Magox

I only watch it because I like following data. There truly is very little to worry about.

Scott Gotlieb, purveyor of panic porn. I don't believe he is looking at these data trends at as granular of a level as he should be. "on the cusp of losing control" He mentions both Texas and Florida. Texas and Florida have both provided explanations that their ICU usage have gone down and that the age demographic of those that are confirmed positives have gone down. Point aside but none the less related, as this issue evolves so do the added metrics that should be viewed do as well. Now that there is strong evidence that contact tracing and targeted testing of industries/prisons and other "vital" places are being more widely implemented, it has captured more asymptomatic carriers lowering the average age of confirmed infected COVID people. This dilutes the positive test rate numbers. Add that with the increased testing, if you focus just on confirmed positive tests and positive test rate, it no longer gives you an accurate enough depiction of what is going on. The things as of right now that I think are most important to view are: Total confirmed positive tests positive test rate average age of confirmed infections Hospital COVID census Hospital new COVID admissions ICU COVID usage Ventilator COVID usage Deaths With all that said, it doesn't really matter. It's all noise because hospital capacity is nowhere near being maxed out. This is media panic porn. But I can't deny, I love data and metrics and the whole analysis of it. Sort of like a past time.

No, I’m not and don’t have any Indian relatives. I’ve visited India for my work over the past few years on a few occasions. I love visiting India, would like to do more sight seeing than I have because we are typically swamped with meetings while we are there but their culture is something else.

My previous statement to you was unfair. Even though I disagreed with the premise of the argument you made. My apologies

Well there it is. Don’t expect the panic porn crowd to stop though Summary. Average age of COVID confirmed infection only 37. Meaning they are at very low risk. Lots less people are in ICU and on ventilators than before. Hospital capacity is nowhere near even in the ball park of being stressed And stop panicking!

Right. That's the point, the comparisons are not similar. It's much more difficult to have similar outcomes in one region than the other due to the autonomous nature and geographical size as opposed to what you just described which is homogeneous and smaller in size. It truly is an apples and oranges comparison.

The people that I'm in closest contact don't fit that $2 a day demographic, our lower skilled employees earn around $300 a month. With that said, the medical system in India provides medical care that is extremely cheap. I'm constantly reminded from my good friend and COO of the company that in the US medical procedures that cost $20,000 can be done for about $300 in India and he claims that it's just as good of treatment. Every time we go, which my brother has come along the last couple times as he is employed in the same organization, our friends and coworkers from the offshore team take us out to various temples on our last free day. Temples well older than a thousand years, it's pretty cool thing to see. In regards to the food, surprisingly there is a lot of Persian food that is served. Everything super spicey, everyone eats with their hands. We are told to not eat that much of it as it could affect your stomach, but we lived in South America for a number of years and are used to eating from vendors from the street, so it doesn't really bother us that much. Traffic is terrible everywhere, especially in Bangalore which is the IT capital of the world, the city has rapidly expanded over the past couple decades and was only built for a couple million people which now has exploded to around 10 million now. So congestion is awful, luckily they always put us up in a hotel that is within minutes from the office. Trivandrum is nice, very tropical and up against the beach. Lots of palm trees, sort of reminds me of Florida in regards to the weather and humidity. Much cleaner than Mumbai or Bangalore, which truth be told are not the most aesthetically pleasing cities. I don't think we will make it out there this year due to everything that is going on, which is too bad because A) I love seeing new places and cultures and B) I get out of the house.

I didn't say you can't, what I'm saying is that within the context of the conversation of what you and GG are discussing that Brazil and India are more appropriate comparisons.

Are you purposely being dishonest or is this another example of reading comprehension issues? Wasn't comparing within the context of you and @GG ' s conversation of efficiency of medical systems using slopes, infection rates or anything along those lines with Sweden. It was the overall philosophy in how they dealt with their issues. The context of India or Brazil being more appropriate is due to geography and the autonomous nature of those countries and how each region is essentially independent of each others. I visit India twice a year for a period of a few weeks for my work. Our parent company is in the IT solutions space, has a large office in Bangalore. When I go I visit, it's the same rotation of Bangalore, Mumbai and Trivandrum as our parent company has offices in each city. In each of those three cities they speak three different languages, they all speak English to communicate with one another. The point that I'm making is not only am I very familiar with India, and that I am in daily contact with our offshore team, that India has separate regions that are very distinct from one another. Very similar to Brazil, I have visited Brazil probably at least 10 times in my life as I used to live in Bolivia which borders Brazil. If you go to Bahia, the type of people there are vastly different than in Brasilia, which are very different than Rio. Both of the countries not only have similar autonomous regional makeups as the US, but geographically they are both similar in size. The comparisons have to do with that, not with the medical systems. Which btw, if you ask any of my colleagues from India, who I have close relationships with, they would argue that India's medical system is much better than what you are inferring it to be. But that is besides the point, because that wasn't the comparison that was being made.

That is correct. It's almost as if there are 50 autonomous states, our geography is much different than Europe's makeup in many ways. India and Brazil would be about as close of comparison as you could get.

For a state of a population of 28 million people and never went through any real peak, Florida did it the exact way you would hope that they would. Which was to never experience a peaking point that would even come close to threatening the fears of not being able to flatten the curve. The curve is flattened but doesn't bottom out as quickly as the places that experienced the high mortalities. That's how it works. Here is a chart that illustrates what flattening the curve looks like vs one that didn't do as well. You see how the ones that didn't do it right, it is a steeper incline and more rapid drop. Not as efficient because the medical system is stressed and isn't able to provide as good of care per patient on a per capita basis. Whereas the places that were more successful didn't experience the peaks but took longer to bottom out. Which is the way it is supposed to be, because the patients are able to get the care they need without having overstressed medical systems.

The deaths are clearly trending lower. It's not even a question.

Vapid analysis from a vapid poster

We can wish all we want, but the country is moving ahead. The train has left the station.

I'm adamant in believing that the data should guide policy. We know whose at risk and who relatively are not. Those that are in the lower category of risk should either practice common sense social distancing measures and if they decide not to, then make sure that they don't get in close quarter contact with those that are at higher risk. I think the virus is the most overstated risk that the world has ever allowed to self impose destructive actions that we have ever seen. Again, it sucks that the virus got here from China and that since it is a novel virus with no vaccine that it was able to kill as many people as it did. But the world's response in hindsight will not be viewed as the best possible response that could have been made, not even close. This was a textbook case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

To piggy back off the last post.

Off to the races!

To your first point, you are talking about what one campaign strategist said back in 1981 as proof that Cutting taxes is code word for systemic racism? Do you not realize how incredibly stupid that sounds? Cutting taxes has nothing to do with race, it has everything to do with an ideology that believes that it stimulates growth....One can attempt to reasonably disagree with that premise, but singling out what A strategist said nearly 30 years ago as your smoking gun proof is utterly ######ed. Also, one video of a kid showing his fear of the police is proof that the police department is targeting African Americans? Is that what you are trying to depict? Singular instances is not an effective way to point to prove endemic institutional racism. I am open to the examining of perceived institutional racist policies. But just screaming that there is or showing a video or audio is not an effective way to do it. It invites ridicule and deservedly so. If you look at the raw numbers, which I'm a data guy, you would be hard pressed to find that police shootings of blacks are disproportionately higher than other races. With that said, I do believe that there are reforms to be had to solve some of the inequities. I don't believe for a second that there was an intended affect to create policies to punish blacks, however I do believe it's possible that cultural practices and where police tend to patrol along with some judicial matters have had the unintended consequence of disproportionately punishing blacks. And don't lecture anyone about a blue pill, because your argument is one that perfectly follows those that engage in group think which is the very definition of a blue piller.

One of the things that is important to continue dialogue with anyone is if they are able to comprehend what is being said. If not, then interest in continuing to engage with that particular person lessens. What's the point? If words don't matter. I didn't say or imply that it wasn't a good measure, I said it was the best measure we have to gauge prevalency and that if indeed what De Santis says (which seems to make sense) is the case where contact tracing is having a statistical impact, then it would water down the value of the percent positive gauge for prevalency. The statement that I made some time ago, still stands, which is that it's the best metric to gauge prevalency. All the basic metrics, from total positive tests, percentage positive test rate, new hospital admissions, total hospitalizations to net new deaths would all have to be viewed to get a good reading of what is going on. And the reason why I have nowhere near as much the passion on this topic that I did before is because this is a largely settled matter in the minds of many. We already know this virus is even safer than the flu for kids under 20. That is on par with the flu for those that are between 20-60. Slightly more dangerous than the flu for those 60-75 and more so for those over 75. If you are healthy with one or no comorbidities then we know that you are at very little risk of the virus becoming lethal for you. Knowing what we know today in regards to the risks and who is at risk, and knowing that people from almost all parts of the country were already fatigued with the stay-at-home orders and knowing that some of the politicians in power are essentially mini tyrants and knowing that some in the medical community are hacks; there is no going back to what we saw before. That is over. Could there be some paternalistic officials that pause reopenings or delay them or in some cases go back to some stringent levels? Yes, but it wouldn't be widespread and even then, the compliance in those areas would be terrible. The jig is up, The only way that I think I could be wrong was if somehow much of the country caught on fire with the virus and I don't see that happening. I just don't see that scenario playing out.

Are you purposely being obtuse or do you have the reading comprehension of a gerbil? I said the best indicator that we have available for prevalency is percent positive. That hasn’t changed. Another swing and miss for Shoshin. With that said, if contact tracing is indeed having a statistical impact then it would skew the percent positive rate higher. Also, from everything that I am seeing It appears that a higher percentage of the virus contractions are for younger and healthier people. If this is the case this would be a welcome development as I do believe the communities within communities and places that were most prone and at risk of the virus could be experiencing a herd sort of like immunity. And that there is better testing and safeguards in place for these places than before. I was going to write about this but lost interest. it was a notion that was thrown out there by Nate Silver, he didn’t really expand on it but it got me to thinking. People tend to think of herd immunity in terms of countries, states and cities. There is no reason why not to apply the same reasoning within communities or nursing homes etc. I think the areas that had the worst cultural and worst safety practices would be areas that very possibly are experiencing herd like immunities. Meaning that risk of high prevalency in those earlier particularly hard hit areas have dampened. I believe what we are seeing now is increased testing and I’m hopeful that the explanation of DeSantis is the case that the contact tracing is capturing more of the asymptomatic infections and that is skewing the percent positive rate higher.

If this is your smoking gun to try to prove what you are saying, you swung and missed. Cutting taxes = dog whistle for racism. LOL All three short videos which I gave the benefit of the doubt, discredited your efforts.

In case you were wondering why positive tests going way up along with positive test rate while deaths and hospitalizations are flat to trending down in Florida.

I just cancelled my NY times and WAPO subscription. I'm done with it.

I find this all to be both infuriating and depressing. Things have changed over the past few weeks.

Wow! This is out of hand. They need to be brought in in front of Congress right now.