Covid-19

[Hashi Lebwohl]

If people had listened to me a month ago, Cagliostro, you would have been issued your own hazmat suit because you are in a high risk group; this would have allowed you to be protected from the rest of us and afforded you the opportunity to retain some of your regular ability to be out in public.

Companies are starting to ramp up production of ventilators--Ford plans on making 50,000 in the next 3 months. Dyson engineered their own ventilator from scratch in only 10 days; they are promising 15,000 of their units. IBM is offering supercomputer processing time for corona research.

Kohl's and Macy's are furloughing most of their employees. Disney executives are either forgegoing their annual salaries right now or taking deep cuts up to 50%. A lot of wild changes are occuring at this time.

[Savor Dam]

A lot of wild changes are occuring at this time.

I wouldn't use the adjective "wild", but what is happening certainly does not match how I would have gamed it out a month ago when [expletive] got real. This could have been much messier. May that still be the case by the end!

I don't agree with every step being taken, but as a whole, I am pretty proud of how well this is generally being handled. Most of the essential social shifts are not requiring authoritarian measures; people are responding to information campaigns and generally doing the right thing without being forced. For both the government and the people, the right tone has been set. Given an understanding of what the situation is, people are rising to the occasion. Had the information not been disseminated as it was, the level of civic cooperation been so high, and the light touch been maintained in compelling that cooperation, this would not have gone so well.

While we've seen both minimization and overreach stick up their heads, the course of action (rhetoric, I ignore now more than ever) is adhering to the playbook for handling an outbreak of this sort. Yes, sooner would have been better, but had this gone any faster, do you think we could have maintained the social compliance balance we've managed so far?

This isn't over by a long shot, but from what I have seen in the last month, I am more optimistic about the state of my society today than I have been for a long time.

[peter]

Shit Cag! Hard call at the best of times but in today's situation doubly so. Hopefully your treatment regimen will still be able to swing into motion despite the ongoing crisis. In the UK the hospitals are doing a great job of separating Covid and non-Covid cases at the point of entry just so that 'normal' admissions can be dealt with and no doubt the same will be being practiced in the US. Any indication as to what line of treatment you will be following yet? I'm guessing that the doctors on your case will not want to let the grass grow under their feet in instigation of your therapy even in these less than ideal circumstances. Keep us posted on how things are progressing my friend and of course you have our best wishes.

[Avatar]

Just in terms of the random 10 million figure, (and sorta related to Peter's earlier point about the people not living in nice houses etc.)

Here millions of people live without access to clean running water. They live cheek by jowl in informal settlements where hundreds of families may share a single tap and a pit toilet.

They don't have money to buy food for more than the current day if they're lucky, and they have to spend that day desperately trying to get enough for food for the next day.

The public health system is barely adequate for normal, every day health concerns. And South Africa is still one of the better off African countries.

This has scarcely touched Africa yet. If it gets a foothold, that figure might not be so far fetched.

--A

[peter]

Typical of the police, once given Draconian powers to levy over the people, to be over zealous in their application. Alongside the ridiculous example of the Derbyshire police deliberately pouring black dye into the local 'Blue Lagoon' beauty spot to discourage visitors we have the use of drones used to attempt to identify lone walkers out on the moors, and along the shoreline of beaches and the setting up of hotlines for people to snitch on their neighbours for violation of the lockdown rules.

Echoing the words of Nigel Farage in his YouTube post of yesterday (and it isn't often you'll hear me and Farage in agreement on anything) do they not get it? We understand what is required of us. We know we must practice social distancing - we understand that sensible following of the guidelines is crucial to our beating this thing. We do not need to be legislated and criminalised into following them! The curtailment of all sensible ways in which this situation may be addressed while still allowing sufficient scope for individual exercise of judgement, for allowing the small areas of 'wiggle room' which will make this thing tolerable, is simply not sensible. Ultimately it will result in the general refusal of the people to cooperate on a much broader level with potentially disastrous results. It is education and advise that will win us through this - that and some simple understanding of each others humanity - not coercion and bullying. Time to put the police back into their box.

[TheFallen]

First off, Cag, all my best wishes for a positive outcome for you.

Yesterday's audited COVID-19 stats as follows:-

US - a 14.2% increase in newly identified cases (an extra 20.4k cases, taking the total identified up to 163.8k)

UK - a 13.4% increase in newly identified cases (an extra 2.6k cases, taking the total identified up to 22.1k)

Italy - a 4.1% increase in newly identified cases (an extra 4.1k cases, taking the total identified up to 101.7k)

Spain - a 9.8% increase in newly identified cases (an extra 7.8k cases, taking the total identified up to 88.0k)

Some very early signs of imposed social distancing regulations having some effect in both the US and the UK (both have been under a 20% new case increase for a few days).

Definite evidence of those same regs (which are applied more harshly over there) clearly working in both Italy and Spain.

Av, I agree that if/when COVID-19 gets a bigger foothold in poorer, less resourced nations - and especially in their cities - infection rates (and attendant subsequent mortalities) could ramp incredibly sharply.

SD I have heard it commented (but I'm not sure I buy it) that the UK's easing in of ever more stringent imposed regulations re social distancing was deliberately done that way to make it more palatable to the populace - rather than smacking it in the face with ultra-draconian measures from the start.

Possibly... but I think it more likely that initially, our government over here was a little slow off the mark, despite the incoming (and credible) evidence and data from countries further along the curve, such as Italy and Spain. Anyhow, we are where we are...

One thing continues to stick out like the biggest sore thumb ever seen in the officially reported COVID-19 stats...

...and that is that the People's Republic of China is continuing to lie its ass off about what's going on over there (as it has done from the get-go).

Not a single stat or data point issued by the Chinese State can be trusted in the least. It is literally jaw-dropping in this day and age that a major world power, accounting for 18.5% of the entire global population, thinks it is necessary - nay vital - to so frenziedly spread disinformation on a global issue like COVID-19 that bloody originated within its nation in the first place. Presumably because the actual truth about the situation is bizarrely viewed by those in charge as being in some way shameful or damaging, both to the political ideology and the global reputation of the State itself.

A 0.001% increase in newly identified cases yesterday? Off a base of over 81,000 confirmed cases? And allegedly, so far only 3.3k total deaths? And an amazing 75.4k already confirmed as completely recovered, leaving only 2.7k active cases? What a veritable utopia it must be over there...

A complete crock of shit and lies. I hope that the PRC gets sanctioned up its ass by all Western nations when the dust finally settles.

(That'll never happen, of course... the PRC will get away scot-free with all its lies, because the West is by now so thoroughly dependant on its cheap manufacturing).

[SoulBiter]

One of the drugs being touted lately is Leronlimab developed by Cytodyne (CYDY). It has been developed as an HIV treatment but seems effective by stopping or decreasing the cytokine storm that causes the respiratory issues killing people. I have been invested in this company for months. Very exciting to see this coming to market and saving lives. It also has an exciting component that may save lives of cancer patients.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

One thing continues to stick out like the biggest sore thumb ever seen in the officially reported COVID-19 stats...

...and that is that the People's Republic of China is continuing to lie its ass off about what's going on over there (as it has done from the get-go).

Not a single stat or data point issued by the Chinese State can be trusted in the least. It is literally jaw-dropping in this day and age that a major world power, accounting for 18.5% of the entire global population, thinks it is necessary - nay vital - to so frenziedly spread disinformation on a global issue like COVID-19 that bloody originated within its nation in the first place. Presumably because the actual truth about the situation is bizarrely viewed by those in charge as being in some way shameful or damaging, both to the political ideology and the global reputation of the State itself.

A 0.001% increase in newly identified cases yesterday? Off a base of over 81,000 confirmed cases? And allegedly, so far only 3.3k total deaths? And an amazing 75.4k already confirmed as completely recovered, leaving only 2.7k active cases? What a veritable utopia it must be over there...

A complete crock of shit and lies. I hope that the PRC gets sanctioned up its ass by all Western nations when the dust finally settles.

(That'll never happen, of course... the PRC will get away scot-free with all its lies, because the West is by now so thoroughly dependant on its cheap manufacturing).

The PRC is probably having the military shoot corona victims so that their official cause of death is not "coronavirus".

While coronavirus is going on, there was at least one recent victim of hantavirus in China, which jumps over from rats.

The updated mortality rate for COVID-19 is now 1.38%. Not as drastic as earlier thought but technically still more deadly than season flu.

[peter]

I keep hearing people on the media saying "this is like the war" but the truth is that it is nothing like it at all. Nothing like this has ever been done before - at least certainly not to a population brought up on a diet of constant freedom in terms of movement and daily communion between the members who make it up. It's as Obi said above - a huge experiment carried out on national levels and no-one - no-one - can predict its outcome.

I'm sorry if I seem unduly pessimistic, but I just can't see us all sitting tight in our homes for months on end and then walking out into the sunshine in x number of weeks time as if nothing has happened. I just feel it in my gut that this is not the way it will be......... and the alternative scenarios scare me......... they scare me a lot. That's why I keep bleating on that at least some ways must be found, be it however small they are, for us to hold on to a thread of normality, if only as a valve for us to let off the pressure that could otherwise erupt with tragic and unknowable consequences.

Don't know what else to say.

[TheFallen]

The updated mortality rate for COVID-19 is now 1.38%. Not as drastic as earlier thought but technically still more deadly than season flu.

Do you have a link to that latest estimate, Hashi? I'm interested in how the current mortality rate is even attempted to be calculated at this early stage.

It's certainly not by simplistically dividing the total number of deaths so far by the total number of identified cases so far (which would currently give a result of 4.86%) - and nor should it be. That would be liable to be both highly misleading and fallacious.

As to COVID-19 being "technically more deadly" than seasonal flu? Well yes...

If your quoted estimate of a 1.38% mortality rate does prove accurate, that would make COVID-19 about 14 times more lethal than winter flu. Which some might argue is a factor that amounts to slightly more than a mere technicality...

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

Pope warns of 'virionic genocide' if governments prioritize economy over people during pandemic

Pope Francis walks during Urbi and Orbi prayer (Latin for To the City and To the World) in an empty St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Friday, March 27, 2020.. (Credit: Yara Nardi/Pool Photo via AP)


ROSARIO, Argentina -- As the world continues to grapple to determine what is the best response to the coronavirus pandemic, Pope Francis sent a handwritten letter to an Argentine judge saying that despite being an "economic disaster," life has to be prioritized over the economy as not to provoke a "virionic genocide."

In the letter, addressed to Roberto Andres Gallardo, who leads the Pan American Network of Magistrates, Francis calls for urgent measures to "defend the population" from the pandemic, which as he noted, grows in "geometric progressions."

He also expresses his regret over the consequences of this crisis: Hunger, violence and the appearance of usurers.

Portions of the letter were made public by Telam, Argentina's state-run news agency.

[...]

"It is true that these measures 'bother' those who are forced to comply with them, but it is always for the common good and, in the long run, most people accept them and have a positive attitude," he said.

In his letter to the judge, Francis argued that governments that face the pandemic with "exemplary measures" show "the priority of their decisions: People first. And this is important because we all know that defending the people is an economic hardship."

"It would be sad if the opposite was chosen, which would lead to the death of many people, something that would be like a virionic genocide," Francis warned.

Though most countries in the world have now accepted that the best way to try to flatten the curve of contagion is to close all non essential business and to ask people to stay home, there are some countries, including Jair Bolsonaro's Brazil, that are going in the opposite direction. Experts have warned that this can lead to preventable death of thousands, mostly the elderly.

In this context, Bergoglio recalled his meeting last Friday with the authorities of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, "to reflect on the now and the after."

"Preparing for the aftermath is important. There are already some consequences that must be faced: Hunger, especially for people without permanent work, violence, the appearance of usurers," who the pope describes as the "true plague of the social future," as they are criminals who have become "dehumanized."

[Gaius Octavius]

MR for US is 1.4%. Worldwide almost 5%. When jospitals saturate in the US the rate will skyrocket. That is part of the reason Italy is 11% and climbing. Probably most of the reason why.

If you just took a random population and provided no supportive tx for the virus, the death rate would be high. It is only so low bc of modern medicine. Send the virus back in time 100 years and it is basically Spanish Flu.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

The updated mortality rate for COVID-19 is now 1.38%. Not as drastic as earlier thought but technically still more deadly than season flu.

Do you have a link to that latest estimate, Hashi? I'm interested in how the current mortality rate is even attempted to be calculated at this early stage.

I pulled it from a CNN article. We were being told over a month ago that this virus's mortality was was 3.8%, or 34 times more deadly than the regular flu, and we were being told that it was a fact. Well, it might have been a fact then but it isn't now.

Worldwide cases currently at 803,650 with 39,033 deaths, or about 4.8% *but* for the United States we have 164,785 cases and 3,173 deaths, or 1.92%--the mortality rate isn't the same everywhere, depending upon local circumstances. This is why projections based on Italy or China do not apply here.

If you look at the infection rate, though, those continue to be pretty small. 803,650 cases with population of 7,774,617,950 is only 0.0103%, so only 1 in 9,674 people are affected at all of of those only a small percentage actually die from it.

[Gaius Octavius]

I've thought about volunteering in NYC. If I do decide to go, I will update you guys on how it was, but probably afterwards, if I survive.

I've heard it was complete chaos, though. Hospital staff are dying. Nurses and physicians are seeing their colleagues become patients and die. Becoming infected with the virus is pretty much guaranteed. There's no proper PPE (personal protective equipment). The few PPE that is available is being sanitized as much as is possible, but it wasn't made to be reused.

I'm personally scared.

[TheFallen]

Hashi, agreed that mortality rates will differ from nation to nation, this primarily being down to two factors:-

The level and rigour of social distancing measures having been or being put in place, and

The sufficiency and quality of available healthcare resources.

Having said that, there is another major difference that you're not taking into account - and that's where on the COVID-19 curve each nation finds itself.

Let's ignore the PRC for obvious reasons and look at Italy.

Ignoring any socio-cultural population differences, Italy has clearly by now managed to suppress the rate of rise in newly identified COVID-19 cases... but it's still a couple of weeks away from maximum new death numbers as cases work their way through the cycle to one conclusion or another.

The US and UK are a couple of weeks further behind the curve on that one.

And as to infection rates, I agree that a single microsecond snapshot in time right now shows an extremely small percentage of the global population identified as infected (0.0103%, as you state). However, you'll have a better awareness of statistics than I do, so you must know that's an irrelevant figure. The rate of growth in infections is all that matters.

If the current daily global new infection growth rate is say 10% and persists at this level, then by mid June, you'd have a billion infected globally.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

And as to infection rates, I agree that a single microsecond snapshot in time right now shows an extremely small percentage of the global population identified as infected (0.0103%, as you state). However, you'll have a better awareness of statistics than I do, so you must know that's an irrelevant figure. The rate of growth in infections is all that matters.

If the current daily global new infection growth rate is say 10% and persists at this level, then by mid June, you'd have a billion infected globally.

Exactly--most of the statistics being thrown at us right now are pictures based on incomplete information...yet many people are presenting them to us as if they are valid, scientific fact--even some of the people here have done it. And those disastrous projections? A model based on incomplete and/or inaccurate information is no different than a wild guess--you might was well throw a dart in the dark.

Your last statement has too many "if" clauses: if the daily rate continues unabated, if the rate is 10%, if the rate lasts until June. The United States is not, generally, as crowded as China so even though it took us longer to enact lockdown measures the general level of cleanliness and availability of high-quality medical care should keep our curve under theirs even if our base number of cases exceeds theirs...provided they are telling the truth (which they aren't).

[Ur Dead]

The world has seen pandemics like this before. The last one was the Flu pandemic of 1917- 1919. What has change is the ability of people to travel
spreading the disease far faster than ever. Also we have come to expect that our scientists can come up with a cure at a moments notice and the cures
and preventive drugs to be made within the month. Well it not happening.
So we have to go back to those old methods the earlier generation did.
In fact we have to relearn those methods of old. And it sticks in our craw
that we have to do that.. We have been spoiled.
The lucky ones now are the ones who have survived their period of sickness
and are free to move about to live their lives. The rest of us have to sit and
watch our back until a cure and preventive drug is available.
The me-now gens are learning a lesson the hard way.

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+


Isaac Stone Fish @isaacstonefish | Twitter

[Hashi Lebwohl]

China is reporting almost no new cases. No one believes them, of course, but we cannot get accurate numbers from them so we cannot even speculate. As I noted, they are probably just shooting new cases and chalking the death up to "civil disobedience".

Speaking of models, the latest one states that our "peak" day should hit around 15 April, with over 2,000 deaths on that day alone and ultimately topping at about 84,000 total deaths.

One other thing to note....most of our cases are in large, densely-populated, Democrat-controlled urban areas. The Republican governors of those States are, for the most part, not issuing Statewide "safe at home" orders, which is causing a new political divide.

[Gaius Octavius]

The World Health Organization, which receives most of its funding from the United States, is towing the Communist Party of China's line.

We must defund this organization and expel its members. US nationals working for this organization should be investigated by the FBI.

Foreigners like Dr. Aylward (Canadian doctor) should be banned from entering the United States after he callously denied Taiwan was a separate country from the PRC.

Dr. Tedros, WHO director from Ethiopia and avowed Marxist, should be banned entry to the United States.

All data from WHO on COVID-19 should be disregarded. They deny that this virus is airborne, but there are studies that refute their idea.