Coronavirus

[Buckly]

We had a huge round of influenza B through most of the winter. Then all of a sudden we got hit hard in January with influenza A. I can tell you A is much harder on the body. It’s been quite a virus year for sure. Maybe it’s a perfect storm kind of thing and that why were seeing this coronavirus. Who knows. Kooch, I had walking pneumonia 2 years ago and was sick for a month. The doc finally got the right antibiotic for the right bacteria but said at the time I’d be coughing for quite a while.

 

[OakSeeds]

”millions to die”. That discredits just about anything you say. There are no such numbers mentioned by any Country in the World. Some of these earlier infected Countries are already ramping their economies back up. By the way it’s the States not Trump who are making these stay at home deals. So he’s not lifting them. The Governors will be and even the epicenter Governor is on board.

Florida will explode in cases of infected persons in the next 10-12 days; Louisiana may run of of beds next week (already asking for a disaster declaration; 2M''s ... Misasouri and Michigan will have real poblems in their health systems soon. The virus disease progression rate for the U.S. (slope - how steep - of the curve) is steeper/higher than Italy and very similar to Spain. The World Health organization says the U.S. will soon be the epicenter - in the world - for the virus.

I doubt you will read this source; however, others might ... somehow the people in American need guidance (coordinated effort) at the federal level.

It was written by a highly respected Dr. at the University of PA.
" If the United States fails to act decisively now, it will follow Italy’s course or, worse, that of Iran, and recovery may take
a decade or more with extraordinary levels of death and dislocation.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/23/opinion/contributors/us-coronavirus-response.html

The number of undetected cases is 11 times more than has been officially reported, researchers at Columbia University estimate. Their analysis offers a stark warning: Even if the country cut its rate of transmission in half — a tall order — some 650,000 people may still become infected in the next two months

 

[Buckly]

So what’s your plan? Seems hopeless.

 

[OakSeeds]

So what’s your plan? Seems hopeless.

To date, there are only 2 tools in the tool box to fight this virus, testing and social distancing (and they are related - testing can support social distancing decisions). Unfortunately, our govt didn't take the threat seriously enough (cry out Trumpers) and we got way behind the curve losing precious valuable time during February and early March. While they will throw a lot of excuses at you (the testting system was inadequate is the favorite), there STILL are an INSUFFICIENT number of tests available (several states will only test health care workers or first responders (essentials) or folks being hospitalized. You can listen to the political talk coming out of the rose garden/press briefing room all you want, but physicians/public health officials and scientists who are the boots on the ground will confirm what I have written. The tests give scientists the highly valuable and very necessary data to make informed/wise policy decisions. Allow me to show you one critical way testing is linked to social distancing. People can have the virus in their body and carry it (incubation) for up to maybe 15-20 days before displaying symptoms (called the lag period). Testing in geographic areas where few cases have been diagnosed may have a bunch of people in the incubation stage (maybe it's 3 days after a trip to FL for spring break, or on Padre Island or mardi gras) and there aren't many people showing symptoms. Testing these folks (a sample of people) might tell us if we should expect an outbreak in several days. Enacting social distancing techniqies like Staying-at-home might then be appropriate. Testing people before or after they show symptoms also allows us to isolate those persons (stay home) and trace contacts they may have recently experienced (then test the contact person). So testing is a tool.

The best tool available at this time (until we get more test kits) is social distancing (stay home and make sure you are 6 feet away from any one you interact with. If they cough or sneeze, get away, avoid contact if you must go out, and wear a mask (if you can get one). Wash your hands frequently for 20 seconds with lots of soap (say the Lord's Prayer as a timer) and don't shake hands or fist bump (stay away 6 feet) .In an ideal world, we would love to test large numbers of people in a population in search of infected persons.
The problem .... too many persons WON"T stay home or away from others when they leave their home. If we don't S-A-H, it will get very, very bad with regard to the rate of infection and, ultimately, the number of dead.

Note -
It is believed the incubation period for this disease is about 1-14 days (one study suggest it could be as long as 24 days - I used 20 days in my example above). Persons usually begin to show synptoms around day 5; however, you can contract the disease and be asymptomatic (show no symptons but be shedding the virus for others to contract.). It's highly infectious and the main method of transmission is when an infected person sneezes or coughs and expells misty droplets into the air (under the right conditions the live virus can literally suspend in the air for up to a couple of hours. If a person walked up a small flight of stairs and was breathing hard and you stood very close to that person (think elevators) (especially if you faced him/her), you might contract the disease. The virus can live on copper for 4 hours, cardboard for up to 24 hours, hard surfaces (wood/stainless steel) for 2-3 days and plastic for a couple days (be especially careful with plastic bags - don't use used ones).

Not too pleasant is it; but, if we all pull together, we can eventually whip this thing. Sorry for the long post.

 

[Buckly]

I disagree. The experts of which you speak have spoken. You will not be tested if you show no symptoms period. If you are sick you will not be tested period. Stay at home is the recommendation from your experts The doctors and hospitals do not want to see you anywhere around them. NY the epicenter will only test people now that require hospitalization. This saves PPE from being used used for testing. Assume you have it, especially if your sick. There are literally millions of tests out there. What does that tell you. Basically nothing. again assume you have it. The experts have spoken, the vast majority of people will not even feel sick. The rest might be mild to medium. The fear mongers out there, Yes were all going to die. The experts have spoken. You’ll come out of this just fine. Just an FYI. In NYC the epicenter right now there’s been less than 300 deaths In 3 weeks. In NYC. 400-500 people a day die for other reasons. That’s a total of 10,000 people over the last 3 weeks as opposed to less than 300 for the 3 week period. This is the epicenter.

 

[Baker]

Beautiful message from Bill Gates*

Subject:
*What is the Corona/ Covid-19 Virus Really Teaching us?*

I’m a strong believer that there is a spiritual purpose behind everything that happens, whether that is what we perceive as being good or being bad.

As I meditate upon this, I want to share with you what I feel the Corona/ Covid-19 virus is really doing to us:

1) It is reminding us that we are all equal, regardless of our culture, religion, occupation, financial situation or how famous we are. This disease treats us all equally, perhaps we should to. If you don’t believe me,
just ask Tom Hanks.

2) It is reminding us that we are all connected and something that affects one person has an effect on another. It is reminding us that the false borders that we have put up have little value as this virus does not need a passport. It is reminding us, by oppressing us for a short time, of those in this world whose whole life is spent in oppression.

3) It is reminding us of how precious our health is and how we have moved to neglect it through eating nutrient poor manufactured food and drinking water that is contaminated with chemicals upon chemicals. If we don’t look after our health, we will, of course, get sick.

4) It is reminding us of the shortness of life and of what is most important for us to do, which is to help each other, especially those who are old or sick. Our purpose is not to buy toilet roll.

5) It is reminding us of how materialistic our society has become and how, when in times of difficulty, we remember that it’s the essentials that we need (food, water, medicine)
as opposed to the luxuries that we sometimes unnecessarily give value to.

6) It is reminding us of how important our family and home life is and how much we have neglected this. It is forcing us back into our houses so we can rebuild them into our home and
to strengthen our family unit.

7) It is reminding us that our true work is not our job, that is what we do, not what we were created to do.
Our true work is to look after each other, to protect each other and to be of benefit to one another.

8) It is reminding us to keep our egos in check. It is reminding us that no matter how great we think we are or how great others think we are,
a virus can bring our world to a standstill.

9) It is reminding us that the power of freewill is in our hands. We can choose to cooperate and help each other, to share, to give, to help and to support each other or we can choose to be selfish, to hoard, to look after
only our self. Indeed, it is difficulties that bring out our true colors.

10) It is reminding us that we can be patient, or we can panic. We can either understand that this type of situation has happened many times before in history and will pass, or we can panic and see it as the end of the world and, consequently, cause ourselves more harm than good.

11) It is reminding us that this can either be an end or a new beginning. This can be a time of reflection and understanding, where we learn from our mistakes, or it can be the start of a cycle which will continue until we finally learn the lesson we are meant to.

12) It is reminding us that this Earth is sick. It is reminding us that we need to look at the rate of deforestation just as urgently as we look at the speed at which toilet rolls are disappearing off of shelves. We are sick because our home is sick.

13) It is reminding us that after every difficulty, there is always ease. Life is cyclical, and this is just a phase in this great cycle. We do not need to panic; this too shall pass.

14) Whereas many see the Corona/ Covid-19 virus as a great disaster, I prefer to see it as a *great corrector*

It is sent to remind us of the important lessons that we seem to have forgotten and it is up to us if we will learn them or not.

 

[chickenlittle]

Not testing and assuming people are sick is just a practical use today of limited resources. It's not like the "experts" don't want to test more. We should be building up test capacity as fast as we can so we can test to figure out who is currently infected/sick and who has recovered. That gives you the knowledge to isolate/quarantine or not.

 

[4wanderingeyes]

Well the nice thing is, the NBA players and staff atleast got tested, some a couple times now. Seems you just need fame, or money, and you can get tested anytime, anywhere, regardless of if you have symptoms.

 

[jsasker007]

Shows everyone how "equal" we all really are.

 

[Buckly]

Not testing and assuming people are sick is just a practical use today of limited resources. It's not like the "experts" don't want to test more. We should be building up test capacity as fast as we can so we can test to figure out who is currently infected/sick and who has recovered. That gives you the knowledge to isolate/quarantine or not.

Everybody is isolating and social distancing. The antibody test for those that have recovered are just not available yet. Soon I hope. I still don’t see the benefit of testing well people. Or even sick people that are home and doing fine. Tests don’t cure you and don’t prevent either. Those are the recommendations. From the experts. Once antibody tests and instant or rapid tests start coming online then that opens up more benefits. But still nothing you can really do but isolate if your sick.

 

[chickenlittle]

The experts are making recommendations based on the best use of resources at the moment. Right now the recommendation is for everyone to isolate regardless of whether they have Covid-19 or not. If the capacity for high volume testing becomes available, the recommendation for how to manage the outbreak would change.

 

[roymunson]

Well the nice thing is, the NBA players and staff atleast got tested, some a couple times now. Seems you just need fame, or money, and you can get tested anytime, anywhere, regardless of if you have symptoms.

to be fair, there have probably been more NBA cases per capita than probably anywhere else. And it's a small group that's been exposed to each other in a short window of time.

In case you guys were confused, not everyone in the country is treated equal. Did anyone think they were? Generally you just try to deal with it and make the best of it.

 

[BuckSutherland]

My wife said they are only testing healthcare workers or those that are being admitted to the hospital where she works. Everyone else that exhibiting symptoms is sent home and told to self quarantine. On Tuesday, the MN dept of health only ran 150 test. They have rapid test on order at the wife's hospital, but its brand new technology and takes time to get there. They have the regular test available, but the state isn't getting them processed.

 

[jsasker007]

to be fair, there have probably been more NBA cases per capita than probably anywhere else. And it's a small group that's been exposed to each other in a short window of time.

In case you guys were confused, not everyone in the country is treated equal. Did anyone think they were? Generally you just try to deal with it and make the best of it.

Now how could anyone be confused in this fully transparent world we're living in?

 

[BuckSutherland]

I am listening to a show on the radio. They were reading statistics off the John Hopkins latest update:

-4% of cases worldwide require hospitalization down from 5% yesterday and down from percentages in the teens a few weeks ago.
-13% of cases in the United States require hospitalization


Just a couple thoughts from talking with my wife and what she is seeing at her hospital:
-Most people with symptoms just get sent home if their stats are acceptable without being tested. If they were all tested it would bring the rate of hospitalization and the death rate down dramatically. The other day they had 25-30 people through the ER with all the symptoms and only tested 2.
-Everyone that she has seen admitted has some type of underlying condition
-Random people dont even know they have this cause they have no symptoms
-The amount of people that have this and are walking around must be MANY MANY times more than those confirmed
-No amount of government intervention can stop this since its already everywhere
-How in the hell did this just go POOF in China and disappear?

 

[ToddG]

Does anyone trust China to tell the truth? I suspect they are a lot worse off then they telling the rest of the world

 

[S.T.Fanatic]

I think everyone is overreacting.

 

[4wanderingeyes]

I am thinking that this is wide spread, and has been going around for over a month in the US, and more people have had it already before we even heard about it coming here. More then likely in China most people have already gotten it right away, and they recovered, and have formed an immunity to it after already having it. I personally think almost everyone will get it regardless of how hard we try to isolate. All we are doing is just prolonging it by hiding. Sure not having everyone in the hospitals at one time, and pushing it back some gives the medical facilities some time to get the equipment needed to take care of some of the sicker ones.

 

[roymunson]

One of the more frightening things to me is, If it spreads like this and can't be contained, what would happen if this was a legitimately horrible bug? What if its something that had the same rate of spread but had a 40% kill rate. Don't tell me the boys in the middle east aren't already thinking about that.

Yikes

 

[Natty Bumppo]

I am thinking that this is wide spread, and has been going around for over a month in the US, and more people have had it already before we even heard about it coming here. More then likely in China most people have already gotten it right away, and they recovered, and have formed an immunity to it after already having it. I personally think almost everyone will get it regardless of how hard we try to isolate. All we are doing is just prolonging it by hiding. Sure not having everyone in the hospitals at one time, and pushing it back some gives the medical facilities some time to get the equipment needed to take care of some of the sicker ones.

Completely agree. Think about the time lag in China from the first dude who got it from the pangolin, to the time the Chinese were aware of this thing being a new virus and not simply the common flu, to the time that they announced it to the world. Are we talking 1, 2, 3 months? That's a lot of time for this thing to spread across the globe.