Muh muh muh means tuh testing - Covid #6

[Clueless Northman]

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

But at some point lockdowns have to end. And I can’t see any economy surviving a 6 month lockdown. So they will have to lift the most draconian restrictions in any case eventually. Deaths or not.

6-months lockdown and mass isolation is what merely "flattening the curve" will give you. You don't flatten the curve, you isolate people as much as possible and then go all in with mass-testing of all clusters with infected people.

Flattening the curve a bit would end in failure because your healthcare system always ends up collapsing and you end up like Italy (or early Wuhan) with massive deaths. Flattening it enough for most people to get infected but in a long enough timeline for the hospitals to deal with it means indeed a year-long sluggish half-assed quarantine.

Frankly, I think an economy would suffer just as much if half of it is stopped for one year than if it's frozen for 2 months.

The "let just everybody catch it" strategy is, of course, merely mass-murder, because 99% of people who will need ICU in the next couple of months will just die. For the US, that's several million deaths, in such a situation.

 

As for the UK, these morons were relying on another totally different kind of pneumonia, as if death rate and ICU needs were the same from one disease to the next - totally oblivious to the numerous data from China, Korea and Italy. At this point, this should be considered criminal incompetence.

[Free Northman Reborn]

12 minutes ago, Clueless Northman said:

6-months lockdown and mass isolation is what merely "flattening the curve" will give you. You don't flatten the curve, you isolate people as much as possible and then go all in with mass-testing of all clusters with infected people.

Flattening the curve a bit would end in failure because your healthcare system always ends up collapsing and you end up like Italy (or early Wuhan) with massive deaths. Flattening it enough for most people to get infected but in a long enough timeline for the hospitals to deal with it means indeed a year-long sluggish half-assed quarantine.

Frankly, I think an economy would suffer just as much if half of it is stopped for one year than if it's frozen for 2 months.

The "let just everybody catch it" strategy is, of course, merely mass-murder, because 99% of people who will need ICU in the next couple of months will just die. For the US, that's several million deaths, in such a situation.

 

As for the UK, these morons were relying on another totally different kind of pneumonia, as if death rate and ICU needs were the same from one disease to the next - totally oblivious to the numerous data from China, Korea and Italy. At this point, this should be considered criminal incompetence.

Interesting. Some good points there. 
 

[RhaenysBee]

4 minutes ago, Clueless Northman said:

6-months lockdown and mass isolation is what merely "flattening the curve" will give you. You don't flatten the curve, you isolate people as much as possible and then go all in with mass-testing of all clusters with infected people.

Flattening the curve a bit would end in failure because your healthcare system always ends up collapsing and you end up like Italy (or early Wuhan) with massive deaths. Flattening it enough for most people to get infected but in a long enough timeline for the hospitals to deal with it means indeed a year-long sluggish half-assed quarantine.

Frankly, I think an economy would suffer just as much if half of it is stopped for one year than if it's frozen for 2 months.

The "let just everybody catch it" strategy is, of course, merely mass-murder, because 99% of people who will need ICU in the next couple of months will just die. For the US, that's several million deaths, in such a situation.

 

As for the UK, these morons were relying on another totally different kind of pneumonia, as if death rate and ICU needs were the same from one disease to the next - totally oblivious to the numerous data from China, Korea and Italy. At this point, this should be considered criminal incompetence.

I do agree with the essence here. “Advising” people to stay at home and closing down “some businesses” and “limiting” opening hours just aren’t enough. They are painful enough measures so governments can convince themselves they’ve done something, but on the long run they’ll do as much if not more harm than the excruciating measure of a one-month lockdown would - which in turn would also give countries a fighting chance.
People are - at least around here - undisciplined and drunk on their independence, liberty and supposed intellect (because using the internet makes everybody a medical and economic expert, apparently) and don’t really stay home as long as they are only advised to do so. They need to be ordered AND sanctioned if they refuse. (The other day there was news of a couple who climbed over the fence of a closed playground because who are authorities to tell them they can’t do something?) 
As an individual, my two week self-isolation at day 8 is worth basically nothing because others refuse to play their part. The situation will only be worse by the time my two weeks end and I can stay another six because people refuse to make the same sacrifice and the government doesn’t order a mandatory lockdown. 
 

[Free Northman Reborn]

55 minutes ago, RhaenysBee said:

I do agree with the essence here. “Advising” people to stay at home and closing down “some businesses” and “limiting” opening hours just aren’t enough. They are painful enough measures so governments can convince themselves they’ve done something, but on the long run they’ll do as much if not more harm than the excruciating measure of a one-month lockdown would - which in turn would also give countries a fighting chance.
People are - at least around here - undisciplined and drunk on their independence, liberty and supposed intellect (because using the internet makes everybody a medical and economic expert, apparently) and don’t really stay home as long as they are only advised to do so. They need to be ordered AND sanctioned if they refuse. (The other day there was news of a couple who climbed over the fence of a closed playground because who are authorities to tell them they can’t do something?) 
As an individual, my two week self-isolation at day 8 is worth basically nothing because others refuse to play their part. The situation will only be worse by the time my two weeks end and I can stay another six because people refuse to make the same sacrifice and the government doesn’t order a mandatory lockdown. 
 

All that is good and well, but what if the outbreak continues after 1 month?

[RhaenysBee]

7 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

All that is good and well, but what if the outbreak continues after 1 month?

In the same place? In my amateur understanding, the objective of a lockdown is to have a chance to filter out the infected while everybody is still, start their recovery process, while preventing further infections because people aren’t in contact. With the estimated two-week incubation period and continuous testing, one month should be enough to see a massive fall in infections and evaluate if another two weeks is needed to ease restrictions. This is something small towns do to successfully contain and end the outbreak, the media tells me. 

[Free Northman Reborn]

7 minutes ago, RhaenysBee said:

In the same place? In my amateur understanding, the objective of a lockdown is to have a chance to filter out the infected while everybody is still, start their recovery process, while preventing further infections because people aren’t in contact. With the estimated two-week incubation period and continuous testing, one month should be enough to see a massive fall in infections and evaluate if another two weeks is needed to ease restrictions. This is something small towns do to successfully contain and end the outbreak, the media tells me. 

If that’s the case then the situation is not nearly as bad. However I have been reading about 6 months of radical measures before normality returns. Hope your scenario is the accurate one, in which case I agree a full shut down makes sense.

[RhaenysBee]

14 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

If that’s the case then the situation is not nearly as bad. However I have been reading about 6 months of radical measures before normality returns. Hope your scenario is the accurate one, in which case I agree a full shut down makes sense.

I think it depends on where you are located. I’m sure in badly hit places one month would not be enough. I truly hope we won’t be under lockdown for half a year. Though if that’s what it takes to survive this, I’m introverted enough to accept the challenge. 

 

[BigFatCoward]

450+ new deaths in spain in 24 hours. 

[LynnS]

On 3/21/2020 at 10:51 AM, Jen'ari said:

I hope she’s ok , mine is very active and healthy but worryingly she did suffer with pneumonia nearly 5 years ago now and had to go to hospital.

I’m going to try to get mostly packaged and frozen stuff for her too, she’s quite a good cook (sadly I didn’t inherit those skills) so eating ready meals won’t be her ideal choice but possibly the only sensible one, particularly as she wants to be around to see her great granddaughters grow up.

Both my parents are gone now, but I have an elderly neighbor who needs help with groceries.  So I shop for both of us now when I go out rather than expose her to risk.  I have been slowly stockpiling for both us which is different from panic buying and hoarding.  If you have to isolate for long periods of time; then you need supplies to do that.  So I pick up a few extra canned or dried goods on each trip.  But you have to do it slowly, in a measured way, over time and mindfully of other people's needs.  Neither of us have a freezer, so I have to make more trips than I'd like.   I will get a small freezer next month from my sister; so I will be able to stock some meat products for both of us and have room for more home-made soups and stuff.

I also have to stock up on drinking water since our water is loaded with calcium and salt, good for washing but not for drinking.   I give water and food items away freely to anyone who needs it in my neighborhood and who are strapped in financial resources until month's end.  Finances are a serious problem now.

Although I am isolating and practicing all the social distancing objectives, including frequent handwashing; I would like to get to a point where I don't have to shop as much right now; which is every three or four days; since store shelves are low on stock.  

There is some relief since Walmart and Independent grocers are hiring more staff and taking measures to limit purchase of some items. As well as implementing exclusive shopping hours for the elderly, disabled and high risk individuals.  They are also sanitizing shopping carts and debit machines before and after each use.  Most pharmacies in the area provided a delivery service.   Most family doctor's are only taking the most needy patients in the office while offering telephone consultations for everyone else.

What I really wish for are face masks and sanitary gloves. 

My brother is a paramedic in his sixties and working 30 hours overtime a week.  I'm afraid for him.

This is a very scary time for all us.  The likes of which we haven't seen for a hundred years.  

[rotting sea cow]

I chatted with a friend who work with viruses (or something related). He believes that due to the testing policies, the number of true cases in European countries should be around 10x higher than reported, with variations among countries depending how pervasive testing is. 

For US he doesn't have an informed guess given how messy and incomplete the reports are. It could be similar or 50x as much. 

He thinks Latin America is not as bad as yet, but things may change quickly.

He thinks once this is over it would be fundamental to test how many actually got infected. 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, rotting sea cow said:

I chatted with a friend who work with viruses (or something related). He believes that due to the testing policies, the number of true cases in European countries should be around 10x higher than reported, with variations among countries depending how pervasive testing is. 

For US he doesn't have an informed guess given how messy and incomplete the reports are. It could be similar or 50x as much. 

He thinks Latin America is not as bad as yet, but things may change quickly.

He thinks once this is over it would be fundamental to test how many actually got infected. 

 

Makes you wonder what's going on in developing countries with high travel rates to infected areas that aren't reporting anything. 

[Fez]

1 hour ago, rotting sea cow said:

For US he doesn't have an informed guess given how messy and incomplete the reports are. It could be similar or 50x as much. 

I doubt it, but I continue to hope that that's absolutely true. If the infection rate is 50x higher than we what we know of, it means the hospitalization and fatality rates are 50x lower than they seem right now.

And I doubt it because that would mean the virus is much less dangerous than the flu. Which would be rather surprising to me, considering just how bad it can get for people who are hospitalized; including otherwise healthy, younger adults.

[A wilding]

It depends how recently those 50x people got infected though. An exponential curve could mean they simply have not yet reached the hospitals yet.

[Jen'ari]

1 hour ago, LynnS said:

Both my parents are gone now, but I have an elderly neighbor who needs help with groceries.  So I shop for both of us now when I go out rather than expose her to risk.  I have been slowly stockpiling for both us which is different from panic buying and hoarding.  If you have to isolate for long periods of time; then you need supplies to do that.  So I pick up a few extra canned or dried goods on each trip.  But you have to do it slowly, in a measured way, over time and mindfully of other people's needs.  Neither of us have a freezer, so I have to make more trips than I'd like.   I will get a small freezer next month from my sister; so I will be able to stock some meat products for both of us and have room for more home-made soups and stuff.

I also have to stock up on drinking water since our water is loaded with calcium and salt, good for washing but not for drinking.   I give water and food items away freely to anyone who needs it in my neighborhood and who are strapped in financial resources until month's end.  Finances are a serious problem now.

Although I am isolating and practicing all the social distancing objectives, including frequent handwashing; I would like to get to a point where I don't have to shop as much right now; which is every three or four days; since store shelves are low on stock.  

There is some relief since Walmart and Independent grocers are hiring more staff and taking measures to limit purchase of some items. As well as implementing exclusive shopping hours for the elderly, disabled and high risk individuals.  They are also sanitizing shopping carts and debit machines before and after each use.  Most pharmacies in the area provided a delivery service.   Most family doctor's are only taking the most needy patients in the office while offering telephone consultations for everyone else.

What I really wish for are face masks and sanitary gloves. 

My brother is a paramedic in his sixties and working 30 hours overtime a week.  I'm afraid for him.

This is a very scary time for all us.  The likes of which we haven't seen for a hundred years.  

I’ve been getting her about a weeks worth of things at once.

I think what you’re doing to help your elderly neighbour and others in your community is really great and I hope you,them and your brother are ok and stay safe .

[Winterfell is Burning]

Brazil's death toll is now at 25, and seems to indicate it will increase exponentially.

Latest polls in Brazil show that only 35% approve Bolsonaro's handling of the pandemic crisis (and is much lower among college educated individuals). For comparison sake, 55 % approve the work of the health minister and 54 % the  governors handling on the situation. While polling in Brazil can be even more unreliable than in places like the US, and even less credible (particularly due to the fact that the Car Wash revealed that not only part of the bribes to the Lula and Dilma Rousseff administrations was paid in the form of paying for campaign polls, and the ones that were unfavourable were buried, among other things), but it seems to reflect the mood of the country right now.

While other countries adopted much more inefficient measures, if at all (see Boris Johnson or Lopez Obrador, for exemple), probably no world leader has shown more erratic behavior than Bolsonaro (the president of the Eurasia group also singled him out as the president who's handling the situation worse), who is clearly not only more worried about the Corona hurting his reelection prospects (and that despite the fact that before taking office, he was a long standing opponent of reelections), but he's deliberately insulting governors and mayors who are taking more effective measures or doing it quickly, or ones that may hurt his base of support (for example, when the governor of São Paulo forbade the mass in churches, he described it as absurd).

What is clearly making him lose his mind more than anything is that the governors that are gaining more attention in how they are handing the situation (and mostly positive press) are the ones from São Paulo, João Dória, and of Rio de Janeiro, Wilson Witzel, and both are center-right, with presidential ambitions, and none of them has a history of saying non-sense like supporting military dictatorships or torture or other non-sense like he does. As I said in the previous thread, the main problem with adopting Trump-like tactics is that Brazil is not a two party system, so conservatives have other options if Bolsonaro begins to crumble. 

Mind you, if we have a repeat of the previous election in 2022 (which is very possible), with Bolsonaro facing another Lula puppet in the 2nd round, he'd sin by a landslide again. The damage he's doing still pales in comparison to the one Lula/Rousseff did, and Lula is too much of an authoritarian egotist to allow the left to rally among someone who doesn't answer to him, let alone someone that rejects and denounces him.

[Fragile Bird]

"sin by a landslide"!

 

[Winterfell is Burning]

41 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

"sin by a landslide"!

 

LMAO! Freudian typo!

[sologdin]

NYT had a quick bit about bolsonaro's death squads in sao paulo.  seems like his priorities are typical of fascism.

[Loge]

2 hours ago, Fez said:

I doubt it, but I continue to hope that that's absolutely true. If the infection rate is 50x higher than we what we know of, it means the hospitalization and fatality rates are 50x lower than they seem right now.

And I doubt it because that would mean the virus is much less dangerous than the flu. Which would be rather surprising to me, considering just how bad it can get for people who are hospitalized; including otherwise healthy, younger adults.

The under-reporting goes both ways. If there are no tests then no deaths from Covid 19 will be reported.

[Tears of Lys]

In entertainment news, Harvey Weinstein, the disgraced former movie kingpin, has tested positive for COVID-19.

(if this has already been noted, sorry.)