No parade in Moscow this year, but the "ring of fire" around Russia remains

This year, we won't see the traditional victory parade in Moscow (Парад Победы в Москва) that normally takes place on May 9 (above, an extract of last year's parade). It is another effect of the COVID epidemics, but the parade will be probably held in September. It has too much political significance for Russia to be skipped: it is a reaction against the perception of being surrounded by hostile powers. And that may not be just a sensation but it may derive some substance by noting the "ring of fire" of NATO bases in Western Europe along the borders with Russia. Of course, on this side of the world, we can't imagine that these bases are there for purposes different than the defense of our freedom. But you, you may perhaps understand that, on the other side, there may be a certain feeling that it could be otherwise.  

So, the yearly parade in Moscow is a political and military message directed to the West. And for a better understanding of how things are perceived in Russia, I think I could propose to you a recent talk by the Russian filmmaker Karen Shakhnazarov on the meaning of the WWII memory in Russia.

Shakhnazarov makes several interesting points, often forgotten in the West. Comparing the forces involved, he notes how at the start of WWII the Soviet Union was outnumbered in terms of population and weaker in terms of industrial production. And not just that: the Soviet Union was surrounded in 1940 by a "ring of fire" of hostile powers. It was not only Germany, on the Western front. There was a "second front" in East Asia, where Japan was a hostile power, and the Soviet Union also needed to keep troops ready against a possible attack from Turkey, and even from Iran. So, he concludes that the decision of the German government to attack the Soviet Union in 1941 was not so reckless as it is often described. It was a risky gamble but, given the forces available, it could have paid. For a while, the destiny of the world was uncertain but, eventually, the balance swung decisively against Germany -- it was a close call, though.

The second world war just followed an established pattern. It was not the first time that practically the whole Western World had ganged up against Russia: it had already happened in 1812 (Napoleon's invasion), in 1853 (the "Crimean War"), and also at the end of WWI, when there was a moment in which Russia was invaded by Western armies, even by an American one, although this story is mostly forgotten in the West (but not in Russia). And, of course, the idea of surrounding Russia with a "ring of fire" is still alive and well today, as we all know. But why?

In the 1950s in Italy, we had a typical propaganda story that said that we should have feared that the Russian Cossacks would have brought their horses to drink at the holy fountains of St. Peter's cathedral, in Rome. That, of course, never happened, but the fear of Russian armies sweeping through Western Europe remains embedded in the way of thinking of Western European leaders and military planners. Just like the fear of Western Armies marching on Moscow remains embedded in the way of thinking of Russian leaders and military planners. There is nothing rational in this idea, but it is grounded in the way things are after centuries of struggles.

So, are we - Western and Eastern Europeans - destined to remain in fear of each other forever? Possibly not. History never repeats itself, although it often rhymes. Empires come and go, but there are things that last longer than empires. One is the backbone of Eurasia: the road that connects the Eastern and the Western part of the continent. It was once called the "silk road" and now it goes under the name of the "Belt and Road Initiative." It is a connection that has been existing for more than two millennia and that survived the vagaries of states, empires, and battles. It will survive more states, empires, and battles. One day, it will make the wars in Western Europe look like what they are: petty squabbles among statelets. It will take time, but history is never in a hurry.

Airline transportation after the epidemic. The problem is being solved, but not the way you would have imagined

That's how a hydrogen-powered plane could look like. Honestly, it is not very impressive: it looks more like an Elvis sighting and one may even reasonably doubt that this thing could fly. If it were easy to power planes using hydrogen, someone would be working at real prototypes rather than just these drawings. 

Airlines have been on the edge of collapse for many years and for many good reasons, but the real problem, at the basis of all the others, is the need for fossil fuels. Airplanes are voracious beasts: they consume around 7% of the world's production of fuels and fueling planes represents about 20%-30% of the costs of operating an airline. So far, most companies have survived the vagaries of the oil market, but it should be obvious that crude oil cannot last forever. In addition, there is the problem of the pollution generated by fossil fuels, especially in terms of contributing to global warming. One result is the phenomenon called "flight shame," another headache for airline managers.

So, if you want to keep planes in the air, you need to get rid of the need for fossil fuels. And that turns out to be nearly impossible, at least for the current generation of planes. I already discussed the technical and financial aspects of alternatives to fossil fuels. Hydrogen is a good fuel for rockets, but not for civilian planes, it is a technological and financial nightmare, Biofuels can't help: there is no way that you can step production to levels sufficient to feed the current fleet of civilian planes. Electric planes are a nice idea for small planes, but there is no way that you can build an electric equivalent of a Boeing 747. Wide-body planes are optimized for the fuel they use, kerosene, produced by refining crude oil. And there is just so much that you can do to improve technologies that have already been optimized nearly to death. Spending a lot of money, you can refine and retouch this and that, and make the plane gain maybe a fraction of one percent in performance, but that doesn't eliminate the need for fossil fuels.

So, airlines reacted to the problem by cutting costs as much as possible. That was obtained by having passengers undergo all sorts of humiliations: crowded planes, long waiting times, unreliable flights, impossible schedules, non-existing ground services, horrible on-board food, and more. To that, add the ubiquitous harassment suffered by travelers at the entrance gates of airports. The whole looks more like the treatment inflicted on war prisoners en route for a concentration camp. But passengers seemed to be happy to accept being mistreated in exchange for low price tickets. 

But, eventually, the solution chosen by airlines led them to a no-way-out street: there is a limit to how much you can cut corners. Ryanair even proposed to carry standing passengers on board, but it was nothing more than an advertising stunt. And then there came the coronavirus epidemic dealing a terrible blow to the already strained airlines. Right now, it is hard to see how passenger service can be restarted: people are so scared that they would accept to fly on a plane only if everyone were wearing scuba diving suits equipped with autonomous oxygen tanks. Probably the scare will abate in the coming months, and it is probably possible to introduce some kind of a "health passport" that would allow passengers to sit near each other without fearing to be infected. But, in the meantime, with the industry deeply in the red, you can kiss the rotors of the turbines goodbye.

Nevertheless, as I tend to say, for everything that happens there is a reason for it to happen, and the destiny of the airlines was already written on the wings of their planes. Last year, the demise of the Airbus A380, the flower of the European Aerospace industry, was a death knell for the very concept of wide-body planes. It was known, and the effort of the aerospace industry was already moving in a different direction.

It is said that when the Titanic sank, the third class passengers remained locked in the lower decks and drowned. These passengers, evidently, were considered as a nuisance. Today, I think that the elites have already understood that there really is no reason why planes should have an "economy class." The result is a new generation of planes that only the rich are supposed to use. By getting rid of the commoners on board we can have less pollution, faster planes, lower use of fuel, and more comfortable flights. And here an example of the result: the Aerion AS2, a supersonic jet for just 8-12 passengers.

The Aerion AS2, an example of the new generation of passenger planes: supersonic business jets (SSBJs)

That is just an example, but the buzzword with the airlines right now is "bizliners," planes (not necessarily supersonic) designed and operated to cater to special groups of people who can afford them: politicians, business people, sports teams, etc. Just not the kind of planes that we, humble commoners, will ever be able to use. But so is life: flying was a privilege that many of our generation enjoyed, but nothing lasts forever. At least, we won't feel guilty about flying anymore!



A comment from Ugo Bardi's personal troll, Mr. Kunning Druger

So, Mr. Bardi -- I can imagine you gloating while you were writing this post, weren't you? Exactly what you and your friends always wanted, especially the braided witch from Sweden. You always hated the idea of ordinary people enjoying the benefits that fossil fuels bring to humankind. Flying, for instance. And now you think you are winning, right? I am sure that your friends in high places promised you a seat in one of those shiny new bizliners, I can see you gloating, indeed. Well, think it over. You were one of the crowd that was claiming "peak oil," right? It was another scam directed to enslave us, the people, to the powers that be. And now, with oil prices at historical lows, your scam has been exposed: there is no such thing as "peak oil." Oil is abundant as ever and planes will keep flying, no matter what you write in your ridiculous rants.

Florence: Two Months Later. The Day of the Zombies

May 1st, 2020. Florentines sit in the sun the "Piazza Pitti" square in Florence to pump up their vitamin D levels after nearly two months of segregation in their homes.

The Florentines are back. After two months of forced segregation because of the COVID-19 epidemics, the regional government issued an "ordinanza" allowing people to walk free in the streets of their town. They are still ordered to wear face masks and groups are forbidden, but it seems that it is past the time when you were insulted from the windows if you were seen walking in the street, or reported to the police by your neighbors if they saw you leaving home more than once per day.

Now, Florentines can walk in the sun again. And that's what they did on this sunny weekend in May.

The result was eerie and disconcerting. There was a definite sense of "zombie movie" in the masked people cautiously exploring the streets, looking at each other as if asking, "are you a zombie, too?" It was a scene not unlike the photos of Tokyo or Hiroshima after the bombings of WW2, with the survivors walking aimlessly among ruins. Florence has not been bombed, of course, but, in a sense, it has been razed down like Hiroshima. It is in ruins in an economic sense.

All the shops are closed, so are hotels, museums, and offices. With the current rules of "social distancing," it is unthinkable that they will ever be able to reopen, they just can't make ends meet without their usual number of customers. And when will tourists come back to a ghost city? No shops, no tourists. And no tourists means, no money, no jobs, no income. And no shops. Those people walking along the street yesterday were economic zombies, and they knew that.

But, if it all happened, it was because it had to happen. Florence couldn't survive forever to the sheer pressure of the millions of tourists arriving every year, something had to give. The only surprise is how fast and abruptly it happened. As Lucius Annaeus Seneca said, "Growth is slow, but ruin is rapid"

Just to give you an idea of how things were, and expected to be as the norm, here is Florence's Piazza Duomo, last spring.

In the end, even zombies have hearts. And, like this old lady, they can sit on a bench, take off their face mask, and enjoy a quiet afternoon in the silence of the empty streets and the closed shops.

Afternoon in Piazza della Passera, Florence -- empty of the usual throngs of tourists. This lady looks British, but she is probably a Florentine.

The most accurate model-based prediction of all times

The "base case" scenario from the 1972 edition of "The Limits to Growth." This scenario described the trajectory of the world's economy on the basis of the data and assumptions that were judged to be the most reliable ones. This run might turn out to have been amazingly accurate some fifty years after it was proposed.

One of the most remarkable features of the story of the "Limits to Growth" study of 1972 is how effectively it was possible to convince almost everyone that it was completely wrong. Amazingly, though, the most vituperated model-based prediction in history may turn out to have been perhaps the most accurate one.

Note how the scenario above, the "base case" scenario, saw the start of the decline around 2010 and the start of the collapse maybe a decade afterward, that is now. If the oil collapse generated by the coronavirus takes the whole economy with it, as it may well happen, then this scenario turns out to have been unbelievably accurate. And that for a prediction made 50 years ago. Truly amazing!

Now, of course, this story has to be taken with some caution, predictions can be right even by mere chance. But, in this case, there is a certain logic in this result: the base case scenario had been already noted by Graham Turner to have been following the real-world data. But that was true for the growth side of the diagram: even standard economic models had been predicting economic growth. The crucial test for the model was to be the sharp change in slope expected to take place around 2010-2020.

Of course, no model could have predicted that the turning point would have been triggered by a word pandemic -- as it happened. But "something" had to give and the virus is not a cause of anything, it is just the straw that breaks the camel's back. The little push that sent the system in a direction where it had to go.

So, it IS possible to use models to predict the future. Another example of a good prediction is the famous one by Marion King Hubbert of the peak of oil production in the US. In 1956, he had proposed 1970 as the likely date and he had been right. On the other hand, predictions are not always so good. In 1970, Hubbert himself had predicted the global "peak oil" for the year 2000. Later on, ASPO (association for the study of peak oil) had estimated the peak for 2010. Both predictions were not so bad, but a little pessimistic if the peak arrived in 2020.

Perhaps the most surprising discovery, here, is how the most vituperated predictions turned out to be the most accurate. Conversely, many economic models that predicted infinite growth were much praised, but they seem to have badly missed the ongoing collapse. Maybe vituperation is a good yardstick to judge whether a prediction is good or bad. In any case, always remember that the future always takes you by surprise. You can't really predict it, but you may always be prepared for it.

Collapse: the way we imagined it, and the way it was.

Even those of us who could see some kind of collapse coming (the "collapsniks") were taken by surprise by the form it took. But, as always, for everything that happens there has to be a reason for it to happen. Above: the Seneca Curve.

Collapses happen, it is a rule of life, as the ancient Roman philosopher Lucius Seneca had noted long ago when he said that "ruin is rapid" (festinantur in damnum). Yet, another rule of collapses is that they always take you by surprise. I think even Seneca himself was surprised when he received a message from his former pupil, Emperor Nero, ordering him to commit suicide.

So, even the most hardened collapsniks were surprised by the onrush of the coronavirus epidemic. I had been thinking about the collapse that the models predicted but, honestly, I hadn't imagined it would take this form. Surely, I had in mind that some unexpected shock would have unbalanced society enough to cause it to take the fast way down, but I imagined it mostly in the form of a war. When the Iranian general Soleimani was assassinated by US drones in January, I thought "This is it." It wasn't. Nobody could have imagined what would have happened just a couple of months afterward.

Yet, for everything that happens, there is a reason for it to happen. And there is a reason also for the coronavirus. I noted in my book (Before Collapse) that epidemics hit stressed societies after that they have reached their physical limits. The main example I discuss is that of the "Black Death" that struck Europe in the mid-14th century. It came after the great economic expansion that had led Europeans to try to expand Eastward with the crusades. But, after some initial successes, the crusades turned out to be an expensive failure. So, the Europeans found themselves stuck in a small and overpopulated peninsula of Eurasia, which they had thoroughly deforested. Famines were unavoidable, and then there came the black death. The final result was a loss of some 40% of the population -- not pretty, but it had to be.

In our case, we surely are badly in overshoot, but we didn't see major famines preceding the epidemic. On the contrary (again, a subject discussed in my book) the stupendous military-economic system we call "globalization" made it possible to bring food just about everywhere in the world, preventing famine to occur and allowing an extravagant expansion of the human population. Of course, some people are still undernourished but the world remained famine-free for nearly half a century, a remarkable success. But things are never what they look like: behind this apparent abundance, the seeds for disaster were growing.

Unlike the case of Medieval Europe, in the modern globalized world the weakening factor was not famines, but pollution. It is hard to evaluate exactly how much human health is damaged by the various forms of pollutions that besiege us nowadays. We are continuously exposed to heavy metals, carcinogenic substances, microplastics, reactive gases, and much more, and we add to it an unhealthy diet based on over-processed food grown by means of all sorts of chemicals unknown before in the natural world. That may keep us alive, but it is not good for our health. And the obesity epidemics in the West may be a consequence of this situation.

Just like in ancient collapses, a weakened population tends to decline. In our case, so far the decline was taking mostly the shape of decreasing natality. Not surprisingly, it is happening in the most polluted regions of the world. The rich West is also highly polluted and most Western populations have been going down: mortality increases, natality decreases. The decline is masked by immigration from areas of the world not yet so badly ravaged by pollution, but it is there.

At this point, would you be surprised if an opportunistic virus were to strike a weakened, geriatric population? Not at all, and you wouldn't be surprised that the coronavirus struck first the most heavily polluted areas of the world: Central China and the Padana Valley in Italy. What's surprising, actually, is that the epidemic is so mild. The mortality rates are projected by IHME as less than 0.1% in most Western countries. These could be optimistic projections, but surely the COVID-19 is nothing like the old black death! Outside geriatric and industrialized countries, the damage seems to be extremely limited.

What's surprising, instead, is the reaction of most governments that, arguably, did much more damage to people than the virus itself. I was saying at the beginning that I expected a war to trigger the collapse of the Western Empire. In a sense, it is what happened. The Western Governments saw the virus as an enemy and they started a war against it using the kind of war they know best: a hybrid war based on shock and awe and economic sanctions. By shutting down their economies, Western Governments waged a war against their own citizens, especially against the poor, as always the most vulnerable when something goes wrong.

So, what are we going to see? If the coronavirus was unable to substantially reduce the human population and the consumption of resources, the lockdown may well succeed at that. If it doesn't, don't worry! The ecosystem is going to solve the overshoot problem for us, one way or another. We may not be able to predict the details, but not the final outcome. For sure, we won't stop viruses with such silly ideas as wearing face masks and living in Plexiglas cages.

It is the great cycle of life  -- it is the way the universe works. It already happened and it will happen again. And so, I leave you with a modern interpretation of the Medieval Theme of the "Danse Macabre" or "Totentanz" by the Italian singer Angelo Branduardi. Sometimes, death seems to be winning the battle, but it never does. What would Death do without life?

I am Death and wear a crown,
I am for all of you lady and mistress
and I am so cruel, so strong and harsh
that your walls won’t stop me.

I am Death and wear a crown,
I am for all of you lady and mistress
and in front of my scythe you’ll have to bow your head
and walk to the gloomy Death’s pace. 

You are the guest of honor at the dance we are playing for you,
put your scythe down and dance round and round
a round of dancing and then one more,
and you’ll be no longer the lady of time.

Why Italians are not singing anymore: the problem of a weak state

Shows of brutality are used by politicians to look "tough on crime," but they are a mark of weakness, not of strength. Something similar has happened in Italy where a weak government imposed harsh confinement measures on citizens. They didn't arrive to force everyone to wear iron chains, but the idea was similar: politicians trying to look "tough on the virus. Image: convicted inmates from Brevard County Jail.

In some places in the US, jail inmates are forced to wear black-and-white striped costumes and chains around the ankles. In some cases, even iron balls are attached to the chains. Without denying that there exists a crime problem, you may reasonably argue that this is not the best way to reduce it. But these spectacular measures are chosen by politicians competing against each other by showing that they are "tough on crime."

Something similar seems to have happened in Italy, with local politicians competing against each other to impose on citizens harsher and harsher measures against the coronavirus epidemic. Also in this case, without denying the gravity of the epidemic, you may reasonably argue that most of these measures were not the best way to fight it.

The Italian lockdown was probably the harshest seen anywhere in Europe. It involved a series of unclear and often contradictory orders from the government, sometimes looking like they were meant to harass citizens rather than stopping the epidemics. Just as a few examples, you could be fined if your spouse rode in the family car in the front seat rather than in the back seat. You could take your dog for a walk, but not your child. You could buy cigarettes, but not books. You could buy newspapers, but not office supplies. You could walk in the street, alone, but not run. In addition, your neighbors could report you to the police if they thought you were doing something that was not allowed by the government, and in many cases they did.

So, why did the Italian government behave like a poor imitation of Stalin's Soviet government at its darkest moments? My impression is that it is because it is an extremely weak government -- a fragile coalition created in a hurry less than one year ago mainly with the purpose of avoiding early elections. No ideas, no plans, just a bunch of politicians engaged in a struggle for their political survival.


Dictatorship is the mark of a weak government: lacking real strength, dictators try to look strong by taking (indeed) dictatorial measures. Their only legitimacy is provided by fear and their survival depends on their capability of scaring their citizens. It is a point well explained by Chandran Nair in his book "The Sustainable State" (2018). An excellent book, well worth reading, it forcefully makes the point that no serious measure can be taken against threats such as pollution (or, recently, the coronavirus epidemic) if the state is not strong and enjoys a prestige sufficient to avoid that politicians start competing with each other instead of worrying about the needs of the citizens.

Nair has in mind China as an example of a strong state and, indeed, China managed the epidemic in an extremely effective way, although with some uncertainties at the beginning, But for an example closer to our world, Germany also did reasonably well with the epidemic. According to an article recently appeared on "The Atlantic", it was the result of the cautious management by the German chancellor Angela Merkel. No scare tactics, but honesty and trust.

Merkel has relied heavily, and very publicly, on the expertise of a handful of experts, including the now famous Christian Drosten, the head of virology at the Charité hospital in Berlin. From the perspective of the public, Pries said, the chancellor and the virologist “are very trustworthy.” People know “that what they get from both Drosten and Angela Merkel are real and very well-considered facts” and that the two also “share information about what they don’t know.” Because they are “honest with respect to their information,” he said, that information is seen as credible. This honesty, at a time of widespread disinformation, Pries told me, was playing a big role in persuading Germans to largely continue to follow the rules and maintain, even now, “a very calm situation in Germany.”

Below, you'll find an article that I wrote for Al Arabiya a few weeks ago, discussing how at the beginning Italians had taken the "stay home" order as both a challenge and a duty, to the point that they would sing from their windows and balconies. But that soon stopped: right now, the mood has soured, with many Italians fed up with the measures forced on them and with a government treating them as if they were unruly children. Right now, the epidemic is winding down, but the economic crisis is rapidly deepening. Money is running out and people are becoming desperate. The government doesn't seem to have any idea about how to manage the crisis and, at this point, anything can happen.

Coronavirus: Why aren't the Italians singing anymore?

By Ugo Bardi Friday 03 April 2020

At the beginning of the COVID-19 epidemic, a few weeks ago, Italians seemed to have found a moment of national unity when the country’s lockdown began March 9. Everyone understood that it was a difficult moment, but took it as a challenge to fight the virus together. Italian flags were hung from windows and people sang from their balconies and windows.

More than three weeks later, patience is wearing thin and the singing has stopped. Locked in their homes, people are scared, bored, and they don’t know what to do or what to expect. The media has done what they are experts at: terrorizing people by a barrage of numbers taken out of context, gratuitous sensationalism, and fake news. Politicians quickly discovered that scaring people pays, and that in difficult moments they could gain popularity by enacting tougher and tougher laws enforcing the lockdown.

Being locked at home with the police patrolling the streets is eerie. It looks like a post-apocalypse science fiction movie, something one would never have expected to see in real life.

In this situation, it seems that everyone has found convenient culprits in the European Union and Germany, who are accused of not doing enough to help Italy in this difficult moment. Several right-wing politicians are openly calling for Italy to leave the European Union and, perhaps in anticipation, the European Union flag has been taken down in some government buildings without anyone daring to enforce the law that makes it mandatory to hang it. The Germans are viewed today by Italians in the same way their ancestors in the Roman Empire viewed their neighbors: Northern barbarians to be feared and despised.

It is not just a question of being locked inside their homes. Italians are discovering that they have suddenly become poor. The Italian economy has taken a terrible beating from several sides. The income from international tourism – which generates 40 billion euros annually – is lost for this year, and nobody knows when (or if) tourists from abroad will return.

And that says nothing about the effect of the crisis on other industries: airlines, transportation, and entertainment among others. Optimists say that the Italian gross domestic product (GDP) will lose 10 percent this year, but some say it will see larger losses. But GDP is an abstract number, whereas workers in the tourism industry who have lost their jobs, very actively feel that loss. Many others are still theoretically employed, but they don’t know if their job will still exist after the emergency is over. Plenty of others are simply running out of money, and food riots in southern Italy have been reported – fortunately only minor episodes have occurred so far. What is perhaps the most anxiety inducing is that no one knows what might happen if the lockdown continues for much longer.

Yet, there is also good news for Italy: The most recent data show that the epidemic has peaked and is now winding down. In a few weeks, it may be over.

Not only is it a victory for the Italians who accepted the sacrifice of the lockdown, it is a historical occasion to learn from past mistakes and to do better going forward. Unfortunately, no one in power can seem to conceive anything but a return to the old ways: there is an absence of progressive policy makers developing a real transition to a green energy economy, for example.

Only a few people recognize the opportunities that the moment offers. We could go for a “green reboot” that could free the Italian economy from its traditional dependency on imported oil and gas. Further, with more activities becoming virtual, it could be time to reform the bloated and inefficient Italian state bureaucracy.

Italians are known to be resilient and enterprising, and there is still a chance to work for a better Italy. Who knows? Maybe one day we’ll remember the time when we sang from balconies as the start of a new era.


_______________________

Ugo Bardi teaches at the University of Florence, Italy, and he is a full member of the Club of Rome. He is the author of “Before Collapse” (Springer 2019).

How effective is a hard lockdown against the COVID epidemics? The data say not so much

Data about the mortality of the coronavirus epidemic start being available. Above, a list of mortality rates for Western European countries (including the US) taken from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) of the University of Washington. The data are ordered by the projected number of deaths per million inhabitants. In addition, I built a "lockdown score," also based on the data reported by IHME (except for the US, where different states chose different options). It would be difficult to say that these data support the idea that a "hard" lockdown that includes a stay home order is more effective than a looser kind of lockdown. (for a live version of the table, write to me at ugo.bardi(whirlette)unifi.it)

Your friend has a headache. She takes a pill and, after a while, she feels much better. And she is sure that it was because of the pill. Maybe, but how does she know that the headache didn't go away by itself? Was the pill a homeopathic medicine? In this case, you could tell her that she ingested pure sugar, unlikely to cure anything. But, if you ever tried something like that, you know that it is nearly impossible to un-convince someone who believes to have been healed by the miraculous powers of homeopathy or the like. It is a typical problem of medical studies: how do you know that a treatment is effective? That's why there exist precise rules defining how you can test a new drug or treatment.

Now, let's go to the coronavirus epidemic: practically every region in the world has been affected and practically every government has implemented some kind of rules to stop the epidemic from diffusing, from voluntary social distancing (Sweden) to stay home orders enforced by the police. Almost everywhere, most people are convinced that the lockdown has been effective in reducing the spread of the epidemics. Maybe, but how can we say? Not having a "blank experiment" to compare with, it might be argued that all these new rules are the equivalent of homeopathic pills: a little sugar and nothing else.

Right now, the data are still uncertain, but they are accumulating and I think we can at least try some sort of preliminary analysis by comparing the results of countries where the lockdown rules have been implemented in different ways. An especially interesting way to do that is to look at the data from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) of the University of Washington. These data are good for this purpose because:

1. The IHME provides a large dataset for several relatively homogeneous countries in Europe in addition to the US.

2. The data include projections for the total mortality at the end of the epidemic cycle and so we can compare countries where the epidemic started at different moments

3. The data also include a list of the rules implemented by each government, whether they include "stay home" orders which we may see as defining a "hard" lockdown, or just invites to citizens to maintain a certain distance from each other. (but note that a "hard" lockdown in Western countries is much softer than the versioni implemented in China and other Asian countries)

Here is an example of the IHME projections. In the case of Italy, you see how the epidemic follows its typical curve and it is going down after the acute phase is over.

Note that I focused on the records on mortality because they seem to be the most reliable ones, unlike those on infected people that depend on the number of tests. About Italy, I checked with independent data on the excess mortality from all causes from the Euromomo site. It seems that the mortality rates coincide, these data are reasonably good.

The results I found for several countries are shown in the table at the beginning of this post (not the complete data set, only Western Europe). You can peruse the table yourself (for a "live" version, write to me) and come to your own conclusion. In practice, the mortality rates range from a maximum of about 700/million to a minimum of 10-20. I cannot find a clear relationship between the mortality rate and the harshness of the rules imposed by local governments.

My impression is that the kind of "hard" lockdown imposed in countries such as Italy or Spain didn't help so much, perhaps not at all. For instance, Germany and Austria do well in the list without the need for a stay home order. But, of course, you might also focus on Sweden's relatively poor performance to argue that very loose rules are not a good idea. However, in this case, you might also note that Norway, a country similar to Sweden, is doing much better also with a relatively soft lockdown. Then you might consider other factors, for instance, population density. A colleague of mine (Claudio Della Volpe) examined the data for this factor and he found that there may be a weak dependence but, at present, it cannot be said for sure.

So, my conclusion is that the hard lockdown is unjustified and probably useless, but let me repeat: these are PRELIMINARY data and this is a TENTATIVE analysis, justified only on the urgency we have to manage the epidemic the best we can. Consider that the lockdown is causing a lot of suffering for a lot of people and risks leading us to complete collapse. We should try to do what we can to understand if it is effective. Let me also note that I am NOT DENYING that the COVID-19 virus is killing people, and I AM NOT SAYING that nothing should be done to stop the spreading the epidemics. (and I am not saying that the virus is an engineered bioweapon, or that it is an evil plot to enslave all of us, gosh!). I just placed on line the data I found for the benefit of the readers of Cassandra's Legacy who may interpret them the way they like. When we'll have better data, we'll be able to arrive at more solid conclusions.

As a final note, the story of the coronavirus epidemics shows how we humans tend to politicize/polarize everything. Not that the virus itself, poor critter, is left- or right-leaning, but by now the Right and the Left have taken sides. The right in the US is against a hard lockdown, while the left favors it. At this point, speaking against the lockdown turns you automatically into a Trumpist and a supporter of the NRA, if not of the Ku-Klux-Clan (and of Bolsonaro, too!).

As an example, yesterday I posted on Facebook a link to a study by Yitzhak Ben Israel, (*) of Tel Aviv University that seems to support the idea that most lockdown rules are not very effective against the virus (and note that I didn't even say I thought the paper was correct -- I can't read Hebrew!). But, as I should have expected  I was defamed and abused just for having linked that obvious piece of Israeli propaganda, surely a hoax thought to support the bad orange man and his ilk (surprisingly, my readers on Facebook seem to be familiar enough with Hebrew to be able to easily detect the mistakes in a scientific paper written in that language).

So, why is the stay-home ruling "Left" while no stay home is "Right"? Beats me. For those of you who can understand Italian, I leave you with a scene from a movie by Francesco Nuti, where he examines various kinds of cold meats concluding, among other things, that mortadella (bologna) is communist, while prosciutto cotto (cooked ham) is fascist.







(*) Dr. Ben Israel was so kind to send me a version of his paper in English. If you would like to have it, write to me