in\u00a0Taiwan and other parts of\u00a0Asia, including Singapore and Hong Kong,<\/a>\u00a0no massive mandatory quarantine or containment has been applied so far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The first cause of Taiwan’s success is the transparency of information, which stopped the rapid growth of infection. The containment in Taiwan has been carried out with relatively high transparency. As early as December 31 of last year<\/a> the Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan began to take serious the potential danger of the Wuhan pneumonia, informing citizens every day<\/a> about the developing trends of the infection and its status. The information provided by the Taiwanese authority also includes whether the infected in Taiwan contracted the illness from overseas input, which helps people take measures to protect themselves in a timely manner. In the constant press conferences, the Taiwanese government provides different options and recommendation that people can choose to adopt voluntarily but are not imposed coercively. The abundant information provided continuously has allowed individuals to make their own informed and balanced decisions under conditions of uncertainty. In contrast, the governments of the European Union countries reacted slowly and as late as February did not provide sufficient information about the potential pandemic, <\/a>making the situation difficult to handle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Voluntary Decision-Making and Cooperation among Individuals and Private Sectors <\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The type of quarantines established by the Taiwanese government are mostly self-quarantines. The Taiwanese government acknowledges that it is crucial to rely on people\u2019s voluntary actions to resist the pandemic. As we have noted above, most cases of contagion in Taiwan come from outside and are almost always detected at the border<\/a>.Taiwanese people\u2019s voluntary self-protection is effectively suppressing the spread of the coronavirus in their country…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“As the Austrian school of economics demonstrates in the calculation theory of socialism, no central planning body has the capacity to organize society based on coercive mandates. The main reason is that the central planner is unable to obtain all the necessary information to organize society in this way,\u00a0as information has subjective, creative, dispersed, and tacit qualities.\u00a0<\/a>This principle is fully applicable to the containment of a pandemic. Individual responsibility along with transparency of information are crucial to stopping a pandemic. Taiwan makes a very good case for how individualism and voluntary cooperation work effectively in resisting the coronavirus pandemic.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

[Read the full article here<\/a>.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The alternative to the lockdown strategy in the fight against Covid-19:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The current coronavirus strategy of most governments is a recipe for a worldwide economic disaster. In many countries, the strategy of confinement and forcing shops to close is a sure-fire path to large-scale business failures. The cascade of economic and financial repercussions to come is likely to lead to another Great Depression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n