hats off!
SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)
- Thread starter Don't Kill Bill
- Start date
Trump pushes FDA limits in rush for coronavirus medicines
Link to story here.
An interesting primer, quite technical though:
Link to story here.
I can't decide how I feel about this, apprehensive but excited.
An interesting primer, quite technical though:
As a Singaporean, I would say the SARs experience was crucial. After SARs, the government developed a system called DORSCON and laid out plans and strategies to handle epidemics. That way, we don't need waste time on the drawing board whenever something happens. Government agencies also have drills every now ans then, that helped improve our readiness.
The government also set aside funds to build our infrastructure. By a great stroke of luck, a new center for communicable diseases that can house infected patients was just opened months before the outbreak, and immediately put to good use.
At the societal level, the memory of SARS is still fresh and everyone knows the seriousness of an outbreak.
It seems like you've just been told, to be honest.
Very stressful day at the house with the missus being a teacher.
She had a briefing from the head that all teachers are to use Microsoft Teams to run virtual classes (kids already abusing this, calling teachers 24/7), lesson work to be provided to all as they normally would be, just on an online format, plus a week of supervising those kids still going in. Her week just so happens to be the half term week so the immediate question is, does she get the week back in lieu?
Worst is that friends who teach at other schools have been given NO teaching commitments! Simply attendance at the school for 1 day each week!
A complete lack of national organisation on this. I’ve pushed her to go to the union rep today as it surely isn’t right that members of the same unions would have such vastly contrasting workload expectations from their schools.
She had a briefing from the head that all teachers are to use Microsoft Teams to run virtual classes (kids already abusing this, calling teachers 24/7), lesson work to be provided to all as they normally would be, just on an online format, plus a week of supervising those kids still going in. Her week just so happens to be the half term week so the immediate question is, does she get the week back in lieu?
Worst is that friends who teach at other schools have been given NO teaching commitments! Simply attendance at the school for 1 day each week!
A complete lack of national organisation on this. I’ve pushed her to go to the union rep today as it surely isn’t right that members of the same unions would have such vastly contrasting workload expectations from their schools.
How are so few old people catching it, young population or are they just staying at home?In the death cases that I know more of (regional newspapers) that was just not the case. And despite some users who like conspiracy theories that does just not match to the usual German overly correct prussian character.
In Germany the first cases from January were pretty well tracked. The second wave came with travellers, from skiing hotspots in Austria etc. Mainly with young people!
That was after the first 648 cases about ten days ago. If you take some days between discovery and death...
All of e.g. Bavarias 15 or 18 death cases were between 67 and 99.
I actually expect Germany to cope better with the virus then most of the other countries because of the organisation, social structure, discpline and health system.
And yes, there is always some people that do not catch the seriousness of the situation.
I'm sorry. I've been calling friends and family and doing therapy by phone (not everyone has money to do this I know) and it's made me feel less alone, though hasn't helped with some other things (rage, anxiety). I don't know how it is with young people (first time I've ever not included myself in that, 33) but people my age and up were constantly on the phone until 10 years ago so are all used to hour long phone calls and they go by in a snap.
All of California is now in a Stay at Home state. 40m people. Hopefully they’ll stop people coming in from other states too to effectively slow down the virus transmission rates.
If it works to really reduce the case load then I’m all for it. Not sure how long , beyond say 14 days, it’ll last though.
If it works to really reduce the case load then I’m all for it. Not sure how long , beyond say 14 days, it’ll last though.
Got sent through videos yesterday of Army trucks coming through the port of Belfast, not sure of the significance of it yet but could this be start of lockdown and preparation for it. Government wont risk saying anything to start mass hysteria and further panic buying.
On the subject of kids working at home for school, not all of them have access to internet or a computer to be able to do the work on. How can they educate themselves when they dont have these things?
On the subject of kids working at home for school, not all of them have access to internet or a computer to be able to do the work on. How can they educate themselves when they dont have these things?
You mean it won't happen in the US? Large parts of the rest of the world won't be able to mitigate it.
When it comes to efficiency I raise my hats of to Singapore, the best in the world in terms of readiness.
But to be fair, it's easier to be efficient when you're rich and only have to deal with a city wide country with a 3 million inhabitants.
Your neighbour (my country) Indonesia can only cross their fingers and brace for impact.
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How they eliminated the virus in Vò, Veneto, Italy, where the first Italian victim of COVID-19 died: https://www.theguardian.com/comment...ed-coronavirus-mass-testing-covid-19-italy-vo
Sounds like a solution for small isolated areas, but the logistics of this now look impossible.
Sounds like a solution for small isolated areas, but the logistics of this now look impossible.
On the Imperial College model, its worth noting that Bill Gates said the researchers he's working with think its flawed and too negative.
4 or 5 of the deaths in Bavaria happened in a nursing home in Würzburg. One of the caregivers brought it in after a holiday in Austria or Italy, when I remember that correctly. Several of the staff were infected, too.
I guess you cannot really stop the infection of old people, especially in families. You just can minimize that.
The hospital in 10 miles distance has three Corona cases, all middle age - one in intensive care without intubation. 5 of the staff infected.
Good to know that the Times is no longer part of the quality press.
Let's try these sources then:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...alist-wouldnt-stay-quiet-covid-19-coronavirus
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/06/li-wenliang-coronavirus-whistleblower-doctor-profile
In that case, we are in some agreement.
I'm not claiming that they are not doing their best to deal with the outbreak - at this stage.
My criticism is focused on the way they handled the outbreak in its early stages. More transparency and openness on their side would have saved many, many lives - not just in China, but all around the world as well.
Whilst technically that can be true, far more damning things can be said about nearly any other country in the world in that regard. It's a silly argument because of that.
You really think some local authorities asking a doctor to hush himself, by that period - bear in mind the entire timeline of discovery of disease and it's implications - made that much of a difference?
Compared with the hesitation and fluffing around in a country like Italy that's incredibly minor, given the information we (the west) already had available. And we've yet to see how those same levels of irresponsibility will fare in countries like Germany, UK or US.
It's not that quick though, because there are nearly 8 billion people on the planet, with hundreds of thousands of them dying every day. The numbers involved in the coronavirus are still tiny.
It's interesting to see how different people view the situation. I was reading the comment section of Der Spiegel yesterday (very left/green leaning normally, not sure about average age) and was surprised by how critical many users were of Germany's drastic measures (which compared to other countries aren't very drastic at all). I've been thinking about this and how we deal with the situation going forward. The average age of people who have died from Covid-19 in Italy is 79.5 and the number of young people without pre-existing conditions dying is almost negligable. The exceptions make the news of course and serve as a reminder that nobody is completely save but even then it turns out these people had been ill before (such as in the unfortunate case of the 34-year old in America who was a cancer survivor). So in hindsight, wouldn't the best strategy have been to completely isolate the high-risk groups and let the young develop some kind of herd immunity while continuing normal life as much as possible? I'm not saying what is right or wrong (nor do I know) so I would like to hear some people who are better educated on this subject.
Teachers are obviously a crucial part of the national effort on this, I'm not sure some moaning they get less time off is a good look to be honest.
The young person may transmit the infection to an older/high risk person. The govt/authorities would still have to identify and make space for the high risk people.
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I would like to loan a baby just for this kind of fun in these times.
After a while it probably will be like this as economically it is a too big burden to keep it the way it is now until there is a vaccination. Some of the preventive actions will be kept for awhile but not all.
The shutdowns right now are made as the health systems needs time to be prepared to cope with the whole situation and the extension of the virus has to be slowed down.
You cannot keep the risk population really save as there always is contact with the normal world.
I think they've tried to go as close to that as they can at the moment (with the "strongly advise" stuff). With home delivery services working as they do now, they've still got to shop. Realistically, giving the amount of time we're talking about, they also need to get outdoors and get at least some exercise.
Some of the most vulnerable will live with younger family members or in care homes or in supported living. Others will rely on carers (paid or family) visiting every day for support with routine stuff like getting out of bed etc. Others will require (physical) checkups/treatments for other medical reasons.
If the German figures are any guide, the older ones are trying to protect themselves, presumably by social distancing. From the ones I've spoken to here, most of them expect to do the same in the UK - though I do keep hearing phrases like "after this weekend/Mother's Day" for the tougher concepts (like don't let the family visit).
And of course, right now - the weekly shopping trip may require trips to multiple shops, or even at multiple times given the number of empty shelves. In some places it'll require queues as well.
For Irish folks here, a pretty stark warning.
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My place of work slowly allowing people to work from home, I'll be off home today with a box of stuff to commence from Monday, no idea when we'll all see our colleagues again.
I also had to go across 3 supermarkets last night, to get a weeks shop. Buying for myself, my mrs and my 18 month old daughter. No nappies, no milk, anywhere.
Crazy times.
I also had to go across 3 supermarkets last night, to get a weeks shop. Buying for myself, my mrs and my 18 month old daughter. No nappies, no milk, anywhere.
Crazy times.
China reporting a second successive day without any new cases, there is good news out there.
Also, people are not respecting social distancing so I have decided to cough anytime someone comes near.
Also, people are not respecting social distancing so I have decided to cough anytime someone comes near.
The danger will come if there remains no clear leadership and the deaths start mounting.
Then people will be as scared as they are panicked, and a stray cough or standing to close will start fights.
Young people may not die but that doesn't mean they don't get seriously ill. There are otherwise perfectly healthy teenagers and 20 somethings in intensive care in Italy. If we just let everybody get it we would soon overflow hospitals even with the young population.
Bleak. It's appalling that such a rich country has such a poorly equipped healthcare system, but I guess we knew that, which is why we are taking such measures early on compared to other European countries.
Thanks man!
Is ireland not one of the poorest mainstream European countries?
One of the key Italy patients, one of the first handful to get and spread it, is 33 and a marathon runner, extremely fit and healthy. Last I heard he was being kept alive by a vent and various HIV drugs.
I think that the most dangerous idea out there is that only the already ill or old are at risk.
As far as I can see this isn't so. Their worst case prediction is 2.2 million Americans dying in an unmitigated epidemic (top of page 7). That's not the worst that can happen (since it assumes a constant ifr of 0.9% and they admit they fail to take into account excess deaths due to overwhelmed health systems), but it is the worst case scenario they put a figure on - the actual worst case scenario is left to our imagination
My main concern regarding the study is based on what seems to me (so could very well be wrong) a critical oversight in its evaluation of suppression/mitigation strategies. It seems to assume that ICU "surge capacity" is the number of empty units available exclusively to covid-19 patients. In the UK these units run at an average 80% of surge capacity year round. Cancelling elective surgeries will reduce this figure but I'm not sure we can completely clear the decks.
This doesn't really change the best strategy though, which is still, and obviously, to go as hard as possible at containing the epidemic to keep it as close to nhs capacity as possible while pouring every available resource into securing supply lines, making sure our front line heath staff are protected, expediting basic ICU training and building ICU's like motherfeckers.
He is 38 but otherwise yes, he was on a ventilator for almost a month. He is apparently talking now and out of ICU and maybe he can help piece together where he got it from.
Yeah and I'll believe that when I see real evidence rather than the word of the Chinese authorities.
A month on a ventilator! That's awful.
Had to drive across London to Reading for work, and to be honest it took the same time as usual. There is still so much going on.
What?