A Kerfluffel after all — maybe

ConVid 19?

A few hundred thousand dead people, worldwide, is hardly a non-event, but some epidemiologists have increasingly questioned the methodology used to estimate the flu’s death total, estimates that originated at London’s Imperial College and which have been used by all other countries to frame their response to the Chinese Virus. But now, those criticisms seem to have been heard and listened to by, of all places, the Mother Star itself:

Imperial College scientist who predicted 500K coronavirus deaths in UK revises to 20K or fewer

A scientist who warned that the coronavirus would kill 500,000 people in the United Kingdom has revised the estimate to roughly 20,000 people or fewer.

Scientist and Imperial College author Neil Ferguson said Wednesday that the coronavirus death toll is unlikely to exceed 20,000 and could be much lower, according to New Scientist. He added that he is “reasonably confident” that Britain’s health system can handle the burden of treating coronavirus patients. 

“There will be some areas that are extremely stressed, but we are reasonably confident — which is all we can be at the current time — that at the national level we will be within capacity,” Ferguson said.

The Imperial College had previously warned of modeling that suggested over 500,000 would die from the virus. 

“This is a remarkable turn from Neil Ferguson, who led the @imperialcollege authors who warned of 500,000 UK deaths - and who has now himself tested positive for #COVID,” former New York Times reporter Alex Berenson wrote on Twitter.

My prediction: once the flu burns out and the world realizes that their leaders have destroyed the global economy for what was a dangerous, and destructive but not world-destroying pandemic, they’ll look to these leaders for an explanation. And those leaders, in turn will do what this Ferguson is already doing, and say, “yeah, but if we hadn’t done all that, all those horrible things would have happened —you’re lucky we were here”. Here’s Ferguson beginning the backtrack:

Ferguson credited the U.K.’s lockdown for stopping the spread of the virus, but as Berenson points out, the country “only began its lockdown 2 days ago, and the theory is that lockdowns take 2 weeks or more to work.”

I’m hoping that Glenn Reynold’s prediction is also accurate:

We may learn a lesson about the usefulness of models. Some people were saying that the pandemic would strengthen the case for “climate change” activism, but it ironically may instead teach us a lesson about relying on unproven models.

Here’s my point; Idaho has exactly eleven reported cases within its borders. You could (a) isolate those individuals, follow their contacts and seal up that group and encourage everyone else to take precautions such as “social distancing”, which is pretty much what Japan has done, or (b) shut down the whole state, and order the entire population to stay indoors until the all clear is sounded six weeks to six moths from now. Idaho’s governor has gone with option b. Better numbers might have allowed him to use a far less devastating approach.