shoshin

Mask use is important for you to keep other people safe. We should all be doing g it in crowds for a while.

On the other side of that image you could put needles, hospitals, pharmaceuticals and the like with their cost. It really is amazing. The Times has some of the best pure data tracking on Covid in America out there. It’s actually the best for a view of all state and metro data. You can find better data in your own state by drilling down your local health department but the times compilation of all the states, counties, and cities is excellent and clearly presented. Except for my own state, I use theirs for US data and the Worldometer for world data.

My theory but based on facts. Think of it more like this. NYC is the hub. Multiple people traveling into the hub are getting it and spreading it to other multiple people in the metro area seeding those burbs. Some people distance and pressure their peers to distance and wear masks etc sooner and have better outcomes. No place is like NYC in America. It has 12 of the most dense areas in the top 20 in America. Including the top 8 with NYC itself in at #6 with its 8M people. And a population where public transport and general crowding is unparalleled. It has no American analogy even in Philly, Chicago, Boston, or LA and if those cities shut down before their case counts got as high as NY, then they would have less impact. This appears to be the case. Only Detroit and New Orleans seem to be on any trajectory like NYC. The health systems couldn’t keep up good standards of care I’m sure. There’s bed capacity and then there’s actual good care. What happened in Italy in particular was a total swamping of their system. Happened in NYC to a lesser extent. It did and is so far. Italy, Spain, France, and the UK are getting hammered. Germany is doing well but they have better care and are culturally different, as are the Northern European countries. Japan and India pop my reasoning though. Japan maybe is culture but that can’t explain 38M people living in Tokyo and the entire country having less than 10 dead a day. And India? They should be getting destroyed. Maybe they are and the data sucks frankly. But if not, that really makes no sense. Korea is another great outlier as we know. We need to look at all the outliers and figure out why. Smarter minds are at work on this.

So are people comparing it to the flu to show how much worse this is?

Tracing only works once you reduce the initial case count. That’s for sure.

it is definitely impossible now. It only gets possible when the cases are very low after the distancing. If we aren’t going to do that, we might as well just not have shut down. Other countries are making tracing work. You can’t say it doesn’t work. The chart shows that this is much more deadly given how we will have gone from 0 CASES and deaths (where the flu never is) to 30-60K deaths in 5 months, swamped some health care systems...and that’s with distancing in place. This isn’t the common flu. Comparing it to the flu is pointless. We can also compare it to heart failure deaths (it’s killing more people).

If we lost the battle, we’d all be at work. Distancing quells this outbreak. Tracing and testing can keep bigger waves from coming. Because this is more contagious, requires much more care, and is more deadly than the flu.

Don’t buy Or use the phone if you don’t like it. Hopefully we can get an app up and working so we only so this shutdown once.

I expect we will hear some suggestions from the administration about how they recommend states open starting later this week. Probably just the initial broad ideas.

We are late to the party in getting Covid. Our numbers will increase. I was noticing this was wildly low in the European counties for a long time too. Must have to do with how long you have to be Covid free before you move to “recovered.” Maybe our standard for recovery is different too because I can’t explain Canada.

Tripling the daily death count over what it normally is in NY is real. Covid is crushing a lot of healthcare systems as they drop almost every other patient to try to care for them. All the above happened in just a couple of months and during a virtual lockdown, where the flu numbers are for a full year with no lockdown. Stop comparing this to the flu. It isn’t the flu.

Those counties travel to NYC so I think it explains it pretty well.

NYC and northern NJ remain 50% of our deaths almost every day. It's shocking. Even as some city cases rise, nothing will likely come close to NY.

So much of what we knew initially came from China. Then Italy (mostly) lead the way with data. Now it's us. The only good news is that with every country trying a different approach, we are getting a fast look at what works well in treatment and social measures. If you take a look at the UK, which was open way longer than the rest of Europe, they are getting bombed now in deaths. Boris Johnson (who I personally hope is doing well) looks to have made a bad choice keeping things open. The UK's deaths/day is already higher than Italy ever got. Sweden is doing well but that's probably a demographic blip where something like 50% of their U30 population lives alone, and they tend to socially distance a little more naturally, plus they live more spread out. Still can't explain some places: Japan (!!!), Mexico, Brazil, India. Possibly the latter 3 have bad data but you would think given population density, those would be huge outbreak centers. And Japan with 38 million people in Tokyo and an aging population...same, even given their culture of distance and cleanliness. My armchair CDC opinion is that come June 1, we should act in behavior like the Japanese (masks, distancing, no handshakes etc), trace and test like the Koreans if we have the capability, protect the older populations by asking them to stay home, and keep gatherings of over [a small number...20?] to a bare minimum. Then if cases remain under control, start raising that minimal number gradually. I don't love the idea of the certificates but I would have to know more what that line of thinking is. If I could flash my digital certificate that I was either immune or had a clean test in the last 2 days and that allowed me to go into a crowded restaurant, I might be OK with that. It's better than the restaurant staying empty. But if we're saying anyone without a negative test or immunity has to stay home, that would be troubling. I agree with this. We can brag all we want about the progress we have made, and that's legitimate, but until the tests are as easy to get as a tic tac, we need magnitudes more. Daily tests for many jobs (people who come into lots of contact with others like nursing home workers) should be a requirement if/once we have the capability.

This is just PA, but *most* of the tests (83%) are running negative. And those would be people who are getting tested because they had symptoms or are in high risk jobs so you would expect them to have a much higher rate of positives than your 75%, yet the positives among that group is only 17%. The 75% number doesn't hold water for a lot of reasons. I find it strange that you and others try to minimize this. It's real and it's serious. I say this from the perspective of someone who is desperate to reactivate the economy. Personally and as a citizen, I am desperate to do this. But we need to do it with some foresight and planning to avoid a much worse outbreak or future shutdowns. I'm not sure we can but I'd like to give it a try.

No. Those are people who had symptoms or are in high risk jobs. So if you expect 75% of people are already infected, those tests should be running much much higher. Yet they are not.

You said over 75% of Americans have it in a 6 month span if I give you through May. That would dwarf the spread of any known disease ever. It’s bold. Not too likely, but bold. Why do you think, out of curiousity, we are getting such a high percentage of negative tests back? Are those part of the 25% that don’t have it and everyone untested does have it? I ask you to question your amped up and unreasonable numbers.

I wish I could believe anything out of China. But I hope this is true and shows a path forward.

Spain is a long ways from out of this but is allowing some businesses to reopen on Monday. They are harder hit than Italy and currently are number two in deaths in Europe (we will take the number one spot today from Italy in the world and hold it for a long time). I expect their second wave to be a disaster.

You think that from December to May, over 75% of the country will have gotten Covid19? So this is the most contagious disease of all time by a fantastic margin never before seen in history? I am guessing you don’t work at the CDC.

You don’t think we got our right assemble back after the Spanish Flu? And back then there were —mandatory— vaccinations. Now people are proud (and stupid) of not getting vaccinated. During times of war and pandemic, constitutional rights have been abridged before. Like now with the right to assemble. And there are other examples. Not to mention the everyday ones mentioned already where constitutional rights collide (yelling fire in a movie theater). This is bad enough without the histrionics about millions dead, bodies in the streets, and the start of a Brave New World/1984 police state. Let’s call the bull#### when we see it and fight back of it gets extended too far. Right now we need to control this disease To some extent and get back to work as soon as possible without risking another shutdown if/when the big case wave comes after this little wave dies down.

The Administration 100% knew of the danger in Jan and Feb and didn't do enough to react to it. But no one else did either. Lots of politicians, including De Blasio, Pelosi, and Trump downplayed the risk (go to restaurants, come to China town, we will be at zero) and it hurt our ability to get ready. Their conduct should be reviewed in November. February was a lost month to prepare but this was coming whether we had done more or not. Philadelphia's mayor says the city should expect to be shutdown through the summer. He might as well drop bombs on the city like they did in the 70s. Total ass to 1) think that's possible, and 2) say it. We need to get the Eff back to work. Put on your masks, work from home where possible, avoid crowds, people at risk be even more careful, wash your hands, take your temp, submit to temperature testing and tracking, test the hell out of people...and let's get this thing back up and running. My wife said her team just found out about about 3 nursing home outbreaks locally today. Those are just the worst. My wife's stepmother is in an over 55 community and if she leaves for any reason (she's totally fine to drive normally), they will only allow her back in if she immediately submits to a 3 week quarantine. They are freaking out in places like that, with good reason.

Not relevant to the Covid discussion.

The State governments are currently prohibiting most Americans’ rights to assemble, including yours because not all the rights in the Constitution always peaceably coexist. You have the right to assemble but not if it is a danger to others. Same with the right to free speech (the proverbial yelling “fire” in a movie theater). Same likely with the unwritten right to privacy invoked by the anti-tracking people against tracing contacts of people infected with Covid 19. When your “rights” endanger others, they are not untethered.

Are you obeying the prohibition against your right to assemble in your state?