Coronavirus: The cure can’t be worse than the problem!

[Erik88]

I really thing a big issue right now is that faith in the media is exceptionally low and they(the media) deserve that. But I'll say this, if you don't trust the media perhaps you can at least trust the medical professionals. This was posted on another forum I visit and the author is a nurse in NY.  I tend to beleive him.

 

 

[peejman]

19 minutes ago, MacGyver said:

The math is the truth. Here it is:

• Jan. 14  — 0
• Jan. 21  — 1
• Jan. 28 — 5
• Feb. 4   — 11
• Feb. 11  — 14
• Feb. 18 — 25
• Feb. 25 — 59
• Mar. 3   — 125
• Mar. 10  — 1,004
• Mar. 17  — 5,902
• Mar. 24 — 53,478
 

These are confirmed cases as of each Tuesday here in America. Notice a pattern?

There are still a bunch of unknowns. We don’t know if mortality here will rival Italy’s. There are a lot of variables. People smoke there a lot more than here. They have more ICU beds per capita than we do. Who knows? We won’t until we have time to look back.

But, on the track we’re on - unless you see those numbers start to go the other way -  I expect that by the end of next month - this will rival a war we’ve not seen in a few generations in terms of casualties.

Everyone is likely to know someone who has died. 

We’re still screwing around playing partisan games and trying to assign blame instead of focusing on scaling testing.

That’s the only thing that’s going that is going to let us start fighting effectively. 

To be fair, practically no one in the US knew Covid-19 existed until late February, testing for it only became widespread here a  couple weeks ago (was only available where I live a few days ago), and it takes a week to get the results.

The rate of tests administered is increasing at an exponential rate, so of course the rate of positives is also increasing exponentially.  I don't discount how dangerous the virus is and how fast it spreads (Italy has made that pretty clear), but the data here is woefully incomplete at this point.

I think the data could/should be normalized by the total number of tests administered and/or the population of the general area to give a better representation of how widespread it is. 

[Erik88]

11 minutes ago, peejman said:

To be fair, practically no one in the US knew Covid-19 existed until late February,

That's not really accurate. The CDC was already rolling out a test at that point but screwed it up.

"As my colleagues Alexis Madrigal and Robinson Meyer have reported, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention developed and distributed a faulty test in February. Independent labs created alternatives, but were mired in bureaucracy from the FDA. In a crucial month when the American caseload shot into the tens of thousands, only hundreds of people were tested. That a biomedical powerhouse like the U.S. should so thoroughly fail to create a very simple diagnostic test was, quite literally, unimaginable. “I’m not aware of any simulations that I or others have run where we [considered] a failure of testing,” says Alexandra Phelan of Georgetown University, who works on legal and policy issues related to infectious diseases."

 

https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/608719/

[4Freedom]

On 3/24/2020 at 3:32 PM, DaveTN said:

No matter how much he is hated; it does matter what the President of the United States says. If he has the support of Medical professionals; people will go along with what he says.

Will asking people to go back to work cause the economy to recover? Not completely, people won’t be vacationing, traveling, or flying; but they may have an income.

I’m a 65 year old former smoker. So I’m high risk. I am retired and work part time from home. Would I be willing to go to work and risk getting a virus that kills ~1% of those infected, if it would help keep our economy from collapsing? Absolutely. My wife woks for a food company and their employees are “essential” and are working. My wife is putting herself at risk to help. I couldn’t ask that of her and me not be willing to do it.

I am not disagreeing with everything you wrote, but the mortality rate is almost 10% in Italy and approaching that in Spain.  In England it is 5% and Germany is very likely hiding their mortality rates and labeling the deaths according to whatever pre-existing conditions people had.   And, if America runs out of life saving equipment the mortality rate the mortality rate will go up.  New York City is going to exhausted of all needed equipment and I think we will see a surge in the mortality rate and even infection rate as our hospital workers will be forced to be unprotected.

 

My brother is working as a medical assistant/CNA in Portland, OR at OHSU that has less cases than places like Seattle and New York and he has told me even there he sometimes does not get all the protective equipment he needs due to shortages and that the staff are highly stressed.  Also there are a shortage of nurses, as now many have to quit their jobs to stay home and take care of their children.  Others are getting sick as well and no longer can treat patients.  

How many diseases have sent our 45 year old politicians to the hospital to be put on breathing equipment?  Your average flu doesn't do that.  

That being said, the interview with Dr. Michael Osterholm (one of most intelligent disease specialists I have yet to hear speak) with Joe Rogan was a very sobering and yes, fearsome, in some ways of the potential reality of this epidemic.  I do think that we need an adequate testing system that is easily available, inexpensive and can be distributed to almost everyone in the country before we open up our economy. 

If we open up our economy it should be in little steps and very limited.  Major cities like Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and most certainly New York must certainly avoid any situation where large numbers of people are grouped togehter.  

Our country wasn't prepared for this epidemic and we can deny it all we want, but we just never thought any tragedy of this level could ever hit our secure borders. And, now we have to reap the results of it and we should only be thankful this is not a worse disease that could have crippled us for generations.  At least we will have different priorities in the future now and be prepared for our next pandemic, especially if an Open Borders type of leader gets elected who wants unchecked borders and more illegal immigrants with very little in the way of monitoring.  In our world that is overpopulated, open borders, where people travel everywhere and where people still have poor dietary and hygiene habits, these diseases will only become more prevalent not less.

 

 

 

 

I don't think our death rate will be as high as Italy. Contrary to media propaganda, their health system is not better than ours, they do not have as many ICUs as the USA has , as well they have much limited number of highly trained medical staff , as well as a much older population and a significant larger amount of smokers.  But, I still think we will definitely be seeing higher mortality rates than we are now once we have equipment and staff shortages, which will be inevitable in the current state.

Edited March 26, 2020 by 4Freedom

[peejman]

45 minutes ago, Erik88 said:

That's not really accurate. The CDC was already rolling out a test at that point but screwed it up.

Fair enough. I'll amend my statement with "practically no one outside the medical community...". 

[deerslayer]

12 hours ago, Omega said:

I would like to go on record to say that I am in the "this is total BS" camp.  I don't know why this has been spun so out of proportion, and all over the world at that.  Sure, I know this is a dangerous virus, and that it has been killing folks, but it is still not rising to the Flu numbers or the H1N1, and this happens every dang year.  There is NEVER a rush to get TP or other supplies each year, so what makes this one so special?  My guess is that the MSM, worldwide apparently, and TPTB have decided a crisis was due, and this was as good as any.  I am not saying that you should not take precautions, especially if you are in one of the high risk categories, but nothing more than your standard precautions should be more than adequate.

 

Flu:

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-estimates.htm

2019-2020

390,000 – 710,000 Hospitalizations

23,000 – 59,000 Deaths in the US

H1N1: 

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/2009-h1n1-pandemic.html

Since they found it in 09' (2009 through 2018)

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/burden-of-h1n1.html

936,000 Hospitalizations

75,000 Deaths in the US

COVID-19 (as of 4pm Yesterday)

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/cases-in-us.html

Total cases: 44,183

Total deaths: 544

Jurisdictions reporting cases: 54 (50 states, District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, and US Virgin Islands)

 

Nearly 2800 CV patients in Italy have died in the last four days.  If it gets that bad in the US, that’s the equivalent of about 15,000 US deaths after extrapolating the numbers of deaths to the US population.  That would be a bigger deal than the flu.  

[DWARREN123]

Seems we go thru something like this every so often so it should not be a new problem but every time it seems like no one or few remember the last time.

We, as a nation, do not get this upset over things we can help with such drunk driving, drugs and other illegal activities. 

[QuackerSmacker]

On 3/24/2020 at 8:48 PM, Fourtyfive said:

Messe, I like it.

Does anybdy pey attntion anymor wen dey hit the kyboard?

[Chucktshoes]

9 minutes ago, QuackerSmacker said:

Does anybdy pey attntion anymor wen dey hit the kyboard?

Bo. 

[btq96r]

On 3/24/2020 at 5:51 PM, Garufa said:

The White House’s stimulus package is now 6 trillion dollars.

That number includes what the fed is pumping into the system though their magic tricks.  So $6 Trillion isn't what's being authorized by Congress through deficit spending we'll have to eventually pay back in future budgets, *only* $2 Trillion or so comes from there.

[btq96r]

5 hours ago, MacGyver said:

The math is the truth. Here it is:

• Jan. 14  — 0
• Jan. 21  — 1
• Jan. 28 — 5
• Feb. 4   — 11
• Feb. 11  — 14
• Feb. 18 — 25
• Feb. 25 — 59
• Mar. 3   — 125
• Mar. 10  — 1,004
• Mar. 17  — 5,902
• Mar. 24 — 53,478
 

These are confirmed cases as of each Tuesday here in America. Notice a pattern?

This on steroids.

[Omega]

2 hours ago, deerslayer said:

Nearly 2800 CV patients in Italy have died in the last four days.  If it gets that bad in the US, that’s the equivalent of about 15,000 US deaths after extrapolating the numbers of deaths to the US population.  That would be a bigger deal than the flu.  

No, that would just be another typical flu season.  I'll give you this though, these numbers are on top of the flu numbers, so yea many deaths. 

Only time will tell, but once this is over, like H1N1, these deaths will be lost in memory next year.  I mean, I lived through the whole H1N1 timeframe and can't recall all those deaths, how can I forget that over 12,000 people died that year...oh yea, it wasn't repeated on every news, radio, and print 24/7.

[deerslayer]

6 hours ago, Omega said:

No, that would just be another typical flu season.  I'll give you this though, these numbers are on top of the flu numbers, so yea many deaths. 

Only time will tell, but once this is over, like H1N1, these deaths will be lost in memory next year.  I mean, I lived through the whole H1N1 timeframe and can't recall all those deaths, how can I forget that over 12,000 people died that year...oh yea, it wasn't repeated on every news, radio, and print 24/7.

I don’t recall any flu season that killed 15,000 Americans in four days.  If that continued for a year, there would be over 1.3 million dead.  

Edited March 26, 2020 by deerslayer

[DWARREN123]

Did not Italy stop treating those over 60?

[jgradyc]

I'm really disappointed in our Center for Disease Control. They had one job. They failed. I'm equally disappointed in the FDA, but they've been a sock puppet for big pharma for so long that it's not surprising. Meanwhile, the Surgeon General (and Fauci) are stuck in the 400 BC dogma of the Hippocratic Oath. We continue to follow the mantra of clinical trials when the Chinese and Italians are actively treating cases with off label drugs, IV vitamin C, malaria drugs + zinc, and more. 

On 23Mar, the Surgeon General said, "it's not practical to think that we're going to treat our way out of this problem with new drugs ... we need to lower demand" for treatments with social distancing." 

As a former military officer, social distancing is the equivalent to retreating. It buys time to gather resources to attack. It buys time to develop new treatments. Social distancing is a tactic; it's not a solution.

Edited March 26, 2020 by jgradyc

[Erik88]

34 minutes ago, jgradyc said:

I'm really disappointed in our Center for Disease Control. They had one job. They failed

No kidding. That article I posted was extremely long but eye opening. Apparently our experts run scenarios where we determine how we handle various pandemics. We actually had not even envisioned a scenario where we couldnt even get the testing right. Other countries had no issues testing their population. Iceland is testing nearly everyone and they have found 50% of patients that test positive are not showing symptoms.

 Prior to this it was believed the US would handle a pandemic better than any other nation. Now we look idiots. I imagine some people at the CDC will be looking for new jobs soon.

"On the Global Health Security Index, a report card that grades every country on its pandemic preparedness, the United States has a score of 83.5—the world’s highest. Rich, strong, developed, America is supposed to be the readiest of nations. That illusion has been shattered. Despite months of advance warning as the virus spread in other countries, when America was finally tested by COVID-19, it failed."

[Alleycat72]

We know about probably 95% of the people that die from it and a small percentage of people that have/had it. So many people have had flu like symptoms and tested negative for flu this year. The numbers are also skewed by the rate of testing. As testing increases exponentially so will the positive test results. The actual rate of new cases should be the difference between the two. 

[Erik88]

48 minutes ago, deerslayer said:

I don’t recall any flu season that killed 15,000 Americans in four days.  If that continued for a year, there would be over 1.3 million dead.  

Bingo. The amount of daily deaths is doubling every 48 hours. If people aren't understanding the numbers they will soon enough.

Chart below shows confirmes cases/total deaths/daily deaths.

 

 

[MacGyver]

3.2 million first time jobless claims last week. That’s a giant number - and way larger than expected. 

[Lumber_Jack]

1 minute ago, MacGyver said:

3.2 million first time jobless claims last week. That’s a giant number - and way larger than expected. 

only like 2.2mil more than exp .  Previous largest jump was like 700k.  Funny thing is futures are still positive and way off lows from overnight.  We'll see what the market does in about 15mins

[btq96r]

4 hours ago, MacGyver said:

3.2 million first time jobless claims last week. That’s a giant number - and way larger than expected. 

Did that even include self-employed like contractors and "gig economy"  types who are 1099's?  They're going to be walloped in all this.

There are probably backlogs of people waiting to apply on top of that, and those who still have part of a paycheck coming at the end of the month before they face their first month without one and turn to unemployment insurance.

[MacGyver]

21 minutes ago, btq96r said:

Did that even include self-employed like contractors and "gig economy"  types who are 1099's?  They're going to be walloped in all this.

There are probably backlogs of people waiting to apply on top of that, and those who still have part of a paycheck coming at the end of the month before they face their first month without one and turn to unemployment insurance.

No, that number doesn’t include contractors or 1099 folks.

Several state systems spent good portions of the week down last week due to crashing from demand.

For reference - and this number wasn’t  wholly representative then either - peak Great Recession saw about 8 million out of work - but that was accumulated over more than a year. 

[Chucktshoes]

Yeah, best I can tell , this does nothing for me as an IC. I am ok with that. I’m still working and doing well. 

[DaveTN]

4 minutes ago, Chucktshoes said:

Yeah, best I can tell , this does nothing for me as an IC. I am ok with that. I’m still working and doing well. 

And we all thank you. Truck drivers are a very import part of this issue, and our ability to eat. 

 

 

 

But you can rest assured the day this is over, we will be back to hating you and flipping you off.

[Chucktshoes]

4 minutes ago, DaveTN said:

And we all thank you. Truck drivers are a very import part of this issue, and our ability to eat. 

 

 

 

But you can rest assured the day this is over, we will be back to hating you and flipping you off.

That’s OK. I have to say I have quite enjoyed not having you bunch of idiots on the road lately.