Thoughts of The Week #56

Thoughts of the Week is a review of the most interesting thoughts I encountered on Twitter and on other mediums during the last week. Given the relevance the epidemic is likely to have over the next week, this edition will be specially focused on the topic.

1/6: Asymmetry (part I)

“The cost of paranoia is bounded. The sooner we get paranoid, quicker we can get a handle on things, sooner we can confidently go back to business as usual the cost of “letting it happen” is unbounded. […] Here is the tradeoff in the US: Restrict international travel now and maintain our ability to move freely domestically or keep the flows coming and inevitably have to restrict movement both internationally and domestically. The choice is clear.” – Joe Norman (link)

There is enough evidence that the pandemic is inevitable. The only question is how big and how fast we want it.

The costs of preventing the pandemic are mostly linear. Closing down schools today for one month costs roughly as much as closing them for one month in April. Closing down 3 schools costs roughly half as closing down 6 (assuming the same size).

Instead, the costs of letting the pandemic grow are nonlinear. Letting the pandemic run today might mean 100 more people infected tomorrow. Letting the pandemic run next week might mean 1000 more people infected the following day.

And it gets worse (see the next point).

2/6: Nonlinearities

“In the US, we have 2.3 million people in prison. I cannot imagine a way to stop #coronavirus from spreading like wildfire among that population. How will federal, state, & local authorities handle this?” – Jon Stokes (link)

Another example of the non-linear consequences of the pandemic.

A pandemic that “knocks-off” (i.e. prevents from working, for any reason) 0.1% of the workforce is bad but not that bad.

A pandemic that “knocks-off” 0.1% of the workforce in a clustered way is much worse: it means that some companies lose a large percentage of their workforce for a few days or weeks and must close the operations (whereas others are directly unaffected).

A pandemic that “knocks-off” 0.2% of the workforce is ten times worse than a 0.1% pandemic – for there are less workers to covers those who are sick, for one company closing creates problems downstream the supply chain, and so on.

This is even worse in organizations in which shortage of qualified personnel might cause cascading consequences – such as hospitals and prisons.

The worst case is so bad that it makes sense planning for it even if it has low chances to happen (which is itself a strong assumption on too uncertain variables).

3/6: Impact

“The difference between the flu and the coronavirus is that between a tide and a tsunami. The same amount of water, but the impact is different because the tsunami arrives all at once.” – Roberto Burioni (link)

As I explained on Twitter, the problem with the coronavirus is not (only) the current mortality, but the mortality we can get if our healthcare system gets overwhelmed. People won’t receive the care they need, even for conditions unrelated to the coronavirus.

“If a juggler can juggle 4 balls letting them drop 1% of time,  then he can also juggle 10 balls letting them drop 1% of time.” – this is how most people estimate mortality. As if healthcare was a fully elastic system.

4/6: Asymmetry (part II)

“Asymmetry. Convex decision. So long as there is no risk of harm from masks & disinfectants, the decision is wise, in spite of the absence of evidence. – Nassim Nicholas Taleb (link)

Face masks do not offer full protection, but they do offer some protection. As long as you remove them carefully and they don’t make you sweat (so that you’re tempted to touch your face), they’re better than nothing.

Their cost is minimal and bounded, their benefit is large and unbounded (at least for you: they might save your life).

Of course, there is the argument that face masks are finite and they should be allocated where they’re the most needed. It’s a valid argument. But let’s focus on the asymmetry of the cost-benefit, because it applies to another method as well: washing hands and disinfecting.

Their cost is extremely low. I’m baffled that so few people are doing it first thing while arriving home.

Don’t be penny-wise but pound-foolish with your time.

5/6: Testing

“True epidemic in Iran and South Korea, community spread in Italy, confirmed transmission from Iran to multiple countries, the US basically isn’t testing anybody… and as far as I can tell it’s gauche even to mention [the virus] in public in the United States.” – @toad_spotted (link)

If a country doesn’t like to talk about a problem, it will have to talk about that problem.

Problems grow the size they need for you to acknowledge them.

The virus is already here, it’s just not evenly detected. – Balajis Srinivasan (link)

6/6: Infection

“I just realized that when people say ‘yeah but you won’t die’ they mean ‘yeah you’ll become a carrier and make everyone you see sick but not die’.” – Paul McKellar (link)

There are many replies to “the coronavirus is not that mortal”.

• “15% mortality in older people (80+ years old) almost means a Russian Roulette if they get infected”.
• One’s chances of dying depend on the number of infected people he meets in his day-to-day (because the more he meets, the more the chances he gets the virus).
• We don’t know! There are many reasons that prevent us from pinpointing the mortality of the virus in a way that is predictive of the future. We should assume the worst scenarios until we can rule them out. (Why? Because asymmetry and nonlinearities; the content of points #1 and #4 above.)

My own essays of the week:

On managing emergencies: any system without circuit breakers, no matter its nature, is vulnerable to disruption when it matters most. (essay link)

I’ve also been interviewed by Christian Hunt on his Human Risk podcast. We talked about the multiplicative dynamics of the coronavirus and about operations management, Just In Time, fragility, redundancy, and Operational Best Practices (link).

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(Here is my general disclaimer.)

The order of the thoughts only represents the order in which I encountered them, and does not imply any sort of prioritization. Quotes are edited for punctuation and grammar. Eventual formatting is mine. Also text outside of italicized quotation marks is mine. The inclusion of quotes does not imply my endorsement; merely, that they gave me food for thought. I did not optimize this review for clarity, but for its ability to spark thoughts in the reader.