For WHOm the Bell Tolls - Covid-19 #11

[Zorral]

5 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Ah, here we go - here's that map I mentioned.

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/nyc-map-shows-neighborhoods-hit-hardest-coronavirus/story?id=69918823

"Some of the hardest-hit neighborhoods include Elmhurst and Kew Gardens Hills in Queens, the South Bronx, and East New York in Brooklyn."

That is emphatically NOT about subway ridership. 

You're an idiot yet again. THOSE ARE MASS TRANSIT RIDERS NOW. These are the people who cannot shelter in place but have to go out to work to deliver your over the internet food and other orders, these are the people who stock, clean and check you out in the supermarkets drug stores and everywhere else, these are the people who are working on the front lines of elderly nursing homes, in the hospitals, driving the buses and the subways, who are working in the overwhelmed morgues, who carry out the dead people.

Ya, the people that people like you NEVER EVEN SEE or think about.

HOW THE EFF DO YOU LIVE THAT YOU CAN'T EVEN FIGURE OUT SOMETHING SO OBVIOUS SO SIMPLE

[Fragile Bird]

22 minutes ago, Triskele said:

  Wish I knew more about pharmacology (I know virtually nothing), but how wild would it be if a drug developed for Ebola that didn't work for it just happened to be more effective against Disease X which  is now COVID-19?  Maybe just maybe that's going to be the case (but we should all hold off for the huge NIH trial results to come in).  

Like a drug for hypertension just happened to be more effective for erectile dysfunction?

[The Anti-Targ]

7 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Perhaps, but they're also testing at higher rates compared to other places. I still remain in the camp that places all over the country, and the world. are vastly under-reporting. I keep going back to the places I've traveled to in the developing world and wonder how their numbers are not exploding. 

 

I countries where infection has been present for a decent length of time then number of deaths is more likely to be a better indicator of infection rate than confirmed cases. Where the general state of health and quality of healthcare system are roughly the same between countries then you expect case fatality rate to be about the same. I'm assuming a CFR of 1% - 0.5%. So I multiply deaths by 100 and 200 and I assume the true prevalence in a country is somewhere between those numbers. So for USA right now, I think the true prevalence of infection is between 3.7 and 7.4 million. For the UK 1.4-2.8M (though likely somewhat higher because officially reported deaths, I hear, are only hospital deaths so dying t home and in retirement villages isn't counted?). For Germany 400K-800K. For Australia 6.5K (which is almost exactly the current confirmed cases) - 13K. For New Zealand 1100-2200 (current confirmed cases = 1409). China 460K-920K.

The issue with that is deaths usually happen weeks after infection, so the death rate today reflects the prevalence of infection maybe a couple of weeks ago, which makes using death rate not a very useful estimate of prevalence early in a country's epidemic.

[Larry of the Lawn]

23 minutes ago, Zorral said:

You're an idiot yet again. THOSE ARE MASS TRANSIT RIDERS NOW. These are the people who cannot shelter in place but have to go out to work to deliver your over the internet food and other orders, these are the people who stock, clean and check you out in the supermarkets drug stores and everywhere else, these are the people who are working on the front lines of elderly nursing homes, in the hospitals, driving the buses and the subways, who are working in the overwhelmed morgues, who carry out the dead people.

Ya, the people that people like you NEVER EVEN SEE or think about.

HOW THE EFF DO YOU LIVE THAT YOU CAN'T EVEN FIGURE OUT SOMETHING SO OBVIOUS SO SIMPLE

Huh?  Didn't Kal say they were mostly essential workers?  Come on dude

[Bonnot OG]

republicans are going to kill a lot of people. Jesus Christ 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8231321/Texas-state-reopen-WEEK.html?ito=social-facebook&fbclid=IwAR3AO_EzvIVOWBIslFS2uZlR-Jt8PprGQbOhQcO9WbnTGvgaUsfia8PUFFI&fbclid=IwAR2AcE-K3NU5U_-WD5kltprKCdL4z1M3JMY4JN8h_4yB7ygLjWKrKoFI13E&fbclid=IwAR3GCYjr3DhDDiRIGViRWZY3TXc6qFnBOukkNrtoemQ-Uk_cf0xB4R8wMrk&fbclid=IwAR1xZJ4wYuuUKsT8eZ_VwxPAEwBp0CNiWDjNjCjKxrZ6viUMK9HJHH1XnYA&fbclid=IwAR2f4NgGq5LCnWUIdHKsfiiK6E6t2fedGwvRFjO1Ekgy1Y_EpQs7JKxfF4o&fbclid=IwAR2rJXjwhM-mH7pLBBMOBKF_CnM7smwM-IVrVyxN6b1NYSq6N_P7vADjw9Y&fbclid=IwAR0ZtRT4hR3xYk0zjWNBnfI2qBVhUOEjIdFazQ0RK3QRBJ7OOVaVS0v3luA

[Kalbear]

23 minutes ago, Zorral said:

You're an idiot yet again. THOSE ARE MASS TRANSIT RIDERS NOW. These are the people who cannot shelter in place but have to go out to work to deliver your over the internet food and other orders, these are the people who stock, clean and check you out in the supermarkets drug stores and everywhere else, these are the people who are working on the front lines of elderly nursing homes, in the hospitals, driving the buses and the subways, who are working in the overwhelmed morgues, who carry out the dead people.

Ya, the people that people like you NEVER EVEN SEE or think about.

HOW THE EFF DO YOU LIVE THAT YOU CAN'T EVEN FIGURE OUT SOMETHING SO OBVIOUS SO SIMPLE

Boy oh boy did you miss the point. Or even any of the followups. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

35 minutes ago, Bonnot OG said:

republicans are going to kill a lot of people. Jesus Christ 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8231321/Texas-state-reopen-WEEK.html?ito=social-facebook&fbclid=IwAR3AO_EzvIVOWBIslFS2uZlR-Jt8PprGQbOhQcO9WbnTGvgaUsfia8PUFFI&fbclid=IwAR2AcE-K3NU5U_-WD5kltprKCdL4z1M3JMY4JN8h_4yB7ygLjWKrKoFI13E&fbclid=IwAR3GCYjr3DhDDiRIGViRWZY3TXc6qFnBOukkNrtoemQ-Uk_cf0xB4R8wMrk&fbclid=IwAR1xZJ4wYuuUKsT8eZ_VwxPAEwBp0CNiWDjNjCjKxrZ6viUMK9HJHH1XnYA&fbclid=IwAR2f4NgGq5LCnWUIdHKsfiiK6E6t2fedGwvRFjO1Ekgy1Y_EpQs7JKxfF4o&fbclid=IwAR2rJXjwhM-mH7pLBBMOBKF_CnM7smwM-IVrVyxN6b1NYSq6N_P7vADjw9Y&fbclid=IwAR0ZtRT4hR3xYk0zjWNBnfI2qBVhUOEjIdFazQ0RK3QRBJ7OOVaVS0v3luA

On an extension of that, and some broader operating principles, and history, we should really ditch the "e pluribus unum" for "and you will know us by the trail of dead" on our currency.

[Bonnot OG]

 

[Spockydog]

1 hour ago, Triskele said:

I'll see you your viagra and raise you a minoxidil.  

Does that stuff work?

[Spockydog]

4 minutes ago, Triskele said:

which of the two?  

funny thing is that they were both discovered by accident in blood pressure research.   

The latter. Wiki says it's a cure for MPB. I thought there was no such thing. Seems there something to this stuff. Huh.

[Tywin et al.]

1 hour ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I countries where infection has been present for a decent length of time then number of deaths is more likely to be a better indicator of infection rate than confirmed cases. Where the general state of health and quality of healthcare system are roughly the same between countries then you expect case fatality rate to be about the same. I'm assuming a CFR of 1% - 0.5%. So I multiply deaths by 100 and 200 and I assume the true prevalence in a country is somewhere between those numbers. So for USA right now, I think the true prevalence of infection is between 3.7 and 7.4 million. For the UK 1.4-2.8M (though likely somewhat higher because officially reported deaths, I hear, are only hospital deaths so dying t home and in retirement villages isn't counted?). For Germany 400K-800K. For Australia 6.5K (which is almost exactly the current confirmed cases) - 13K. For New Zealand 1100-2200 (current confirmed cases = 1409). China 460K-920K.

The issue with that is deaths usually happen weeks after infection, so the death rate today reflects the prevalence of infection maybe a couple of weeks ago, which makes using death rate not a very useful estimate of prevalence early in a country's epidemic.

I'm not going to tell you your numbers are wrong, because I really have no clue. But I also think what's being reported is largely unreliable, and I've yet to see anything that suggests widespread reports are reliable, country to country. 

But hey, if you think differently, please don't try and cough too much as you adjust your mask before you squeeze that lime I may like to purchase.......

[Spockydog]

4 minutes ago, Triskele said:

Minox at best slows the process, and never touch finasteride unless you want an accidental chemical castration.  

Eek.

Luckily, I've been perfectly happy rocking the Jason Statham look for the past decade.

[BigFatCoward]

10 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

The latter. Wiki says it's a cure for MPB. I thought there was no such thing. Seems there something to this stuff. Huh.

Male Penis Boredom?

[Spockydog]

1 minute ago, BigFatCoward said:

Male Penis Boredom?

That is actually very funny. Laughed out loud.

Definitely no such thing.

[Raja]

5 hours ago, williamjm said:

It's always difficult to know whether to pay any attention to this sort of unofficial report, but it sounds like the official results should be coming in later this month, hopefully they'll show some improvement.

I don't know whether to laugh or to cry - from the article

Quote

The lack of a control arm in the study could make interpreting the results more challenging. 

In addition, more here

There's a federal trial going on atm - I'd wait for that. I'm very skeptical of the one being carried out by the pharma company.

[mcbigski]

10 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Ah, here we go - here's that map I mentioned.

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/nyc-map-shows-neighborhoods-hit-hardest-coronavirus/story?id=69918823

"Some of the hardest-hit neighborhoods include Elmhurst and Kew Gardens Hills in Queens, the South Bronx, and East New York in Brooklyn."

That is emphatically NOT about subway ridership. 

IDK the further you are from Manhattan in the denser areas, it looks worst.  NE towards Long Island not as much but closer to East Egg is probably still higher rent and less mass transit.

7 hours ago, Paxter said:

The effect of some of the Euro lockdown is interesting. They seem to have done a great job at moving from rapid growth to stabilization, but nothing is really happening beyond stabilization. Italy's 7-day rolling average of daily fatalities is pretty much flat for the past two weeks. 

I'd still call that (qualified) success, but it's obviously not what we saw in China, with fatalities falling sharply around 30-40 days after the general outbreak. 

Personally wouldnt trust CCP numbers.  Hopefully not but YMMV.

6 hours ago, Werthead said:

The WHO is concerned about the antibody levels in people who've had the virus, which are not universally, conclusively high enough to suggest that building herd immunity is even possible.

Still early days but that is a concerning conclusion.

At this point, I would give zero weight to WHO except where they might deviate from the party line.  Even then I'd be skeptical though.  Were they right about anything ahead of the curve?

4 hours ago, Triskele said:

I'll see you your viagra and raise you a minoxidil.  

I'm not even sure what you mean.  I get that I'm blessed to be 6 5 and have all my hair in my late 40s.  And my great grandpa built the railroad because his tool sufficed.

[Reny of Storms End]

1 hour ago, mcbigski said:

And my great grandpa built the railroad because his tool sufficed.

Just the one? 

[Heartofice]

Swedish epidemiologist discussing the Swedish strategy and how the UK did a massive 180. 
 

Interesting to hear it, although Swedish numbers are not great at the moment either. Having said that, I think his defence would be that Sweden is just hitting their numbers early and as long as hospital capacity isn’t being exceeded then it’s acceptable.

[Isis]

4 hours ago, mcbigski said:

At this point, I would give zero weight to WHO except where they might deviate from the party line.  Even then I'd be skeptical though.  Were they right about anything ahead of the curve?

Lol ok

[Ran]

53 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Swedish epidemiologist discussing the Swedish strategy and how the UK did a massive 180. 
 

Interesting to hear it, although Swedish numbers are not great at the moment either. Having said that, I think his defence would be that Sweden is just hitting their numbers early and as long as hospital capacity isn’t being exceeded then it’s acceptable.

Giesecke is very Swedish  -- quite phlegmatic.

I think his guess of 50% in Stockholm is unlikely right now, but not impossible (it certainly could be the case if his estimate that it's at flu levels -- ~.1 IFR -- is correct). For example, interesting result from our sentinel tracking of COVID-19 this week -- last week 35% of samples from Stockholm were positive on PCR testing, this week 14%. Sample sizes are relatively small (a couple hundred each week) but it would correlate to the fact that ICU admission has been steady for the last 3 weeks and deaths appear to be on a decline after a peak on April 8th. OTOH, my region went from 4% last week to 33% this week, and as I've noted elsewhere our next door neighbors have been in isolation the last two weeks because they almost certainly have it (they're youngish and on the mend, and their 3 year old is 100% fine other than being extremely bored).

The IHME model revised yet again and other than some weirdness regarding its claims of ICU beds (we have over 1,000, not 79!), it now estimates ~6,000 deaths by August 4th provided we make no changes to our level of distancing. I don't know if that's accurate or not, but IMO 6,000  deaths for an entirely novel SARS without effective anti-virals or vaccines -- when a bad flu season can kill ~3000 -- would be an amazingly good result. We'l see if it holds out. The main focus in Sweden still is trying to figure out how to keep these out of nursing homes. As I said, we're not the only ones with the issue (over 60% of confirmed deaths in Norway are from a few homes, and Finland just came out and said they've got at last 45 deaths at homes that are probably covid-19), but obviously our approach and our structure makes it even more difficult and imperative.