[ExI] why belgium?

[spike at rainier66.com]

If we want to interpret Covid-19 cases and mortality as a function of government action or inaction, this site is helpful:

 

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

 

Why Belgium?  They appear to be doing something really super-wrong.  The ten populous countries which appear to be the worst in case/fatality ratio are Belgium, UK, France, Italy, Netherlands, Spain Brazil, Iran, USA, Germany.

 

If we look at it in terms of deaths by Covid per capita, the bad guys are Belgium, Spain, Italy, UK, France, Netherlands, USA, Germany, Iran, Brazil.

 

Very puzzling.

 

All of those hard-hit countries have a lot of international travel and a high GDP per capita, which enables a lot of travel, with the possible exception of Iran (I can’t explain that one very easily.)

 

Now there is another confounding factor.  If we look at the USA, half the Covid-19 deaths are confined to a geographical area centered at Times Square in New York with a radius of about 50km.  About half of that is ocean, but let’s ignore that for the moment and say ok, about 7500 square km, or round up to about 10,000 square km in the USA contains half the C19 mortality.  The land area in the USA is about 10million square km, so half of the C-19 deaths are in less than 0.1 percent of the land area, about half of which is ocean.  I do not know what to tell those beleaguered unfortunates who live in that less than 0.1 percent of land area, about half of which is ocean, but my first advice is stay the hell away from all mass transit, especially the subways, because those go in tunnels as opposed to the open air.

 

I don’t know how it goes in these other countries in the top 10 worst-hit nations, but I vaguely suspect they too have small areas which concentrate a lot of cases.

 

Have we any Belgians among us?  Or Europe hipsters who might know?

 

spike

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