Thank you....i think what you said at the start is true - spending, and too much of it, has replaced actual results. It's like consumerism i guess - i spend therefore i am.
Government claims that its covid response "saved" around 15,000 lives.
Since most covid deaths are in those near to death already, let's say on average a "saved" life is a one year delay of death.
That means we have, optimistically, 15,000 life-years saved. Let's also, optimistically, say that those, mostly languishing in rest home life-years were of optimal quality. That makes 15,000 QALYs (quality adjusted life-years, the currency of health economists).
Then, at $1.5 billion just for the vaccination (again conservative), it comes to $100,000 per QALY.
Pharmac's threshold for funding a pharmaceutical is a closely guarded secret, but I think it is around $35,000 to $50,000 per QALY.
And that $100,000 is for the vaccine alone, add the testing, hordes of contact tracers, "support" payments, damage to countless lives and businesses,....
What sort of society sacrifices the futures of its youth for a slight extension of the lives of its dying aged?
Those are apt thoughts - and I covered in another post that in 2022 an OIA was released that said the average age of someone who died from Covid up to that point was...83....which is higher than the average age of death within New Zealand! The amount of $ really doesn't make sense...but as i go through stuff i think they had to continue as they got backed in a corner by their initial response based on 'wait for a vaccine that has failed each time it was attempted previously for a coronavirus' then once it was available it had to be drummed up to be both the salvation for life and the requirement for release from restrictions. I wonder if Ardern or Hipkins et al ever truly reflect on what happened??
Keep up the good work
The true cost is much more than dollars and cents
But the catastrophic overspending everywhere
Both financial and to common sense
Our communities and support networks
To our hospitals and our health
Our democracy and woke journalism
Even the food we put in our mouths
They have sold us out
To large corporates without a soul
Leaving us indentured servants
Forced to pay their toll
For medicines we didn't need
For a pandemic that was hype
For a nation said to be peaceful
They're baiting us to fight
Like our grandfather's did in Crete
And their fathers at the Somme
Cold, wet and hungry
Oh they soldiered on
For freedom many died there
For a chance of liberty
And our so called leaders just gave it away
That's the price they paid
With our money
And cunning trickery
Thank you....i think what you said at the start is true - spending, and too much of it, has replaced actual results. It's like consumerism i guess - i spend therefore i am.
Absolutely.
On paper it looks great.
We spent X on healthcare
But where did X actually go?
But also, money is just a middleman. A way to meter how we trade
We have lost our voice.
Our sovereignty
We are sick
Poor
Stressed
Being taught less at school
Policed more
Yet, when you want them they're never there or unable to do anything
The roads are full of holes
Queues at all the hospitals
And so on and on
It's not only money
It's the resources and labour the money is used to buy.
They have destroyed that too.
Plastic fantastic society
All packaging and no substance
OUCH!!!
Back of the envelope calculation:
Government claims that its covid response "saved" around 15,000 lives.
Since most covid deaths are in those near to death already, let's say on average a "saved" life is a one year delay of death.
That means we have, optimistically, 15,000 life-years saved. Let's also, optimistically, say that those, mostly languishing in rest home life-years were of optimal quality. That makes 15,000 QALYs (quality adjusted life-years, the currency of health economists).
Then, at $1.5 billion just for the vaccination (again conservative), it comes to $100,000 per QALY.
Pharmac's threshold for funding a pharmaceutical is a closely guarded secret, but I think it is around $35,000 to $50,000 per QALY.
And that $100,000 is for the vaccine alone, add the testing, hordes of contact tracers, "support" payments, damage to countless lives and businesses,....
What sort of society sacrifices the futures of its youth for a slight extension of the lives of its dying aged?
Those are apt thoughts - and I covered in another post that in 2022 an OIA was released that said the average age of someone who died from Covid up to that point was...83....which is higher than the average age of death within New Zealand! The amount of $ really doesn't make sense...but as i go through stuff i think they had to continue as they got backed in a corner by their initial response based on 'wait for a vaccine that has failed each time it was attempted previously for a coronavirus' then once it was available it had to be drummed up to be both the salvation for life and the requirement for release from restrictions. I wonder if Ardern or Hipkins et al ever truly reflect on what happened??