Covid-19 #16: Not Waving, Loop-de-Looping

[Fragile Bird]

3 hours ago, rotting sea cow said:

With all these outbreaks being reported at slaughterhouses, I wouldn't be so sure. Argentinians cannot live without their beef.

Also, didn't the chinese reported the virus being present in imported food at the Beijing's market?

The Chinese claimed that Canadian seafood caused the outbreak in Beijing, salmon, iirc. Frankly, I suspect that was bullshit. China has demanded that all seafood imported from Canada be certified Covid-19 free and guaranteed by the exporter. 
 

Of course, Canada has a senior executive from Huawei under house arrest in British Columbia, waiting for her extradition trial requested by the US. Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei, is a bargaining chip in US trade talks, according to the Chinese. In the meantime, shortly after her detention more than a year ago, China arrested two Canadians, have charged them with espionage, and have had them in solitary confinement with no access to consular officials or lawyers.
 

So sure, don’t eat that Canadian salmon or lobster, it’s gonna give you Covid-19.

[maarsen]

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

But we're going to open schools:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/29546814/sources-marlins-cancel-game-virus-spreads

The director of our department confidently said everything would be reopened by April 12th (same day Donnie Dipshit said everything would be fine). I haven't been in the office since around that exact time.

I told our bosses they should have sent everyone home weeks before they did. Why do we sustain systems that support the promotion of idiots? 

I have been in the labour force for almost 50 years. With that experience I can tell you that idiots will work for less than the competent. Hiring idiots lowers labour costs. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

If anything ever convinces people that America isn't a "meritocracy", it should be this. I'm not holding my breath though.

I always point to a lawsuit from years ago. The most qualified candidate was not offered a job. He sued, and on discovery, they found that not only were they trying to find the most average candidates to hire for the position, that it was a nation wide practice. The job: police officer. The judge ruled in favor of the police.
 

 

[Fragile Bird]

5 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I always point to a lawsuit from years ago. The most qualified candidate was not offered a job. He sued, and on discovery, they found that not only were they trying to find the most average candidates to hire for the position, that it was a nation wide practice. The job: police officer. The judge ruled in favor of the police.
 

 

Yes, I understand that the thinking behind that is that competent people will get bored and leave the police force and will get angry at the way things are done. "You'll just be unhappy here".

[Fragile Bird]

This link has a decent graph in it that shows cases per 100,000 population. Other charts get distorted by the large jump in raw case numbers.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/covid-19-curves-compare-canada-and-other-key-nations-1.4881500

The countries can be changed, of course, to whatever you want.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

26 minutes ago, maarsen said:

I have been in the labour force for almost 50 years. With that experience I can tell you that idiots will work for less than the competent. Hiring idiots lowers labour costs. 

I disagree. It's not about pay. It's about reducing the possibility that your subordinate will one day be your supervisor. Promote the dumbass that can't climb the ladder faster than you.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

14 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Yes, I understand that the thinking behind that is that competent people will get bored and leave the police force and will get angry at the way things are done. "You'll just be unhappy here".

So why not fix it? This is a self-defeating policy and state of mind, and anyone who is perpetuating it should be shit-canned immediately. We can do better. 

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

I always point to a lawsuit from years ago. The most qualified candidate was not offered a job. He sued, and on discovery, they found that not only were they trying to find the most average candidates to hire for the position, that it was a nation wide practice. The job: police officer. The judge ruled in favor of the police.
 

 

Yep, I remember that case well; and apropos choice of musical accompaniment.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

So why not fix it? This is a self-defeating policy and state of mind, and anyone who is perpetuating it should be shit-canned immediately. We can do better. 

The thing that never makes sense to me is that sounds like just the kind of thinking in which incompetent people engage; but I can speak from experience that it just doesn't work that way.

For years I thought I was way overqualified for the job I had, and I hated it, but because of kids couldn't just strike out on my own. Right up until I switched companies to one that was actually willing to listen to all the ideas I'd come up with over the years to increase efficiency while also offering a better product, instead of telling me to stay in my lane because they thought they had it figured out the best possible way to figure.

That's not to say there aren't other growing pangs (and the pandemic really put us behind on the timetable I'd drawn up for us to realistically be able to compete with my former company), but I'm so much happier here where I've been given the chance to actually try to innovate. And I don't see why policing, or any industry really, is any less amenable to innovation than any other. To think otherwise is just a lack of imagination.

[rotting sea cow]

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Highly highly unlikely. A 37 day incubator is more likely, or there was a false negative test.

The first. The sailors were tested before embarking. In the second case the outbreak should have started much earlier.

 

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

There has been no case of COVID-19 traced to food. It is true that viruses survive in freezing conditions reasonably well, but they don't survive for long at all on food surfaces. Food packaging however is a slightly different matter. Food safety is my professional wheelhouse. There has been enough work done in this area for me to be confident that food isn't an issue. SARS-COV-2 can survive long enough on food packaging that it's a small but non-negligible risk. If people are in supermarkets and cough, sneezing or even breathing on packaging then spread that way is possible. If you are in an area with a reasonable number of ongoing cases and poor mask wearing then sanitising your food packaging when you get home from the supermarket is not a bad idea.

What about on the surfaces of packaged meat? I believe you, but consider that the meat industry in Argentina is huge and the conditions worse than those in developed countries. Calves are hastily slaughtered and the meat quickly processed to be sent overseas in frozen and vacuum sealed packages. I don't think there are taking lots of precautions. I'm going to ask around to see what people think about it.

Argentinian meat is otherwise excellent

 

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

And in a cooking situation it's not likely that a cook is going to be handling raw food then picking their nose.

We are talking about a ship, a fishing trawler, with likely unclean and cramped conditions. Not an hotel or a restaurant. Maybe there was not even a cook. In Argentina, for example, construction workers take turns to make asados (BBQs) for lunch every day.

 

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

It's a wee bit worrying that a 19 day incubation was observed in just 5 cases. But maybe they were targeting instances of unusual case patters not just picking 5 random infected people.

Well, which other possibilities we have? A very long incubation time (25 days at minimum assuming one of the sailors violated quarantine) or food contamination that endured for more than a month. Both options are unlikely. I tend to think the first has better chances. But again, it would be a kind of lottery ticket that it happened exactly on a ship out at sea, unless it's more common than we think, which would be worrisome.

 

 

 

[rotting sea cow]

2 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

The Chinese claimed that Canadian seafood caused the outbreak in Beijing, salmon, iirc. Frankly, I suspect that was bullshit. China has demanded that all seafood imported from Canada be certified Covid-19 free and guaranteed by the exporter. 
 

Of course, Canada has a senior executive from Huawei under house arrest in British Columbia, waiting for her extradition trial requested by the US. Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei, is a bargaining chip in US trade talks, according to the Chinese. In the meantime, shortly after her detention more than a year ago, China arrested two Canadians, have charged them with espionage, and have had them in solitary confinement with no access to consular officials or lawyers.
 

So sure, don’t eat that Canadian salmon or lobster, it’s gonna give you Covid-19.

To be fair, the cancelled seafood imports from other countries too. Besides Canada they did the same to Norway, Peru and Chile (AFAIK). They claim the outbreak at that marked had the famous D614G variant which was so far unseen in China. Although I agree that an incoming traveller is a more likely source. 

[Fragile Bird]

Some good news on the American front - major retailers are already announcing their stores will be closed over the Thanksgiving holiday, instead of opening for Black Friday. Target, Walmart and others. ‘This is not the time for huge crowds looking for bargains’.

[Zorral]

The horror that is tourists from the USA; the colonial mindset stripped bare for all to see, but who cares as We are WE.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/deluded-anti-mask-tourists-swarm-covid-plagued-puerto-rico?

Quote

 

On Saturday, a caravan protest organized by Puerto Rico’s Socialist Workers Movement aimed to shut down the San Juan airport as a statement against ongoing tourism and the capitalist colonialism the group says is putting people in Puerto Rico at risk. One of the group’s leaders was arrested by Puerto Rico police.

Because the island is a territory of the United States, Puerto Rico cannot formally shut down or limit flights at the Luis Muñoz Marín Airport on its own accord. Only the Federal Aviation Administration can make that call—another reminder to locals of the bind they find themselves in during a global health crisis

 

 

[Zorral]

Just saw this, concerning the study that identifies 6 clusters of Covid-19 symptoms:

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.06.12.20129056v1

Quote

Abstract
As no one symptom can predict disease severity or the need for dedicated medical support in COVID-19, we asked if documenting symptom time series over the first few days informs outcome. Unsupervised time series clustering over symptom presentation was performed on data collected from a training dataset of completed cases enlisted early from the COVID Symptom Study Smartphone application, yielding six distinct symptom presentations. Clustering was validated on an independent replication dataset between May 1- May 28th, 2020. Using the first 5 days of symptom logging, the ROC-AUC of need for respiratory support was 78.8%, substantially outperforming personal characteristics alone (ROC-AUC 69.5%). Such an approach could be used to monitor at-risk patients and predict medical resource requirements days before they are required.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Well I just got the email that all furloughed employee insurance ends in a couple days, and surprise, you're getting billed for everything (code speak, we're not going back to work). Pretty much called this. 

[The Anti-Targ]

On 7/28/2020 at 6:52 AM, rotting sea cow said:

The first. The sailors were tested before embarking. In the second case the outbreak should have started much earlier.

 

What about on the surfaces of packaged meat? I believe you, but consider that the meat industry in Argentina is huge and the conditions worse than those in developed countries. Calves are hastily slaughtered and the meat quickly processed to be sent overseas in frozen and vacuum sealed packages. I don't think there are taking lots of precautions. I'm going to ask around to see what people think about it.

Argentinian meat is otherwise excellent

 

We are talking about a ship, a fishing trawler, with likely unclean and cramped conditions. Not an hotel or a restaurant. Maybe there was not even a cook. In Argentina, for example, construction workers take turns to make asados (BBQs) for lunch every day.

 

Well, which other possibilities we have? A very long incubation time (25 days at minimum assuming one of the sailors violated quarantine) or food contamination that endured for more than a month. Both options are unlikely. I tend to think the first has better chances. But again, it would be a kind of lottery ticket that it happened exactly on a ship out at sea, unless it's more common than we think, which would be worrisome.

 

 

 

Yes, On food packaging is possible, but crew will be bringing on many fomites with them that can be equally or more risky. Any item that's not fabric can have viable virus for 12+ hours.

The thing about vaccuum sealing meat is that in the act of vaccuum sealing you are going to remove virus. So a contamination event would have to happen between exiting the vacuum sealer and putting the package into the carton for freezing. There is a window there, but all upstream contamination of the packaging will be neutralised in the vaccuum sealer.

 

[Fez]

New study finding last heart damage due to COVID-19, and not just among those hospitalized. From the abstract:

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2768916

Quote

 

Findings:  In this cohort study including 100 patients recently recovered from COVID-19 identified from a COVID-19 test center, cardiac magnetic resonance imaging revealed cardiac involvement in 78 patients (78%) and ongoing myocardial inflammation in 60 patients (60%), which was independent of preexisting conditions, severity and overall course of the acute illness, and the time from the original diagnosis

ResultsL  Of the 100 included patients, 53 (53%) were male, and the median (interquartile range [IQR]) age was 49 (45-53) years. The median (IQR) time interval between COVID-19 diagnosis and CMR was 71 (64-92) days. Of the 100 patients recently recovered from COVID-19, 67 (67%) recovered at home, while 33 (33%) required hospitalization.

 

It's a small sample size to be sure, but yet another piece of evidence to add to the argument for why letting the virus run free is such a terrible decision.

 

[Fragile Bird]

Is there a website that does a breakdown of how many deaths have been linked to nursing home/long term care facilities in the US? I keep seeing numbers by color/ethnic group, and some board members have commented that deaths are high at care facilities in their state. Minnesota, I think, has had 80% of their deaths in nursing homes.

I just wondered because I was looking at the deaths in Ontario, 2,769, a number I have a high level of confidence in, and the deaths associated with care facilities is 1,844, about 67%. At one point it was beween 75% and 80%, and then everyone was tested and the military moved in to the worst-hit homes.

That led me to look at deaths in US states. 16 US states have more deaths than Ontario, but only 4 have larger populations. I wonder if a similar testing blitz on nursing homes to isolate cases among residents and workers could drop the death rate. Or are the deaths mainly outside of those facilities?

And another question - does anyone else have any doubts about the US case numbers? There's a post being shared on Facebook that suggests the case numbers started to drop once the WH took the CDC out of the reporting loop and ordered hospitals to send their numbers straight to HHS. I admit that I shared the post as well, but is it fair? How would we know otherwise?

[Ormond]

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

Is there a website that does a breakdown of how many deaths have been linked to nursing home/long term care facilities in the US? I keep seeing numbers by color/ethnic group, and some board members have commented that deaths are high at care facilities in their state. Minnesota, I think, has had 80% of their deaths in nursing homes.

 

Back around June 11 just about half of Nebraska's Covid deaths were related to such facilities but so far I haven't bee able to find more recent data:

http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1223328/half-nebraskas-covid-deaths-are-long-term-care-facilities-spread-slowing

[Fragile Bird]

1 minute ago, Ormond said:

Back around June 11 just about half of Nebraska's Covid deaths were related to such facilities but so far I haven't bee able to find more recent data:

http://netnebraska.org/article/news/1223328/half-nebraskas-covid-deaths-are-long-term-care-facilities-spread-slowing

I think the number across Canada is about 80%, though as the pandemic continues that percentage could go down. The numbers were driven by LTC homes in Quebec being hit hard. Even in little Nova Scotia where there have been only 64 deaths, 53 deaths were in one nursing home alone. 80% is almost twice the rate in the 16 countries in the OECD.

That article that mentions the OECD says the rate in the US is a mere 31%, lower than I expected. It also means that focusing on nursing homes won't help much. Oh well, it was an idea.

Link to the article:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/coronavirus-canada-long-term-care-deaths-study-1.5626751