The Next Pandemic: SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19

[shoshin]

4 hours ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

 

Guess he's decided to ignore Trump's phasing plan. 

[fansince88]

2 hours ago, SoCal Deek said:

Enough about the testing already.

Tests? What tests?

 

[Cinga]

13 minutes ago, shoshin said:

 

Sweden has a lot of differences with the US that work to its advantage (homogeneity, few big urban centers, compliant and educated population, organized centrally planned healthcare), so that it's now level with the US is not a winning moment. Plus, they are still rising. Sweden is no longer the darling of the NY Times crowd it once was. 

 

So are you saying we're just a bunch of dumb hillbillies who don't like authority?

More on how Sweden has handled this vs pretty much everyone else:

 

and a lot of it supports what I and others have been saying

 

From the article:

Below are a series of points made by Mr. Giesecke, via UnHeard:

• UK policy on lockdown and other European countries are not evidence-based
• The correct policy is to protect the old and the frail only
• This will eventually lead to herd immunity as a “by-product”
• The initial UK response, before the “180 degree U-turn”, was better
• The Imperial College paper was “not very good” and he has never seen an unpublished paper have so much policy impact
• The paper was very much too pessimistic
• Any such models are a dubious basis for public policy anyway
• The flattening of the curve is due to the most vulnerable dying first as much as the lockdown
• The results will eventually be similar for all countries
• Covid-19 is a “mild disease” and similar to the flu, and it was the novelty of the disease that scared people.
• The actual fatality rate of Covid-19 is the region of 0.1%
• At least 50% of the population of both the UK and Sweden will be shown to have already had the disease when mass antibody testing becomes available

 

[Magox]

3 minutes ago, Cinga said:

 

So are you saying we're just a bunch of dumb hillbillies who don't like authority?

 I guess since Sweden is no longer the darling of The NY Times crowd, they must be doing something wrong?   Is that the implication? 

[Buffalo Bills Fan]

Even though Nathan said he didn't want to have his sister come home, this is what they were doing 20 minutes after we finally got Cassandra and home.

My sister facebook

My niece back home witch is great news.  Ya that's my nephew he is young. But glad they got along and happy. Very good news today.! 

[shoshin]

36 minutes ago, Cinga said:

 

So are you saying we're just a bunch of dumb hillbillies who don't like authority?

More on how Sweden has handled this vs pretty much everyone else:

 

and a lot of it supports what I and others have been saying

 

From the article:

Below are a series of points made by Mr. Giesecke, via UnHeard:

• UK policy on lockdown and other European countries are not evidence-based
• The correct policy is to protect the old and the frail only
• This will eventually lead to herd immunity as a “by-product”
• The initial UK response, before the “180 degree U-turn”, was better
• The Imperial College paper was “not very good” and he has never seen an unpublished paper have so much policy impact
• The paper was very much too pessimistic
• Any such models are a dubious basis for public policy anyway
• The flattening of the curve is due to the most vulnerable dying first as much as the lockdown
• The results will eventually be similar for all countries
• Covid-19 is a “mild disease” and similar to the flu, and it was the novelty of the disease that scared people.
• The actual fatality rate of Covid-19 is the region of 0.1%
• At least 50% of the population of both the UK and Sweden will be shown to have already had the disease when mass antibody testing becomes available

 

 

You have me wrong here but that's not a big deal. I want to reopen and would love us to have Sewden's outcome. It's just that with our cities, we resemble Sweden very little. The rest of the US resembles Sweden in population density more, but not in many other ways. I say this based on data and having had to travel there for work a lot. 

 

There is a lot of inaccurate stuff in your bullet points, the most glaring of which is "At least 50% of the population of both the UK and Sweden will be shown to have already had the disease when mass antibody testing becomes available." There is not a single study to support this but I'd love this fantasy to be true.

 

But another doozy is "Covid-19 is a “mild disease” and similar to the flu, and it was the novelty of the disease that scared people." That's absurd. The flu doesn't kill 70K people in 5 months from 0 the months proceeding --with distancing in place--, and the flu doesn't swamp morgues and hospitals and overwhelm healthcare systems that are turning away all unnecessary surgeries.  

 

I want to reopen according to the Trump guidelines, but even the states that are opening now appear to not care about those. That's fine, but let's do it eyes wide open. Things will get a lot worse in deaths and health care before they get better by rushing into reopening. Since I think reopening is the priority, I lean towards taking that risk but it's real and let's not think some miracle is going to happen where we find ourselves with less than several hundred thousand more dead by April 2021. The bodies from Covid and an overwhelmed healthcare system will pile up.

 

I keep anecdotally saying it but my wife works in a huge health system and her team is literally swamped with people getting sicker by the day, not just from Covid though that too, but from all the other ***** that's not getting adequate treatment (drains, assisted nursing procedures, home care issues, a myriad of other health services). When Covid cases rise beyond where they are now, those people will get even sicker. As will all the other "elective" doctor appointment people. Let's reopen but let's not be stupid enough to think the price for doing it will be anything other than high. 

 

31 minutes ago, Magox said:

 I guess since Sweden is no longer the darling of The NY Times crowd, they must be doing something wrong?   Is that the implication? 

 

No, it's just that the NY Times bestowed a gold star to Sweden but guess what, Sweden despite it's many many advantages in dealing with something like this (including that such a high number of its people live alone, its high degree of compliance with social distancing guidelines, that its workers are working from home as a result of corporate decisions, and its dispersed population), is doing no better than us. We have a way more susceptible population than Sweden. Have no fear: When we lift restrictions, our numbers won't stay where they are level with Sweden. 

Edited April 21, 2020 by shoshin

[Cinga]

5 minutes ago, shoshin said:

There is a lot of inaccurate stuff in your bullet points, the most glaring of which is "At least 50% of the population of both the UK and Sweden will be shown to have already had the disease when mass antibody testing becomes available." There is not a single study to support this but I'd love this fantasy to be true.

 

But another doozy is "Covid-19 is a “mild disease” and similar to the flu, and it was the novelty of the disease that scared people." That's absurd. The flu doesn't kill 70K people in 5 months from 0 the months proceeding --with distancing in place--, and the flu doesn't swamp morgues and hospitals and overwhelm healthcare systems that are turning away all unnecessary surgeries.  

 

Of course you can't accept either of those hypothesis because you have been ingrained with how bad this is supposed to be. 

 

Peace, I don't want you to think I'm picking on you, it's only that you seem to present a better argument in favor of the tactics the gov has taken than most, even if I disagree, I think it's how we all learn

[shoshin]

1 minute ago, Cinga said:

 

Of course you can't accept either of those hypothesis because you have been ingrained with how bad this is supposed to be. 

 

Peace, I don't want you to think I'm picking on you, it's only that you seem to present a better argument in favor of the tactics the gov has taken than most, even if I disagree, I think it's how we all learn

I’m eager to be wrong. I need to be back to friggin work!

[SectionC3]

3 hours ago, Buffalo_Gal said:

Hmmm Trump just dropped a hint about a revolutionary test to come out in a few weeks (he hopes). 

 

If he said it I believe it.  Trump always tells the truth.  

4 hours ago, Buffalo_Gal said:

Trump asks him to give them a wall update.  This man is in charge of building the wall in Mexico (I couldn't get his name).
General: 4K contractors, 400 employees, and no pause in building the wall. Construction is going smoothly.  164 miles done as of today. Will be finished the start of next year.

 

I love when the press asks one of these Generals questions.  Even the most obnoxious "journalist" tones it down. 



 

This wall is the best thing ever.  Just outstanding.  Those dudes on Narcos Mexico will never figure out how to get drugs and people over and around the wall.  Not even with the explosions in drone technology.  Keep America Great! 

[Magox]

I don’t think the antibody studies that are suggesting that the mortality rate will be between .1% - .2% will be correct with those figures but I do think they heavily suggest that the mortality rates are much lower than what was previously thought.

 

My guess is somewhere between .3% - .4%.  But even if the Studies were correct at .1% or so you still could see 70k deaths in 5 months with social distancing measures.   
 

How?

 

Its rate of contagion and that there is no vaccine in place.  If the common flu didn’t have a vaccine and it was many multiples more contagious than the common flu, you would see similar outcomes.

 

And Sweden is doing much much better than the doomsday predictions.  And there Is growing evidence that they have flattened the curve.  
 

“The trend we have seen in recent days, with a more flat curve -- where we have many new cases, but not a daily increase -- is stabilizing,” Karin Tegmark Wisell, head of the microbiology department at Sweden’s Public Health Authority, said on Friday. “We are seeing the same pattern for patients in intensive care.”
 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2020-04-19/sweden-says-controversial-covid-19-strategy-is-proving-effective

 

clearly there are dynamics at play that help out the Swedes but there are two large advantages the south has over Sweden.  Heat and humidity.

 

Personally I would like to see Georgia follow the federal guidelines but it should be a fascinating test case.  Again, the standard Of failure shouldn’t be if they see increases In cases and deaths but rather if their hospital systems can handle their patients.   Which was the whole pretext of flattening the curve.

 

 

 

 

[B-Man]

 

 

#JOURNALISM: 

 

Headline: Kentucky sees highest spike in coronavirus cases after lockdown protests.

 

Article: “It’s unclear whether the protests had any impact on the surge of deaths reported Sunday in the state.”

 

Since the protests were Sunday, and the deaths were reported Sunday, it isn’t actually “unclear.”

 

It’s clear that the protests couldn’t have contributed to the deaths.

 

The headline is just another blood libel.

 

 

 

.

[B-Man]

DISINFORMATION: 

 

Don’t Get Fooled by Fake Photos of Coronavirus Lockdown Protests.

 

 

 

 

it turns out that the picture in question actually came from a March 2 Bernie Sanders rally in Boise, Idaho.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shoshin]

9 hours ago, Magox said:

I don’t think the antibody studies that are suggesting that the mortality rate will be between .1% - .2% will be correct with those figures but I do think they heavily suggest that the mortality rates are much lower than what was previously thought.

 

My guess is somewhere between .3% - .4%.  But even if the Studies were correct at .1% or so you still could see 70k deaths in 5 months with social distancing measures.   
 

How?

 

Its rate of contagion and that there is no vaccine in place.  If the common flu didn’t have a vaccine and it was many multiples more contagious than the common flu, you would see similar outcomes.

 

And Sweden is doing much much better than the doomsday predictions.  And there Is growing evidence that they have flattened the curve.  
 

“The trend we have seen in recent days, with a more flat curve -- where we have many new cases, but not a daily increase -- is stabilizing,” Karin Tegmark Wisell, head of the microbiology department at Sweden’s Public Health Authority, said on Friday. “We are seeing the same pattern for patients in intensive care.”
 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2020-04-19/sweden-says-controversial-covid-19-strategy-is-proving-effective

 

clearly there are dynamics at play that help out the Swedes but there are two large advantages the south has over Sweden.  Heat and humidity.

 

Personally I would like to see Georgia follow the federal guidelines but it should be a fascinating test case.  Again, the standard Of failure shouldn’t be if they see increases In cases and deaths but rather if their hospital systems can handle their patients.   Which was the whole pretext of flattening the curve.

 

 

 

 

A couple of things. On the 70,000 for this wave, that’s just numbers. We are at 43,000 dead. The current deaths/day is about 2000. In Italy and Spain, they held their peak deaths per day for what, 20 or so days and then didn’t steeply decline but went down gradually with a long pause at 50-70% of their peak where they currently are. It’s only going to take 2 weeks at 1500/day to get to 70,000. So that’s not pessimism or gloom and doom, it’s just numbers. The 70,000 would have been right if we locked down through May. With reopening, I don't know. What we are seeing is a definite drop in NY Metro deaths finally but a rise elsewhere. And even with the drop, it's still a staggering 500/day. 
 

As to your second point about flattening the curve enough so hospitals can manage this, I agree. But I think you may miss how hospitals in most places handled this in the last month since the shutdown started. From my friend who is a surgeon in rural WV to here in a big city, our medical system went dark for almost every non-Covid patient to handle this. And it mostly worked except NYC and a few other spots. But shutting everything in a medical system down is not handling this. It’s a ultra-crisis mode. The people not getting treatment need treatment for a variety of issues. Think of it like the economy: We can only put things off for so long. 
 

I am for reopening but let’s not kid ourselves that it’s going to be something other than extremely messy. Distancing worked to stem the flood of cases and deaths. Reopening will not continue a downward trend of cases and deaths. And maybe you’re right that it's better for warm places, so the summer will help but that’s a brief respite. 
 

On Sweden. Stockholm is by far the largest city in Sweden. It has 1.7M people. The entire country doesn’t have 11M. It doesn’t have one city with the socio economic makeup of a Cincinnati let alone 30, with some of our metro areas having more people than their entire country. It’s a neat place but it is not similar to here in important ways. Sweden can show what is possible when people act intelligently but as you can see from our protestors crowding around each other, Sweden does not show what is probable. 
 

And Remember: Sweden and the US have very similar numbers NOW. That’s a country that didn’t shut down (Sweden) vs a country that did (us). Our numbers wouldn’t be the same if we had stayed open. 

Edited April 21, 2020 by shoshin

[Westside]

15 hours ago, jrober38 said:

 

Capitalism works until it doesn't. 

Spoken like a true communist 

[Cinga]

Okay, as some of you know, Maryland has been on mandatory mask in public since Saturday and I have quickly reached a conclusion.
That this is WORSE than when we didn't have this rule! Now hear me out before you bash....

We know the most common way of ANY virus spreading is hand/face contact. You touch something that has the virus, then touch your face. Now in a hospital or care facilities, they have hand sanitizer stations all over, and staff uses them all the time.
But in public we don't, and not everyone carries a pocket size bottle with them like I have been doing since this started. And therein lies the problem....
The public is not used to wearing a face covering of any sort. And what I see now is people constantly reaching up to readjust that mask or bandana, or whatever they have to cover their face (one of my favorite I saw was a crocheted scarf). Touching their face in the process, right after touching that card reader, or shopping cart that is not sterile and even the mask that may now be contaminated.
I really think as a whole, society was doing pretty good with the don't touch your face, wash your hands a lot thing. However this just ruined all of that...

Just my thoughts....

[shoshin]

Still in a state of mostly lockdown, Milan/Lombardy is no longer seeing deaths and cases slowing, they are just remaining level, right at the time when it wants to reopen. This should be the thing to worry about in bigger US cities, maybe especially those US cities that only had fewer cases so far compared to NYC. 

 

Quote

In Italy’s most populous and economically important region, where Milan is the capital, the number of new infections remains stubbornly high, raising doubts about whether Italy is ready to start unwinding its lockdown as scheduled from May 4.

 

Quote

 

The slow pace of the pandemic’s retreat suggests the effects of Italy’s lockdown have reached their limits. The challenge for Italy is to reopen businesses despite a high level of continuing contagion in its economic heartland.

 

Italy’s plan is to use its lockdown to reduce the pandemic to a level where it can fight smaller outbreaks by testing, tracing and isolating potential virus carriers. But officials and health experts worry that the scale of contagion in Lombardy is still too big for that approach to be sufficient.

 

In Lombardy, as elsewhere in Italy, daily deaths have been declining since around the end of March. Hospitals have recorded a steady fall in the number of patients in intensive-care units—a huge relief for the hospitals in Lombardy’s cities of Bergamo and Brescia that were forced to ration care in March.

 

 

Lombardy got things under some degree of control through the lockdown, but it doesn't seem likely to last when they raise the restrictions given the high case counts.

[Tiberius]

Don't want to run out of pork chops! 

 

Bloomberg) -- Hundreds of National Guard personnel are being activated in Iowa as coronavirus sweeps through meat-processing plants in a state that accounts for about a third of U.S. pork supply.

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds said 250 National Guard members have been moved to full-time federal duty status and could help with testing and contact tracing for workers at plants operated by Tyson Foods Inc. and National Beef Packing Co.

Activating guard soldiers is the latest attempt to contain the disease, which has forced a growing number of slaughterhouses and meat-processing plants to slow or halt operations.

The disruptions are stoking concerns for eventual fresh-meat shortages in grocery stores as well leaving some farmers without a market for their animals. That’s pushing down prices for hogs and cattle, while making meat more expensive. Wholesale pork posted its biggest three-day gain in six years.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/iowa-sends-national-guard-troops-225054924.html

[SoCal Deek]

Here are the stats as of today: 

 

Almost 27,000 of the 42,000 deaths (64%) are in and around the NYC metro area.

 

For those of you who live in that area, you need to realize this is very much so a regional story. This is not to downplay its seriousness but the rest of the country is simply not experiencing what the NYC area has dealt with.

[Chef Jim]

8 hours ago, B-Man said:

DISINFORMATION: 

 

Don’t Get Fooled by Fake Photos of Coronavirus Lockdown Protests.

 

 

 

 

it turns out that the picture in question actually came from a March 2 Bernie Sanders rally in Boise, Idaho.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Defeat our common enemy!  Stupidity. 

2 hours ago, Cinga said:

Okay, as some of you know, Maryland has been on mandatory mask in public since Saturday and I have quickly reached a conclusion.
That this is WORSE than when we didn't have this rule! Now hear me out before you bash....

We know the most common way of ANY virus spreading is hand/face contact. You touch something that has the virus, then touch your face. Now in a hospital or care facilities, they have hand sanitizer stations all over, and staff uses them all the time.
But in public we don't, and not everyone carries a pocket size bottle with them like I have been doing since this started. And therein lies the problem....
The public is not used to wearing a face covering of any sort. And what I see now is people constantly reaching up to readjust that mask or bandana, or whatever they have to cover their face (one of my favorite I saw was a crocheted scarf). Touching their face in the process, right after touching that card reader, or shopping cart that is not sterile and even the mask that may now be contaminated.
I really think as a whole, society was doing pretty good with the don't touch your face, wash your hands a lot thing. However this just ruined all of that...

Just my thoughts....

 

This was part of my point when I said WTF when I was denied access to two grocery stores this weekend. Most of the masks did little or no good. 

[Tiberius]