Coronavirus

[Bazza]

3 hours ago, Old Man said:

 

Just wait...

[Scott Ruggels]

I have to wear a mask at all times when I am in my clinic. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/17/opinion/coronavirus-face-masks.html

 

[unclevlad]

Idle minds lead to idle speculations....

 

So, do you think the "oh that's gonna go viral!" comment is going to disappear, as "going viral" is starting to get a whole nuther meaning...???

 

[BNakagawa]

7 hours ago, Old Man said:

Damage Report!:

 

Italy continues to break new ground with their daily fatality and new case totals.  Yesterday they had more fatalities than China.  Today they have far more fatalities than China, 4825 vs. 3255.

 

The U.S. case trajectory has now exceeded Spain's at the 18 day mark, and is closing in on China's.  China had 60000 cases at the 25 day mark, and that was after welding people into their apartments.  The U.S. continues to undertest.

 

A mysterious surge of pneumonia patients has been reported in Russia, but the authoritarian leader there continues to downplay the situation and insists everything is under control.  I wonder how many times this is going to play out.

 

The FDA has approved the testing of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine as possible treatments for COVID-19.   A vaccine trial is underway in Seattle.  Better late than never, but thousands of Americans will die before either is generally available.

 

Social media continues to occasionally show me posts from people who are concerned that the lockdowns and social distancing measures are too much, and that they are needlessly damaging the economy.  They appear not to understand that exponential fatalities will wreck the economy just as much and would make recovery that much harder as well.  To say nothing of the morally indefensible argument that lives should be sacrificed for profits.

Presuming that China's reported numbers are accurate...

[unclevlad]

Tokyo Olympics coming under fire.

 

USA Swimming wants postponement;  USA Track and Field joined in.  The national Olympic committees of Brazil and Norway have joined in, in advocating for a postponement.  

 

Yes, in some ways, there's still some time...but the whole "we are carrying on like all is normal" is beyond insulting at this point.  Even just saying "we hope to, but recognize it may not be possible" at least accepts the reality.  The flat "we're going to have them on time" is tone-deaf.  The Olympics has a longer timeline than most events with a fixed schedule;  each sport has trials to run first.  The training has been heavily disrupted, and hope for hydroxychloroquine notwithstanding, no one expects the situation to suddenly reverse course in the short term.  Run things backwards...trials would probably have to start in, what, early to mid June?  I can't see trying to run ALL of them within a week or so, and some may just take a couple weeks.  For some sports, picking the national team is an obstacle in itself...think basketball, volleyball, water polo.  Or the boxing trials...those take time to run.

Last...perhaps most important.  How many countries are in, literally, survival mode?  My apology if that feels insensitive.  But economically?  It is a reasonable term, describing the efforts to try to keep the economy from collapsing.  The consequences we already know about...Bank of America is predicting 3 MILLION unemployment claims when the numbers for the last week come in...are going to take a massive effort to fix if problems persist for even a couple weeks....and there's no possible way they'll just disappear.

[RPMiller]

 

[Pariah]

Great news out of Salt Lake City:

 

Miller family, Rudy Gobert providing Vivint Arena employees financial relief and an employment opportunity

 

Quote

In addition, the Larry H. Miller Group of Companies is on the verge of creating a streamlined process that will provide temporary jobs for part-time workers from the arena and the shuttered Megaplex Theatres who are currently out of work because of the COVID-19 crisis. LHM has partnered with the Utah governor’s office, the Utah Department of Workforce Services, retailer associations and a variety of corporations with temporary employment needs to make this makeshift work opportunity happen as soon and smoothly as possible....

 

In essence, the LHM Group would act as a workforce services company, providing willing associates to companies like Amazon or Smith’s, both of which have publicized the need for an influx in temporary workers. Those companies would pay LHM for the work, and employees would be compensated via their regular paychecks. The service would be free for the employees. When the arena reopens, the employees will return to their previous jobs.

 

 

[Sociotard]

French police accused of fining the homeless for not staying indoors during the COVID-19 crisis

 

https://www.euronews.com/2020/03/20/coronavirus-france-s-homeless-fined-for-not-staying-indoors-during-covid-19-lockdown

[Michael Hopcroft]

5 minutes ago, Sociotard said:

French police accused of fining the homeless for not staying indoors during the COVID-19 crisis

 

https://www.euronews.com/2020/03/20/coronavirus-france-s-homeless-fined-for-not-staying-indoors-during-covid-19-lockdown

That points out one of the big problems of this crisis: How do people without shelters of their own shelter in place? This could add elements of a humanitarian crisis to an already difficult situation. When not managed properly, a homeless shelter could be a place where the virus spreads like wildfire. Given that a lot of homeless people are medically vulnerable for innumerable reasons, and are often distrustful of local authority because of things like what's happening in Paris, the potential suffering is frightening to imagine.

 

Portland has a large homeless population: estimates differ, but it is estimated that about 14,000 people in Portland had no reliable shelter as of 2017. That's a lot of people who are especially vulnerable to COVID-19. How to avert the humanitarian crisis I mentioned earlier? There is talk of turning a variety of places into temporary shelters, some quite high-profile like the Oregon Convention Center. I don't know whether anything will come of that talk.

[Old Man]

Found a nice state-by-state projection tool.  Looks like we have about two weeks here before things go fully pear shaped.  New York and Washington reached that point yesterday.

[Bazza]

States of Australia have taken additional measures to combat it. Some are just reducing things to essential services, others have closed their borders. 

[Bazza]

And the national Aussie Rules competition has been suspended until May. Mainly because states have closed their borders, or are going too in the next day or two. 

 

Edit: Americans trying to understand AFL (Australian [Rules] Football League). (Note: some language may be a slight issue).

https://twitter.com/i/events/1241228545898074112

 

[assault]

On the other hand, the National Rugby League competition is currently planning to keep playing. It will be interesting how long that lasts.

Note for students: There are two major football codes played in Australia, Australian Rules (AFL) and Rugby League (NRL), plus soccer and Rugby (sometimes known as Rugby Union), which both have mass, but smaller, followings.

 

Historically rugby league emerged from a split in the British rugby union competition over the question of professionalism. At the time (the 1890s), rugby was dominated by wealthy amateurs. Working class players faced the problem that if they were injured during a game, they were at risking of having to take time of work, with the resulting economic hardship. Naturally, compensation schemes for such players were regarded as unseemly professionalism by the rich players...

Eventually a bunch of clubs in the north of England split off and formed their own league.

 

The rules of the two games are still very similar, but there has been divergence over time.

[Old Man]

It mainly affects old people, right?

 

"I have patients in their early 40s and, yeah, I was kind of shocked. I’m seeing people who look relatively healthy with a minimal health history, and they are completely wiped out, like they’ve been hit by a truck. This is knocking out what should be perfectly fit, healthy people. Patients will be on minimal support, on a little bit of oxygen, and then all of a sudden, they go into complete respiratory arrest, shut down and can’t breathe at all.

 

"It’s called acute respiratory distress syndrome, ARDS. That means the lungs are filled with fluid. And it’s notable for the way the X-ray looks: The entire lung is basically whited out from fluid. Patients with ARDS are extremely difficult to oxygenate. It has a really high mortality rate, about 40%.

 

“In my experience, this severity of ARDS is usually more typical of someone who has a near drowning experience — they have a bunch of dirty water in their lungs — or people who inhale caustic gas.

 

“When someone has an infection, I’m used to seeing the normal colors you’d associate with it: greens and yellows. The coronavirus patients with ARDS have been having a lot of secretions that are actually pink because they’re filled with blood cells that are leaking into their airways. They are essentially drowning in their own blood and fluids because their lungs are so full."

[Bazza]

Oldie, thanks for in many cases being the resident NGD reporter on this story. #muchAppreciated 

[Starlord]

[Duke Bushido]

4 hours ago, Bazza said:

Oldie, thanks for in many cases being the resident NGD reporter on this story. #muchAppreciated 

 

 

On this vein--

is anyone here doing or aware of someone doing any sort of corporate tracking on how businesses are taking care of or not taking care of their employees during all this?

 

I have tried (learned I won't be shopping Hobby Lobby ever again, and while I can't stand the rebranded Ore-Ida frozen entres that constitute the bulk of the menu and Chili's, I will be going out of my way to not just decline invitations to meet friends there, but instead try to actively change the venue...)

 

Anyway, I cannot imagine that I am not alone in my desire to continue to update the list of which businesses I do and don't patronize based on how good they are to their people. 

 

Is there anyone out there keeping up with this sort of thing?

 

 

[Hugh Neilson]

8 hours ago, Michael Hopcroft said:

That points out one of the big problems of this crisis: How do people without shelters of their own shelter in place? This could add elements of a humanitarian crisis to an already difficult situation. When not managed properly, a homeless shelter could be a place where the virus spreads like wildfire. Given that a lot of homeless people are medically vulnerable for innumerable reasons, and are often distrustful of local authority because of things like what's happening in Paris, the potential suffering is frightening to imagine.

 

Portland has a large homeless population: estimates differ, but it is estimated that about 14,000 people in Portland had no reliable shelter as of 2017. That's a lot of people who are especially vulnerable to COVID-19. How to avert the humanitarian crisis I mentioned earlier? There is talk of turning a variety of places into temporary shelters, some quite high-profile like the Oregon Convention Center. I don't know whether anything will come of that talk.

 

Late last week, Edmonton announced a plan to use the Edmonton Expo Center as a shelter for COVID-19 victims requiring self-isolation.  It will be staffed by health service workers and volunteers from a charity which operates homeless shelters in the city now.

 

Seems like a good idea - it's not like these venues will be hosting a lot of conferences and trade shows any time soon.

[Hugh Neilson]

I wonder to what extent we can assess the extent of testing by the "death to recovered" ratios in various countries.  It seems like those who have the most severe symptoms (up to critical cases and deaths) are the ones most likely to have been tested, even where testing is not happening more broadly.

 

I did have someone comment the other day that Italy has a demographically older population than most of the rest of Europe.  That may explain the higher mortality statistics, at least in part.

[Michael Hopcroft]

8 hours ago, Pariah said:

Great news out of Salt Lake City:

 

Miller family, Rudy Gobert providing Vivint Arena employees financial relief and an employment opportunity

 

 

We are now seeing the truth of what Dwight L. Moody said -- that "Character is what a man is in the dark." We don't really know who we are until we face crisis.

 

Will anyone remember how well or badly employers treated their workers? Past experience says that in large part they won't. Some companies, like Amazon, have always treated their workers like disposable cogs in the great machine. It hasn't stopped people from rushing to Prime Day or prompted them not to watch Good Omens. I would like to know what large companies, or small employers like family-owned restaurants, do for their workers without the cameras rolling.

 

We don't know what kind of economy will come out of the crisis. All we can do right now is take care of ourselves and others as best we can. The dark has come. Show your character.

[Michael Hopcroft]

12 hours ago, unclevlad said:

Last...perhaps most important.  How many countries are in, literally, survival mode?  My apology if that feels insensitive.  But economically?  It is a reasonable term, describing the efforts to try to keep the economy from collapsing.  The consequences we already know about...Bank of America is predicting 3 MILLION unemployment claims when the numbers for the last week come in...are going to take a massive effort to fix if problems persist for even a couple weeks....and there's no possible way they'll just disappear.

And now my question in the last post applies to state and federal government. How can you possible give unemployment pay to three million workers signing on in one week? States don't have the money, and the federal government -- well, let's just say I doing think it has any idea what they're doing. Advocation social distancing while standing on each other's toes so everyone gets in the shot does not encourage me, but there are still a lot of middle-rank people -- the civil servants who actually do the work -- who don't necessarily give a damn what the directive is from the White House. They see a problem, they deal with the problem, even if the White House wants them to ignore it.

 

Still, resources are being stretched thinner or thinner. 

[Cancer]

Drive-in theatre on the other side of Puget Sound doing great business.

[Cancer]

1 hour ago, Duke Bushido said:

 

 

Anyway, I cannot imagine that I am not alone in my desire to continue to update the list of which businesses I do and don't patronize based on how good they are to their people. 

 

Is there anyone out there keeping up with this sort of thing?

 

 

 

Can't say I'm keeping track, but a couple of local outfits are doing people right.  One grocery store is explicitly hiring (part-time) people who've been laid off from other businesses.

[Cancer]

Also, Starbucks is maintaining their reputation for treating their people well during this episode.

[BoloOfEarth]

Just got word this morning that one of the residents in the assisted living place where my mother-in-law lives, has tested positive for COVID-19 and been moved to the hospital.  They've been on lockdown all week, but I guess too little too late.  Don't know if the affected resident was on the same floor as my mother-in-law, but given that aides, nurses, and other staff cover all floors, I'm doubting it matters much.  My mother-in-law (age 75) has pretty bad dementia and is completely non-communicative, so we have no idea how she's been weathering things thus far, just second-hand reports from staff members.  Now we're worried we'll never see her again.