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Atelos comments on Safety can be dangerous - Less Wrong Discussion

4 Post author: PhilGoetz 07 September 2011 05:24AM

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Comment author: Atelos 07 September 2011 06:16:18AM *  34 points [-]

In 2005, Hurricane Rita caused 111 deaths. 3 deaths were caused by the hurricane. 90 were caused by the mass evacuation. ... Exercise for the reader: Find other cases where cautionary measures are more dangerous than nothing.

The ratio of 90 deaths from the evacuation to 3 deaths from the hurricane looks bad, but is in fact irrelevant. The proper comparison would be 90 deaths from evacuating, to X deaths that would have resulted had those people stayed put, or performed some other action in preparation. While it's possible a proper estimate of the risk of staying near the hurricane's projected path would show that it was the less dangerous course, the abstract you linked doesn't suggest that is a topic covered by the paper.

Comment author: Pfft 07 September 2011 03:51:38PM 0 points [-]

I guess the argument is the same as for the drugs: the evacuation effort should be scaled back until it causes equally many deaths as the hurricane.

Comment author: Nick_Tarleton 07 September 2011 04:16:40PM 5 points [-]

Actually, until the marginal lives lost and saved are equal, which says nothing about the total.