Coronavirus

[Lawnmower Boy]

Welp, now that the long weekend is over and the labs are reporting again. . . 

 

As a fun distraction from the ongoing global apocalypse with America as the on-fire-but-ignoring-it cheerleader, I've decided to look at the state active cases and deaths totals as a race. Hey, there's not much else in the way of sports, and, while they represent dead and dying people, they're not me and I don't know them. Unless they're my American cousins. Please God, don't let them be my American cousins. 

 

Ahem. The point here is that you can forget about all the death and suffering and poverty and just root for Texas, Georgia, Iowa and Nebraska to keep on climbing those league tables. I'm watching Texas chase Michigan since forever, and I can tell you, my heart's in my mouth. Georgia has further to go, but a few days ago I thought it would never beat Connecticut, but while I don't like the way that the state isn't opening up a solid lead, I have some faith that we're going to hear an "Oh, my bad" upwards correction in a few days that will put Michigan in Georgia's sights. I just know that Virginia can overtake Louisiana, while there's a whole bunch of states that stand to get by Washington in the next week. Including Iowa. There's literally no limits to Iowa's surge up the standings so far. It's showing more leg than Nebraska, and that's saying something. 

 

Meanwhile, a big old scolding to Kentucky, Utah, Oregon and Hawaii, all of which have great potential that they're completely squandering. So disappointing. 

 

[unclevlad]

31 minutes ago, Lawnmower Boy said:

Meanwhile, a big old scolding to Kentucky, Utah, Oregon and Hawaii, all of which have great potential that they're completely squandering. So disappointing. 

 

 

 

I bet your bookie really, really misses the loss of your business during all this........

[TrickstaPriest]

3 hours ago, ScottishFox said:

Sometimes to be an effective worker you have to manage up the chain of command as well as down.

I'll admit that if you're on the Trump-bashy side of the political spectrum this is a VERY SOLID thing to bash him on.  Just, wow.

 

 

I'm more concerned about him literally killing himself with the side effects of taking such a medication.  As mentioned by others, it would be an unfortunate situation.

[Matt the Bruins]

My concern is more for gullible people who'll try to emulate him but don't have access to some of the best health care on the planet. Trump could decide garlging Clorox straight from the jug is an effective preventative measure and my response would be "you do you."

[ScottishFox]

1 hour ago, TrickstaPriest said:

 

I'm more concerned about him literally killing himself with the side effects of taking such a medication.  As mentioned by others, it would be an unfortunate situation.

 

Millions of people already take the drug as a prophylactic against malaria and for lupus.  The fatal side effect rate has to be pretty damn low.

 

But given the lack of hard evidence that its effective and some that says it is worse than nothing - this seems like a risky route to go.

 

Probably the hardest part of analyzing any of this mess is that the data quality is all over the place and some of it seems intentionally distorted state by state to reflect the narrative that the hometown politicians favor.

 

Multiple states have had to adjust their numbers up or down after getting caught cooking the books.

 

And I'm still pretty PO'd at how the nursing homes were handled by New York (you must take coronavirus infected persons by state mandate into the nursing home.)  Great job Cuomo - thousands died because of this.

 

The Department of Health lady in Pennsylvania also mandated this but simultaneously moved her mother out of the nursing home so she wouldn't die.  Nice - great leadership - the others can die, but not my mom.

 

I also wonder how many people we've saved with the shutdowns (I assume at least 50-100k) and how that will stack up against the massive upswing in suicide, drug overdoses, domestic violence and the one I just heard about today - a potentially 20% higher death rate for new cancer patients as their initial diagnosis are delayed for months.

 

Still - nobody in my family or my wife's (which is ginormous) has gotten the crud yet and the fatality rate remains very low (3 per 100,000).

[Badger]

Been silenced due to bad internet connections.  But, I had been thinking all along, that I thought (most of them) could be reasonable till about mid-May and stay quarantined.  But, after 2 months, it was going "I got to get on with my life, and find a way to survive". 

 

That is starting to look like how it is going.

 

 

[Joe Walsh]

That's the impression news reports are giving, but the truth is the vast majority of people are complying. Something like 90% are either fine with what's going on or worried that we'll move too quickly.

[Cygnia]

Vaccine experts say Moderna didn’t produce data critical to assessing Covid-19 vaccine

[Old Man]

[Old Man]

[Cygnia]

Spoilered because it's S*P

 

[Iuz the Evil]

3 hours ago, GM Joe said:

That's the impression news reports are giving, but the truth is the vast majority of people are complying. Something like 90% are either fine with what's going on or worried that we'll move too quickly.

That's definitely not the case locally. We are facing considerable community pressure to open up so that business can open. State unemployment at 22% and higher locally. And folks starting to just say "heck with it" more and more. Traffic congestion returning, more folks moving around the community. 

 

By moving into "deep stage 2" the hope is it will buy another couple months of time and give people hope. We want to be very careful about this. Nobody's wanting to go too fast. 

 

Child abuse emergency report numbers are up over double last year, with half the reporting. Domestic violence through the roof. Nobody getting preventative care or dental care. Had a spike in suicide already. Emergency food assistance up 287%. You can argue it's not related to economic stressors, social isolation, increased liquor sales, and growing frustration at the situation. I don't think I'll believe that though. 

 

This is really bad. People are not handling the situation well at all, and there's some hope that this may mitigate the secondary effects of our intervention. I think it'll be some time before we take another step in this process, and we are monitoring like crazy. Testing almost double the State requirement, doing probes of nursing homes, compliance response for business, all that. 

 

We will see how it goes. 

[Badger]

You're wrong, they only want to get out for a haircut.    (ok that one comment made by not someone here, still burns me)

 

Seemed more people were out this weekend than any recently in my area.  At least, in my area of VA, people might be telling Gov. Northam to do some anatomically implausible things to himself.  

 

Edit: ANyhow, I think regardless of the percentages of who stays where now.  Each passing week will see significantly more people venturing out.  And depending on the area, of course.  If an area hasn't had much (non-economic) devastation, it will be more likely to be fed up with it all.  People can self-quarantine, yes, but the powers that be, didn't seem to contemplate, there was an expiration date.  Quarantine is a 2-3 month option, not an 18 month one.

[Old Man]

I'd be stressed out too if I was expected to work at, for example, a meat packing plant full of infected coworkers, or else lose my job and my health insurance and not qualify for unemployment.

 

If only there were a large national organization that could send relief funds to citizens on a monthly basis, like in many Western democracies. 

[Iuz the Evil]

14 minutes ago, Old Man said:

I'd be stressed out too if I was expected to work at, for example, a meat packing plant full of infected coworkers, or else lose my job and my health insurance and not qualify for unemployment.

 

If only there were a large national organization that could send relief funds to citizens on a monthly basis, like in many Western democracies. 

Oh I absolutely agree that would be a HUGE help. Unfortunately we don't have that as a feature of our society. So the choices are extremely grim. 

 

I'm not being flippant. The choice is expose yourself to possible infection and risk, or face economic ruin in a society with very limited safety net resources. And local government gets to make the call on which road we hop towards, because the Feds deferred to the State. And the State is deferring to local health officials. Gee, thanks. 

 

So you do the best you can. Infection control matters. Suicide, health issues, and abuse matter. Economics matter. It's all important and you just try to be prudent and careful. 

[Old Man]

3 minutes ago, Iuz the Evil said:

Oh I absolutely agree that would be a HUGE help. Unfortunately we don't have that as a feature of our society. So the choices are extremely grim. 

 

I'd argue that it could be a feature if citizens would make it clear to their elected officials.  As opposed to the false dilemma that the administration is pushing.

 

But I'm getting off topic, again.

[Iuz the Evil]

2 minutes ago, Old Man said:

 

I'd argue that it could be a feature if citizens would make it clear to their elected officials.  As opposed to the false dilemma that the administration is pushing.

 

But I'm getting off topic, again.

Likely true. Nothing I can personally do about that with the choices I'm having to make now, man. It is a true dilemma here, we cannot create a full public safety net system with local money. I am doing the best I can. 

[Zeropoint]

It's time to stop asking nicely and start making the government do its damn job of caring for the citizens.

[Old Man]

To veer back on topic, while hydroxychloroquine appears to be useless at best at treating coronavirus infections, there are trials underway for other possible treatments:

 

Remdesivir, a Gilead antiviral, seems to reduce time to improvement in at least one double blind study.

 

Tocilizumab, an antiinflammatory, may significantly reduce coronavirus death rates. (preprint, not peer reviewed)

 

Famitodine, of all things, may reduce the odds of being hospitalized for outpatients suffering coronavirus infections. (also a preprint)

 

Of these only the last one might possibly be generally available prior to Q4.

 

 

[Iuz the Evil]

39 minutes ago, Zeropoint said:

It's time to stop asking nicely and start making the government do its damn job of caring for the citizens.

Um. I'm the government too? That's actually what I'm talking about. 

 

I don't understand this place sometimes. 

[Old Man]

Trying really hard to leave the politics for the political thread here. But I’m very sympathetic with people who are hurting from this crisis, financially and otherwise. I feel as though real people have been forgotten as this plays out. 

[Lord Liaden]

4 hours ago, Zeropoint said:

It's time to stop asking nicely and start making the government do its damn job of caring for the citizens.

 

How, practically speaking, do we do that?

[Starlord]

[Starlord]

Maryland bar unveils social distancing tubes

 

[Joe Walsh]

13 hours ago, Iuz the Evil said:

That's definitely not the case locally. We are facing considerable community pressure to open up so that business can open. State unemployment at 22% and higher locally. And folks starting to just say "heck with it" more and more. Traffic congestion returning, more folks moving around the community. 

 

By moving into "deep stage 2" the hope is it will buy another couple months of time and give people hope. We want to be very careful about this. Nobody's wanting to go too fast. 

 

Child abuse emergency report numbers are up over double last year, with half the reporting. Domestic violence through the roof. Nobody getting preventative care or dental care. Had a spike in suicide already. Emergency food assistance up 287%. You can argue it's not related to economic stressors, social isolation, increased liquor sales, and growing frustration at the situation. I don't think I'll believe that though. 

 

This is really bad. People are not handling the situation well at all, and there's some hope that this may mitigate the secondary effects of our intervention. I think it'll be some time before we take another step in this process, and we are monitoring like crazy. Testing almost double the State requirement, doing probes of nursing homes, compliance response for business, all that. 

 

We will see how it goes. 

 

There are definitely a lot of people hurting out there, financially, emotionally, physically, psychologically. Not to mention vaccinations are down, cancer patients are having to forego treatment, and on and on.

 

As you say, it's a good sign not many are wanting to go too  fast. The national surveys I've seen (e.g. https://navigatorresearch.org/navigating-coronavirus/) have shown a consistent preference for being safe when lifting stay-at-home orders. Most people seem satisfied with what the pace of their states' transition, with the remainder having a plurality in favor of going more slowly vs. more quickly.

 

In my state specifically, out of a population of more than 12 million only a few hundred have come out to protest. A few businesses have reopened in defiance of the order (and then were shut down). Some politicians are suing, seemingly to make a name for themselves/grandstand.

 

Which, again, isn't to say people aren't hurting. It's outrageous how small businesses are being treated by the federal government, for example. And social isolation is seriously damaging to some, particularly seniors.

 

Thankfully the state's unemployment filing backlog is being worked through, making things better for people who lost their jobs (thanks substantially to the extra $600). If only we'd done what most other countries did, and just pick up the payroll tab so as to avoid all this dislocation and swamping of the state unemployment machinery!

 

I'm just hoping we will all be ready to go back under stay-at-home orders as the inevitable second wave begins (as it already has in France and Iran).

 

That's why I'm thankful my state's plan is based on metrics, and has mechanisms for moving regions back and forth between phases as indicated by conditions on the ground within each region. I'm happy to let the data do the talking rather than letting politics decide what's best.