Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Fragile Bird]

2 hours ago, rotting sea cow said:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/coronavirus-in-usa-spreading-undetected-cryptic-transmission-washington-death-toll-latest-a9370266.html

 

Coronavirus has been spreading for weeks in the US undetected, researchers say

Yesterday in a round-up of the latest news in Canada, a researcher was saying that a breakdown of deaths indicates that if you are under 50 the chances of dying are less than 1%, over 50 it doubles to 2% and it just goes up to those over 80 having a 15% chance of dying from Covid-19.

Children are not getting sick or very mildly sick, which apparently is the case with flu over all. However, as with the flu, it appears they do get infected and spread the infection.

An issue in the US has been the fact that the CDC testing kits were defective and so test results have been unreliable. And no one is testing children. The test kits used in Canada have not had the issues the CDC test kits have had. The other US problem has been the fact hospitals could not test patients without the permission of the CDC. And then, presumably, once permission was received, the CDC test kits were defective. Other test kits are now available, but permission still has to be received before testing can be done, although I think I heard it’s from state authorities now, not just the CDC.

Not a very comforting bit of news.

[rotting sea cow]

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

Children are not getting sick or very mildly sick, which apparently is the case with flu over all. However, as with the flu, it appears they do get infected and spread the infection.

Yeah, the BBC has a nice infographic about it

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/F197/production/_111074816_death_ratio-nc.png

[The Anti-Targ]

John Campbell on Youtube said he heard that in the USA if you get tested and are negative you have to pay for the test, and if you get tested and are positive you have to pay for your quarantine. If that's true everywhere then it's a significant disincentive to getting yourself tested if you are developing symptoms, or even think you've been exposed. Can anyone confirm?

[williamjm]

I thought this article with a senior WHO official being interviewed about the situation in China seemed like a good summary:

https://www.vox.com/2020/3/2/21161067/coronavirus-covid19-china

It does seem as if they've at least somewhat brought it under control for now, even if they could have done a better job to begin with when the outbreak was just starting.

[The Anti-Targ]

12 minutes ago, williamjm said:

I thought this article with a senior WHO official being interviewed about the situation in China seemed like a good summary:

https://www.vox.com/2020/3/2/21161067/coronavirus-covid19-china

It does seem as if they've at least somewhat brought it under control for now, even if they could have done a better job to begin with when the outbreak was just starting.

If China took drastic action at the start a pandemic might have been avoided. But if, as some are claiming, that the disease was in Iran in November (or December) then chances are a pandemic was inevitable. If the incubation period is 14+ days and you are infections from about day 2-5 then there's a heck of a lot of spread before anyone gets sick, and then a whole lot more spread before anyone figures out this is a totally new infectious disease. So this thing might have always become a pandemic regardless of China's actions, only it might have been a bit slower to get going.

Retrospective studies after the pandemic is over will be interesting to see whether they conclude a pandemic could have been prevented or not.

Scottish Health minister apparently said up to 4% of patients will need hospital care. If concurrent cases gets high that is going to cause every healthcare system a lot of problems.

On 26 Feb official reported cases outside of China was 3.3K, on 3 March officially reported case outside China is 12.2K. Almost a quadrupling of reported cases in 6 days. And how many unreported cases? Is there any estimate on the ratio of reported vs unreported cases? I'm guessing almost no mild cases get medical examination or testing, and 80% of infections are mild / asymptomatic. So in countries where community spread is confirmed would we estimate that reported cases is only about 20% of the total? So, in the USA total number of infected is likely to be more like 500+ rather than 108. In Korea it'll be more like 20-25,000 infected rather than 5,000? In China it's more like 300,000+.

[sologdin]

Quote

ohn Campbell on Youtube said he heard that in the USA if you get tested and are negative you have to pay for the test, and if you get tested and are positive you have to pay for your quarantine. If that's true everywhere then it's a significant disincentive to getting yourself tested if you are developing symptoms, or even think you've been exposed. Can anyone confirm?

it would be consistent with the business of for-profit medicine, wherein health is a product, demonstrating parity with trifling pop music, sweatshop fashion, meathead sport, and anodyne cinematic narratives, to name a few, all of which when examined closely share a strongly correlated cross-elasticity of demand.

[Fez]

24 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

John Campbell on Youtube said he heard that in the USA if you get tested and are negative you have to pay for the test, and if you get tested and are positive you have to pay for your quarantine. If that's true everywhere then it's a significant disincentive to getting yourself tested if you are developing symptoms, or even think you've been exposed. Can anyone confirm?

So there is the one specific case of a man and his young daughter, who are being asked to pay for their quarantine. I don't know the details, but it certainly seems totally fucked. I haven't heard of any other cases where this has occurred; though there might be some.

[The Anti-Targ]

2 minutes ago, Fez said:

So there is the one specific case of a man and his young daughter, who are being asked to pay for their quarantine. I don't know the details, but it certainly seems totally fucked. I haven't heard of any other cases where this has occurred; though there might be some.

What's the situation with sick leave in the USA? Is sick leave federally mandated as part of employment conditions, or it is left to states? I assume some insurance plans will have income protection insurance, but that would make insurance more expensive, so a lot of lower income people won't be able to afford it, would employer health insurance plans include in lieu of sick leave? Mostly interested in the basic entitlements, rather than the apparently common work culture of being expected to work until you collapse.

[Zorral]

6 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

What's the situation with sick leave in the USA? Is sick leave federally mandated as part of employment conditions, or it is left to states? I assume some insurance plans will have income protection insurance, but that would make insurance more expensive, so a lot of lower income people won't be able to afford it, would employer health insurance plans include in lieu of sick leave? Mostly interested in the basic entitlements, rather than the apparently common work culture of being expected to work until you collapse.

It's been discussed and lamented constantly here -- there is very little and none at all for those who stock the grocery shelves, the check-outs. In other words most of our low paid but essential industries that deal with our essentials such as food and transportation and communications not only don't get paid what they are worth, they don't have any benefits, much less health insurance or sick leave.  A lot of teachers don't either.

[Fez]

5 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

What's the situation with sick leave in the USA? Is sick leave federally mandated as part of employment conditions, or it is left to states? I assume some insurance plans will have income protection insurance, but that would make insurance more expensive, so a lot of lower income people won't be able to afford it, would employer health insurance plans include in lieu of sick leave? Mostly interested in the basic entitlements, rather than the apparently common work culture of being expected to work until you collapse.

Paid sick leave is NOT federally mandated. What is federally mandated is that employers are required to allow employees to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave under certain circumstances (including an illness that prevents you from doing your job) without any punishment. Though I suspect employers, especially those with lots of hourly employers, could find an excuse to fire someone who took the leave. Plus, it is unpaid; so you better have some savings or another working family member.

States can mandate employer sick leave. Though last I saw, only 10 of them did.

I don't think any health insurance plans cover income protection. There are short-term and long-term disability insurance plans that can cover income loss instead. I believe at best they only cover 60% of your income though; since the expectation is that you would also apply for Social Security Disability Insurance and/or Supplemental Security Income. Which is the part of Social Security that people keep forgetting about. Though neither pays that much, and both are more intended for long-term disability. 

Regarding the private disability plans, the cost is related to the payout, so someone not making much could get a rather cheap plan. However, someone not making much might not have enough spare money to pay for anything. Also, 60% of income might not be livable even for the short-term for many folks.

Some employers will offer disability insurance as an employee benefit, though usually only the short-term kind. And usually that's very much a white collar job benefit only.

[RhaenysBee]

My grocery delivery arrived today. At least half of it. The delivery person, a friendly and positive elderly man, described the situation as quite intense. Last week their trucks set out with up to a ton of goods even though the safety limit is 850 kilograms. For this reason there is now a cap on the amount you can order from certain goods - hence my sister got 6 bottles of iced tea instead of the 18 we ordered. There was also an apology section on the invoice where they listed all the products they were unable to deliver due to stock shortage. Wild. Well now, I must buy half my groceries manually. The triceps 6 boxes of milk is going to give me. Good thing I don’t spend money on a gym membership. 

On a personal level, my father returned from Spain and now I won’t sleep for two weeks to be sure that neither he nor my sister and I (who just met him) contracted the virus. Not that the mathematical probability of this is higher than 0.01%. 

[Maya Mia]

My young son just told me his co workers problem they work in the dining hall of a huge retirement facility, about 20 miles from Sarasota, where one of the confirmed cases in FL is.

he had the mismortune to just get back from visiting family in WI - which I believe does not have an outbreak. These kids make about $10 per hour.

He was told today he is not allowed to come to work, because he traveled to WI until he has been testedand cleared by a doctor. The test costs about $3300 we are hearing, plus the doctor visit. Which doctors are not performing the tests, but the company doesn’t care.  This 20 yr old kid has no symptoms at all. It is all based on because he had interstate travel.

[Which Tyler]

Donal wants to use the flu vaccine to stop COVID19...

https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-asked-if-flu-vaccine-could-stop-coronavirus-2020-3?r=US&IR=T

[Pebble thats Stubby]

1 hour ago, Maya Mia said:

My young son just told me his co workers problem they work in the dining hall of a huge retirement facility, about 20 miles from Sarasota, where one of the confirmed cases in FL is.

he had the mismortune to just get back from visiting family in WI - which I believe does not have an outbreak. These kids make about $10 per hour.

He was told today he is not allowed to come to work, because he traveled to WI until he has been testedand cleared by a doctor. The test costs about $3300 we are hearing, plus the doctor visit. Which doctors are not performing the tests, but the company doesn’t care.  This 20 yr old kid has no symptoms at all. It is all based on because he had interstate travel.

is that not a lawsuit waiting to happen?  I mean I know your emplyment laws are fucked but thats ridiculas.  

 

1 hour ago, RhaenysBee said:

My grocery delivery arrived today. At least half of it. The delivery person, a friendly and positive elderly man, described the situation as quite intense. Last week their trucks set out with up to a ton of goods even though the safety limit is 850 kilograms. For this reason there is now a cap on the amount you can order from certain goods - hence my sister got 6 bottles of iced tea instead of the 18 we ordered. There was also an apology section on the invoice where they listed all the products they were unable to deliver due to stock shortage. Wild. Well now, I must buy half my groceries manually. The triceps 6 boxes of milk is going to give me. Good thing I don’t spend money on a gym membership. 

On a personal level, my father returned from Spain and now I won’t sleep for two weeks to be sure that neither he nor my sister and I (who just met him) contracted the virus. Not that the mathematical probability of this is higher than 0.01%. 

One good thing that has come out of Brexit.  I'm already prepped for food shortages caused by corona-virus panic or for when we need to self isolate.  (actually a large amount of my stuff needs using up before the end of the year and replacing before the next deadline)

maybe do half your shopping online with one supermarket then use a different one for the other half.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

54 minutes ago, Which Tyler said:

Donal wants to use the flu vaccine to stop COVID19...

https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-asked-if-flu-vaccine-could-stop-coronavirus-2020-3?r=US&IR=T

The side effects of being like a really smart person with a great big brain.....

[mcbigski]

3 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

John Campbell on Youtube said he heard that in the USA if you get tested and are negative you have to pay for the test, and if you get tested and are positive you have to pay for your quarantine. If that's true everywhere then it's a significant disincentive to getting yourself tested if you are developing symptoms, or even think you've been exposed. Can anyone confirm?

If you have no coverage at all, then that might be close to the case, though if you test positive, you'd be on the hook for the test and the quarantine.  But there are so many possible combinations of medicaid, medicare, group coverage, and individual coverage, that you really can't state anything categorically.

2 hours ago, Fez said:

Paid sick leave is NOT federally mandated. What is federally mandated is that employers are required to allow employees to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave under certain circumstances (including an illness that prevents you from doing your job) without any punishment. Though I suspect employers, especially those with lots of hourly employers, could find an excuse to fire someone who took the leave. Plus, it is unpaid; so you better have some savings or another working family member.

States can mandate employer sick leave. Though last I saw, only 10 of them did.

I don't think any health insurance plans cover income protection. There are short-term and long-term disability insurance plans that can cover income loss instead. I believe at best they only cover 60% of your income though; since the expectation is that you would also apply for Social Security Disability Insurance and/or Supplemental Security Income. Which is the part of Social Security that people keep forgetting about. Though neither pays that much, and both are more intended for long-term disability. 

Regarding the private disability plans, the cost is related to the payout, so someone not making much could get a rather cheap plan. However, someone not making much might not have enough spare money to pay for anything. Also, 60% of income might not be livable even for the short-term for many folks.

Some employers will offer disability insurance as an employee benefit, though usually only the short-term kind. And usually that's very much a white collar job benefit only.

Group DI is typically 50 to 66.6% for long term coverage.  Short term disability (usually around 2 weeks to 6 months) is typically 100% of pay.  Where covered by a large employer.  Smaller employers tend to have a lot spottier coverage.  Most people who have long term coverage also are given short term.  It's certainly more common in white collar jobs, but probably a bigger split based on who is full time and who is part time as far as coverage goes.

As for individual policies, there isn't a strict income limit, really depends on the financial underwriting.  They aren't going to issue a policy that pays you more when you're disabled than when you're working (moral hazard).  And they are rated by occupation class, so someone making not making much is typically not going to get offered as favorable coverage due to the nature of the job.  For example, a construction laborer is going to pay more per unit than an accountant, and probably get a much shorter benefit term to boot (eg 2 year coverage versus to age 65).

Reducing income to 60% is going to wreck a lot of people's finances, but one additional wrinkle is that premiums paid with non-tax deducted dollars (typically individual plans) pay income tax free benefits,  Though company provided benefits are almost always taxable.  (a few companies will allow you to opt to get taxed on the value of the premiums you pay, which would make your benefit tax free - basically you're agreeing to buy more coverage that way).

And one more issue with Social Security disability payments are that it can take literally years to get your claim approved.  Sometime 30 months later you could get a check for the previous two years of benefits, but in the mean while, you've had to live for years without any monthly income, worst case.

So yeah, not making specific recommendations for anyone here, but if you don't have enough accumulated to retire today, looking into to getting additional disability coverage is prudent idea.

[Mudguard]

The added wrinkle in the US of the possibility that the patient is financially responsible for the test and quarantine is another reason why basic healthcare should be covered entirely by the government.  This is crazy.  If you are saying that the patient is financially responsible, then the patient should have the option to say no thanks to both the test and quarantine.  If either are forced on the patient, then the government should cover the expense.  The government should really announce ASAP that they will cover all medical expenses related to the coronavirus outbreak.  If they don't, it's going to discourage people from getting tested and will make it much more difficult to stop it from spreading.

I can't believe that the CDC had issued such stringent guidelines for testing for coronavirus that it prevented the detection of a bunch of cases.  This failure comes from the top, including Trump, who has been downplaying the severity of this disease from the beginning.  We've all had the benefit of seeing what happened in China with the delay in responding aggressively to the outbreak.  If this blows up in the US, these deaths are on Trump's hands.  It is unconscionable that we weren't aggressively testing for this disease as soon as it was clear how serious it was.  

[The Anti-Targ]

Some

3 hours ago, Maya Mia said:

My young son just told me his co workers problem they work in the dining hall of a huge retirement facility, about 20 miles from Sarasota, where one of the confirmed cases in FL is.

he had the mismortune to just get back from visiting family in WI - which I believe does not have an outbreak. These kids make about $10 per hour.

He was told today he is not allowed to come to work, because he traveled to WI until he has been testedand cleared by a doctor. The test costs about $3300 we are hearing, plus the doctor visit. Which doctors are not performing the tests, but the company doesn’t care.  This 20 yr old kid has no symptoms at all. It is all based on because he had interstate travel.

 

1 hour ago, Pebble thats Stubby said:

is that not a lawsuit waiting to happen?  I mean I know your emplyment laws are fucked but thats ridiculas.  

 

 

At a retirement facility it is understandable to be extra cautious since fatality rates in the elderly are very high. WI has one case at the moment, but I think with the level of anxiety out there that is probably enough to get retirement facility managers spooked. Imagine the lawsuits if an outbreak at a retirement facility with up to 10% death rate gets tracked back to a worker and the employer knew about their travel and took no precautions.

The problem isn't the stay at home order, it's probably fairly sensible in the context. The problem is there is nothing in place to allow [low paid] employees to get tested on the insistence of employers quickly and cheaply and get back to work with minimal time off. I bracket low paid, because even fairly well paid employees can ill afford $3000 for a test without insurance covering it. And I can just imagine insurance deciding that "risky" travel is a good reason to deny coverage so long as you are not symptomatic.

[The Anti-Targ]

53 minutes ago, Mudguard said:

The added wrinkle in the US of the possibility that the patient is financially responsible for the test and quarantine is another reason why basic healthcare should be covered entirely by the government.  This is crazy.  If you are saying that the patient is financially responsible, then the patient should have the option to say no thanks to both the test and quarantine.  If either are forced on the patient, then the government should cover the expense.  The government should really announce ASAP that they will cover all medical expenses related to the coronavirus outbreak.  If they don't, it's going to discourage people from getting tested and will make it much more difficult to stop it from spreading.

I can't believe that the CDC had issued such stringent guidelines for testing for coronavirus that it prevented the detection of a bunch of cases.  This failure comes from the top, including Trump, who has been downplaying the severity of this disease from the beginning.  We've all had the benefit of seeing what happened in China with the delay in responding aggressively to the outbreak.  If this blows up in the US, these deaths are on Trump's hands.  It is unconscionable that we weren't aggressively testing for this disease as soon as it was clear how serious it was.  

I mean, a silver lining might be that MFA becomes the single election issue and people finally wake up and realise its importance and vote accordingly. I don't see why MFA candidates shouldn't be saying loudly and often that if you had MFA the US health system would be able to deal with the situation a lot better than now.

[The Anti-Targ]

Aussie's quarantined on Christmas Island have been given the all clear as no cases occurred during the quarantine period. If I was one of them I might be quite tempted to see if I can stay on Christmas Island and not let anyone else in. It's kind of a safe haven now.

Might have to apologise to the Canadians and Mexicans here. Apparently the second person to be diagnosed (caught it in Italy some time before returning from holiday). The person came back non-symptomatic and traveled on some domestic flights. One flight / airport (not sure which from the article) included some international baseball teams from Canada and Mexico. This was the flight where the person had to return home early because they were feeling ill. So reasonable chance of exposure for those baseball teams.

Now, some of these people might turn up at a medical facility and be diagnosed and assumed to be evidence of community spread, because they did not travel to a risk country and thus no known traceback to an overseas source. I hope these people are all contacted and told they were exposed to a person likely to have been infectious with the virus in NZ, so that if they get sick they can give the doctor this information. But likelihood is that these guys (I assume guys) will return home with no symptoms, and if they get sick, because they are young and probably fairly fit might just thing they have a cold, and not actually seek medical treatment. Can you imagine, significant outbreak getting started in Canada and Mexico from a source country that had only 2 confirmed cases at the time. Talk about bad luck.