I am not there but, from what I read and what I know, German has a younger population than Italy, meaning there are less old people who are at risk of dying of any disease, including Covid. They were particularly efficient in testing for the disease, which means the number of total cases diagnosed that did not result in death is much higher and that brings down the mortality rate. Finally, that I didn't know until they stated it, it seems that Germany has more ICU beds than Italy, which helped absorbing the spike in severe cases and improved survival.Shemp wrote: ↑March 25th, 2020, 3:36 amNo. The rate in Germany might be, say, 20% higher than Italy because of the slightly older Italian population, but not 10000% higher (100x). The Italians (and Spanish) have simply decided to go crazy, probably related to the tense political situation. Northern Italy is where Berlusconi came from.
Italians and Spaniards might be less disciplined than the Germans, but they're not stupid. We didn't "go crazy" because of a political agenda, we went crazy when we saw a lot of our elderly parents and relatives dying like flies. You could say those people were fragile and with debilitating conditions and would have died anyway, even from a seasonal flu, yet we are not as cynical as the Brits and the Americans. Our elderly's lives matter.
Sure, there have been hundreds of thousands of people who moved back south a few days beforre the government started the lockdown in Milan and other northern areas. That surely contributed to the spread of the disease down south. There ar plenty of cases in Rome, Naples and virtually any southern city. Many of them are undetected or asymptomatic. The northerners have been far more diligent and efficient in testing the population, which resulted in many more officially reported cases. If they had been as good down south, you would have seen a multiple of the cases there, too.Shemp wrote: ↑March 25th, 2020, 3:36 amAs an Italian, you know there is constant traffic between north and south Italy. If tjis covid19 is really do contagious, surely the disease would have spread all over Rome and Naples and other crowded cities of the south. So why is only north Italy so badly affected? Answer: crazy Italian politics mixed with mass hysteria.
Yes, that is the strategy. Most young people are avoiding contact with their parents and elderly relatives. My brother keeps working in his own bakery and hasn't seen my parents for 2 weeks. I even taught them how to do some of the accountancy on Google Sheets, so they didn't have to meet to check the books.Shemp wrote: ↑March 25th, 2020, 3:36 amAs for your grandparents, the worst evil you could wish upon them is to be dragged off to a hospital and spend their last days with a tube shoved down their lungs pumping air in and out like in some horrible torture chamber. Best thing is for old people to remain quarantined at home while young people deliberately get sick then recover so as to create herd immunity, which will take several months. Then the epidemic will fade away and the quarantine of old people can end.
It's a tragedy alright, but a tragedy for old people. We love them, down there...