Coronavirus

[TrickstaPriest]

2 hours ago, csyphrett said:

My mechanic told me that talk radio is stating that California is reporting every death as Corvid related. I'm thinking two things. Quit listening to talk radio because it's a bunch of scammers who know better. State governments are lazy, but not that lazy.

 

I'm sure anyone on the pol thread has heard my rants on that topic before.  Yeah, talk radio is outright malicious now.  (edit: I don't have to mention a political body and I don't want this to be a point of discussion - I am saying I don't treat the bodies' as equal or equivalent, but I treat each radio host on a case by case basis of 'bad score')
 

 

1 hour ago, Michael Hopcroft said:

IIRC, the current COVID-19 death count includes only those that can be verified by available means -- usually people that died in the hospital. Of the many more people who died at home, how many of their deaths were caused by the virus with very few people knowing it? And what happens if (and I hope this doesn't happen) someone dies by suicide after developing COVID-19 symptoms? Do those count as COVID-19 deaths?

 

I wholly expect there are a lot more covid deaths in cities where people died in their home and were uncounted than there were 'miscounted' covid deaths.  New York was the primary example, where the amount of counted deaths shot up almost 30% so far once they incorporated the home-deaths.  Compared to that, I expect most 'accidental' counts are pittance.

 

Philosophically, if someone dies in a car accident because their hospital was packed due to COVID, does that count as a COVID death?

 

There is an actual answer.  Mostly, 'yes'.  If you are counting covid deaths for the purposes of determining the loss of life due to covid being controlled (or uncontrolled), the shutdown of essential services like hospitals can be assumed to be part of the cost.  You can argue it does not affect the lethality-rate, but the aftereffects of covid and the cost to society are worth considering when you are having these conversations of "is it worth it". 

 

In short.  The 'killing rate' in a vacuum doesn't let you make informed decisions.

 

But if the argument is should they be included/discluded from the reported lethality rate, the argument is liable to be academic.  The only high rate of deaths that could move the needle on the covid fatality rate are sudden events from heart disease or car accidents.

[Ragitsu]

2 hours ago, csyphrett said:

My mechanic told me that talk radio is stating that California is reporting every death as Corvid related.

 

I've always known to keep clear of those feathered bastards.

 

 

[Old Man]

Coronavirus deaths are known to be undercounted.  Overall death rates in New York, Italy, and elsewhere have jumped 25-30%, and bodies are not tested for coronavirus.

 

Coronavirus cases are also known to be undercounted, especially in countries where incompetence or malfeasance have inhibited testing--America, Brazil, Iran, and so forth.  Even people with obvious coronavirus symptoms are not tested in some cases.

 

Some governments are also thought to be deliberately underreporting cases for political reasons.

 

IOW we're never going to know with sufficient accuracy what the fatality count is.  Many families will never know exactly what their loved ones died of.

[TrickstaPriest]

Just now, Old Man said:

Coronavirus cases are also known to be undercounted, especially in countries where incompetence or malfeasance have inhibited testing--America, Brazil, Iran, and so forth.  Even people with obvious coronavirus symptoms are not tested in some cases.

 

Politics, the great enemy of getting anything done.

 

It's unfortunate how much science and scientific analysis is affected by this.  It's why keeping the actual scientific method and review process reliable is so important.

 

Consider the damage that may have been avoided if the 1960s study inspecting heart problems hadn't been bribed to avoid sugar and to blame fat instead?  How many have died or had terrible health because of decisions made based on that?

[Old Man]

[Old Man]

[Cygnia]

[ScottishFox]

17 hours ago, Old Man said:

 

I'm sure it was written that way to prevent people from looking at a chart and cherry picking data to support their own agenda.  Given that 14 days is the incubation time, if you still have any net case increases, then you still have community spread.  And if you still have community spread, the virus cannot be controlled with contact tracing.  The only other way to get a handle on the spread is with mass testing, which the administration has totally failed at.

 

Or we can cross our fingers and hope that remdesivir or some other treatment turns out to be a silver bullet, but that is some Obama-level irrational hope.

 

A trend line is just math.  And given that numbers frequently spike upward or downward due to delays in reporting it's probably the best way to do this.

 

Imagine this scenario:

14-Day Trend:   8000, 7000, 5000, 3000, 2500, 2000, 1500, 1000, 750, 500, 250, 125, 70, 73  - Oops, can't reopen the economy!  The trend is obviously a massive decline in cases.

 

The trend in Texas for the last two weeks is *barely* down.  It's probably going to get spiked by the re-opening.  We'll see.

 

Not sure if you've seen the video from the Kern County ER doctors in LA, but it's interesting.  I had to go find it on Vimeo because after 5 million plus views on YouTube they decided to ban it.

Although some of their points were a bit out there the guys did make a couple of good ones like:

* Many doctors and nurses are getting laid off due to lack of work which is exactly what you don't want to do before people come back out of their homes and start getting sick.

[death tribble]

Captain Tom celebrates his 100th birthday. The Queen and the PM have sent him messages, he had an RAF flypast of vintage planes and he was made an honorary colonel in his old regiment. He has raised £31 million for charity

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-52472132

[ScottishFox]

Looks like the opinion of the medical community is shifting on COVID.

 

https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/494034-the-data-are-in-stop-the-panic-and-end-the-total-isolation?amp

 

That article makes great points.  Some of them were eye-poppers.

 

Even the Wall Street Journal had an article on how the lock downs are having a small effect in terms of lives saved

https://www.wsj.com/articles/do-lockdowns-save-many-lives-is-most-places-the-data-say-no-11587930911 (annoying paywall).

 

[pinecone]

41 minutes ago, ScottishFox said:

Looks like the opinion of the medical community is shifting on COVID.

 

https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/494034-the-data-are-in-stop-the-panic-and-end-the-total-isolation?amp

 

That article makes great points.  Some of them were eye-poppers.

 

Even the Wall Street Journal had an article on how the lock downs are having a small effect in terms of lives saved

https://www.wsj.com/articles/do-lockdowns-save-many-lives-is-most-places-the-data-say-no-11587930911 (annoying paywall).

 

I usually agree with you but, that first article is just statisticial flim flam. "confirmed cases" is a nonsense item when testing is so poorly implemented. I don'y know what answers are found in the data, because the data is garbage. Italy's numbers seem to be "chery picked" to reach a concusion that was prefered, rather than being an 'honest" overview of the data. Overall...hooey..:)

[ScottishFox]

27 minutes ago, pinecone said:

I usually agree with you but, that first article is just statisticial flim flam. "confirmed cases" is a nonsense item when testing is so poorly implemented. I don'y know what answers are found in the data, because the data is garbage. Italy's numbers seem to be "chery picked" to reach a concusion that was prefered, rather than being an 'honest" overview of the data. Overall...hooey..:)

 

My perspective could be a bit skewed as I spent an hour watching the Kern County doctors go over their numbers and basically conclude that everyone should go back to work.  Throw away the masks and build up your immune system style.

They looked at multiple community tests like the ones in New York, California and elsewhere that show that 10-20% of the public has already had COVID-19.

 

They crunch a bunch of numbers and come out along the lines that Coronavirus is going to be about as lethal as a bad influenza season and that while the initial shutdown was VERY MUCH JUSTIFIED due to the lack of solid data early on that the data at this point suggests that shutdowns are not having a significant effect compared to places that are not shutting down (Sweden, South Dakota, etc.).  They mention very large tragic spikes upward in child abuse, domestic abuse, suicide, etc., being caused by people being forced home.

 

They mention some immunologically silly things that have been decided like:  I can't go in a salon and have my hair cut by one person, but I can stand in line at CostCo with 200+ people for 45 minutes after shopping with the hoard.

 

So going into the article with that as my warm up video it made a lot of sense to me.  I just re-read it based on your feedback and...  it's good stuff, imo.

 

Remember the point of the shut down was to avoid flooding hospitals.  Made sense - critical factor in survival rate.

 

Chart below from California HHS.

 

 

 

 

 

[Old Man]

Sounds like some YouTube video went viral over the past few hours.  Fortunately thirty seconds of googling helps to clear up any doubts about it.

Doctors' viral video rebuked by health officials; YouTube ...

centraloregondaily.com › doctors-viral-video-rebuked-...

 

Two Bakersfield doctors' viral, dubious COVID test claims ...

calmatters.org › health › 2020/04 › debunking-bakersfi...

 

YouTube issues statement on removal of controversial video ...

www.turnto23.com › news › coronavirus › video-inter...

 

Though Widely Discredited, Bakersfield Doctors' COVID-19 ...

www.kqed.org › news › bakersfield-doctors-dubious-c...

 

Medical Community Refutes Bakersfield Doctors' Attempts to ...

www.truthorfiction.com › Reporting › Disinformation

 

How Science Denial Works: 2 Case Studies - Climate Crocks

climatecrocks.com › 2020/04/29 › how-science-denial-...

 

Lastly,

 

A detailed breakdown of the Kern County doctors' statistical errors (Twitter)

Moreover the (Kern doctors') estimate does not pass even a basic plausibility check. In New York City, 12,067 people are known to have died from the virus, out of a population of 8.4 million. This is a rate of 0.14% of all people. Not just infected people. All people.

[Pattern Ghost]

The doctors in question work for Accelerated Urgent Care . . . I think I'll stick with the recommendations of immunologists and infectious control specialists.

[Old Man]

As for other conservabubble-sourced stories, I note the same tired pattern of skewed facts.  Sure, maybe 99% of people will survive a COVID-19 infection, but 1% is still 3.5 million dead.  Sure, many of those fatalities will be the elderly, as if they weren't still people.  Sure, after sacrificing those 3.5 million people there might be herd immunity, except herd immunity is not a thing if, like other coronaviruses, immunity only lasts 18 months.

 

California HHS data shows that with the lockdown, hospital bed occupancy has remained constant.  This is good, because it means the hospital system there hasn't been overwhelmed.  It's also bad, because it's not dropping either--it's a constant.  That means that the lockdown is only barely keeping a lid on the pandemic.

[Old Man]

 

Spoiled for language:

[Ragitsu]

38 minutes ago, Old Man said:

As for other conservabubble-sourced stories, I note the same tired pattern of skewed facts.  Sure, maybe 99% of people will survive a COVID-19 infection, but 1% is still 3.5 million dead.  Sure, many of those fatalities will be the elderly, as if they weren't still people.  Sure, after sacrificing those 3.5 million people there might be herd immunity, except herd immunity is not a thing if, like other coronaviruses, immunity only lasts 18 months.

 

California HHS data shows that with the lockdown, hospital bed occupancy has remained constant.  This is good, because it means the hospital system there hasn't been overwhelmed.  It's also bad, because it's not dropping either--it's a constant.  That means that the lockdown is only barely keeping a lid on the pandemic.

 

Of course, "survive" does not always mean "get off scot-free"; you can still potentially be saddled with complications that take many years to heal.

[Old Man]

[Old Man]

43 minutes ago, Ragitsu said:

 

Of course, "survive" does not always mean "get off scot-free"; you can still potentially be saddled with complications that take many years to heal.

 

But that's a net plus for the for-profit healthcare industry, amirite?

[TrickstaPriest]

2 hours ago, ScottishFox said:

They looked at multiple community tests like the ones in New York, California and elsewhere that show that 10-20% of the public has already had COVID-19.

 

They crunch a bunch of numbers and come out along the lines that Coronavirus is going to be about as lethal as a bad influenza season and that while the initial shutdown was VERY MUCH JUSTIFIED due to the lack of solid data early on that the data at this point suggests that shutdowns are not having a significant effect compared to places that are not shutting down (Sweden, South Dakota, etc.).  They mention very large tragic spikes upward in child abuse, domestic abuse, suicide, etc., being caused by people being forced home.

 

I don't think any major city like New York has had to deal with the piles and piles of dead bodies and ~chronically sick~ (correction: chronically hospitalized) people during a bad flu season before.

 

 

1 hour ago, Old Man said:

As for other conservabubble-sourced stories, I note the same tired pattern of skewed facts.  Sure, maybe 99% of people will survive a COVID-19 infection, but 1% is still 3.5 million dead.  Sure, many of those fatalities will be the elderly, as if they weren't still people.  Sure, after sacrificing those 3.5 million people there might be herd immunity, except herd immunity is not a thing if, like other coronaviruses, immunity only lasts 18 months.

 

3.5 million is more dead per capita in the US than the Spanish Flu.  Though I don't know that it would be as high as 1% of the total population.  But 3.5 million would be an unprecedented disaster in the history of the United States, and more than every war, disaster, plague, and terrorist attack put together in raw numbers.  Only the loss of Native American life would be worse.

 

So 1% of total population probably an overestimate.  But given the fatality rate hovers at around 5% and people are suggesting it's lower (1%?), accounting for hospital shutdowns, and even if it's only going to reach 70% of the population (given how virulent it spreads), 0.7% of total population is still equivalent to the Spanish Flu and still almost more than every other event in our history put together.

 

But this is thumbnail math.  Perhaps total infection spread will be much less than 70%, or the fatality rate (even with absolutely crushed hospitals) will be less than 1%.  Maybe.  (edit: my main course of doubt is spread-size, as I think 1% with closed hospitals is a plenty low estimate - it's likely to be higher)

 

I do want to remind people herd immunity is not lifetime, and you did an effective proposal of that here.

[TrickstaPriest]

15 minutes ago, TrickstaPriest said:

I do want to remind people herd immunity is not lifetime, and you did an effective proposal of that here.

 

I should add/edit - I want to remind people herd immunity is not lifetime as far as we know.  Also that this hit us later in the flu season than normal, and only was spreading/doubling hard for a month (I think?), and was largely restricted by lockdown.  Lastly, the numbers will probably go up when more deaths are reported and more testing is available.

 

Unfortunately, the biggest failure in our response to this is the lack of testing that was available in other countries.  If I had a second failure, it would be the public messaging that has been used towards society.

 

We can't/won't stay closed, but because of the quirk of the rate of doubling, and the two week lag in between sickness and reported deaths, New York could have reduced the death of 18k people to closer to 4k by closing a single week earlier.  Inaction for a single week in a single city has probably cost almost a quarter of the deaths the US has faced so far, for the country with the highest death rate in the world (and possibly highest per capita soon).

[Cygnia]

 

[TrickstaPriest]

 

[Cygnia]

[Ternaugh]

https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2020/04/30/las-vegas-food-lines-casinos-closed-covid-19-pkg-ebof-lah-vpx.cnn/video/playlists/coronavirus/