Virus supplies worldwide comparison

Cathie G

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I saw this too, and this is one of the many things that makes me wonder how many people all over the world have been exposed. Actually, a better question might be how many people world wide have NOT been exposed. Probably an easier number to count.

5 million people in and out of ground zero over 6 weeks after this bug is known to have been out and circulating around the population. I'm pretty certain that a large number of those people brought some hitchhikers home with them.
I'm not certain of the December 2019 date as the earliest time it was traced to either. I was told by a healthcare tech, that critical care people (like me) were testing negative for the flue back in November. Even though they had flue symptoms. I'm a little nobody. She had no reason to lie to me...and is not a dummy either.
 

ManAlive85

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I never cease to be amazed by the degree of paranoia that is shared by some members of this forum, particularly around this subject. As responsible adults, of course we should distrust the media and be cynical of our governments but the idea that this is some kind of orchestrated global conspiracy is simply absurd.

I’m a Brit and often feel like something of an outsider looking in during these discussions. I haven’t been closely following what’s going on in the US other than the headline stats and the press statements from your great leader. From what I’ve seen though, it’s pretty clear that tangerine chump has got no better idea what his government should be doing right now than the leader of any other country in the world. Broadly speaking, authorities, just like us, are blindly scrambling to take what they hope will be the least damaging course of action in an unprecedented time of global crisis and whilst I would be shocked if some governments didn’t do their best to find a way to make the chaos work to their advantage where they can, I find the assertion that this is in some way a calculated overreaction to a minor health scare frankly ludicrous.

I completely understand that people are scared and angry about loosing their income and their liberties but I simply can’t see what angle you’d have to approach this from to see how a group or administration might be benefitting from this scenario, unless they own shares in a hand sanitiser factory. I’m no economist but surely the fiscal carnage caused by these indefinite shutdowns far, far exceed the benefit to any government from enacting these measures?

So many of the statistics, particularly death rates, are at this stage broadly meaningless and will remain so for weeks until this crisis at least begins to stabilise. However those who assert that COVID-19 is no more serious than seasonal flu are misguided, it is not only significantly more contagious, it has proven to be many times more deadly, in particular amongst the elderly. Seasonal flu doesn’t decimate entire care homes, for example, as has been reported in Spain and Italy. Nor does it cause hospitals to be so overwhelmed with critically ill patients that people have to be airlifted en masse to neighbouring countries for emergency treatment. And with regard to whether a patient dies from COVID-19 or pneumonia or apparently unrelated seasonal flu, once people are dying because they can’t get a hospital bed due to healthcare systems being overrun, it doesn’t matter whether the cause of death is appendicitis, it’s ultimately an extra death caused by the effects of the coronavirus.

Here in London we are at the start of what will be a steep upswing in cases and hospitals are now reaching maximum capacity for critical care patients. Fatalities are beginning to grow noticeably and are in line with the predicted trend of doubling every 2-3 days. Only time will tell but, from what I’ve seen, I suspect the US is in a very similar position. I think the suggestion that most people have already been exposed to the illness is extraordinarily optimistic and that the disease still has many more weeks or months of chaos to wreak until 50-60% of the population have been infected and it becomes safe for normal activities to resume.

There is no way of knowing how this crisis will come to pass but if there is a chance that we can save any lives by just staying indoors it would take a very strong argument to convince me that’s not a worthwhile sacrifice.
 

Cathie G

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I prefer to not take things to heart.
My mother is in a nursing home in Albany Georgia. Wynfeild Park. She has very limited breathing and most days can only talk in whispers. If at all.
Albany Georgia is a small town in south western Georgia.
The primary hospital is Phoebe. Phoebe is absolutely overrun with COVID-19 cases and there is now 1 case in my mothers nursing home. The nursing home is next door to the hospital.
The situation is so critical that it made national news (on the Rachel Maddow show.)
So, know that while I'm trying to make jokes and keep things light, some of us ARE already in this. It's why I mentioned last week that I had a fever. I wasn't going to go any further.
I wasn't going to mention this. But I thought I'd point out that we are all reacting in our own way. And this is no where near over.
I chose to remain calm.
All of the facts aren't in yet. And some of the facts are not facts at all.
I want this post to reflect what the situation is in your part of the country. Or in your country.
There will be time to hurl insults afterwards.
I'll be praying for your little mom and you and family...in the meantime.
 

ZEROPILOT

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I never cease to be amazed by the degree of paranoia that is shared by some members of this forum, particularly around this subject. As responsible adults, of course we should distrust the media and be cynical of our governments but the idea that this is some kind of orchestrated global conspiracy is simply absurd.

I’m a Brit and often feel like something of an outsider looking in during these discussions. I haven’t been closely following what’s going on in the US other than the headline stats and the press statements from your great leader. From what I’ve seen though, it’s pretty clear that tangerine chump has got no better idea what his government should be doing right now than the leader of any other country in the world. Broadly speaking, authorities, just like us, are blindly scrambling to take what they hope will be the least damaging course of action in an unprecedented time of global crisis and whilst I would be shocked if some governments didn’t do their best to find a way to make the chaos work to their advantage where they can, I find the assertion that this is in some way a calculated overreaction to a minor health scare frankly ludicrous.

I completely understand that people are scared and angry about loosing their income and their liberties but I simply can’t see what angle you’d have to approach this from to see how a group or administration might be benefitting from this scenario, unless they own shares in a hand sanitiser factory. I’m no economist but surely the fiscal carnage caused by these indefinite shutdowns far, far exceed the benefit to any government from enacting these measures?

So many of the statistics, particularly death rates, are at this stage broadly meaningless and will remain so for weeks until this crisis at least begins to stabilise. However those who assert that COVID-19 is no more serious than seasonal flu are misguided, it is not only significantly more contagious, it has proven to be many times more deadly, in particular amongst the elderly. Seasonal flu doesn’t decimate entire care homes, for example, as has been reported in Spain and Italy. Nor does it cause hospitals to be so overwhelmed with critically ill patients that people have to be airlifted en masse to neighbouring countries for emergency treatment. And with regard to whether a patient dies from COVID-19 or pneumonia or apparently unrelated seasonal flu, once people are dying because they can’t get a hospital bed due to healthcare systems being overrun, it doesn’t matter whether the cause of death is appendicitis, it’s ultimately an extra death caused by the effects of the coronavirus.

Here in London we are at the start of what will be a steep upswing in cases and hospitals are now reaching maximum capacity for critical care patients. Fatalities are beginning to grow noticeably and are in line with the predicted trend of doubling every 2-3 days. Only time will tell but, from what I’ve seen, I suspect the US is in a very similar position. I think the suggestion that most people have already been exposed to the illness is extraordinarily optimistic and that the disease still has many more weeks or months of chaos to wreak until 50-60% of the population have been infected and it becomes safe for normal activities to resume.

There is no way of knowing how this crisis will come to pass but if there is a chance that we can save any lives by just staying indoors it would take a very strong argument to convince me that’s not a worthwhile sacrifice.
As far as I'm concerned, your views are perfectly American. And very much inline with my own.
How this effects you is how it is affecting us overseas.
I also respect the views of others. Because the whole truth hasn't presented itself yet.
 

Len B

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With a vaccine available 10s of thousands of people die here in the States from the flu each year. How many would die if there was no vaccine would the hospitals be over run with sick people? I think so. When someone develops a good safe vaccine this may be as common as the flu as we refer to it today," just the flu" even though each year it may be a different strain of THE FLU. Each year I get what is refereed to as the hi-test flu shot because of my age, so maybe they will come up with a hi-test covid19 vaccine. for older people, Hopefully soon. Stay Safe and don't Panic.
 

ZEROPILOT

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With a vaccine available 10s of thousands of people die here in the States from the flu each year. How many would die if there was no vaccine would the hospitals be over run with sick people? I think so. When someone develops a good safe vaccine this may be as common as the flu as we refer to it today," just the flu" even though each year it may be a different strain of THE FLU. Each year I get what is refereed to as the hi-test flu shot because of my age, so maybe they will come up with a hi-test covid19 vaccine. for older people, Hopefully soon. Stay Safe and don't Panic.
Apparently there are about 5 strains of this family of virus in circulation right now. But most are not either as contagious or as lethal.
 

Gijoux

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I really have trouble following some of the more recent posts here and the apparent trend to discount this issue. I just this evening got a group message from a very good friend of mine that I used to do semimars and public speaking with. This is a very strong, active individual. Was one of the top female softball players in the world that did world tours and taught olympic players. Thought it may provide a needed perspective:

Good people. I wanted to tell you that Rosemary and I have tested positive for COVID-19. We believe we were infected on Friday 13. I started having serious symptoms a week ago. We were lucky enough to get tested pretty quickly, and it became official Wednesday. You should know that these symptoms are no joke. I have never been so sick in my life, and I’ve had a few tangles with other illnesses. COVID 19 is overwhelming.
I thought I was being careful. I’m not a risk-taker with my health, but I got it anyway. I am right in the middle of this thing and weeks and months ahead of almost everyone I know. I want you all to understand that it’s worse than you think. Way worse.
When you have a choice between your normal habits and what you know to be safer habits, I don’t want you to think twice. Please err on the side of health, yours and the other people’s you come into contact with. If I knew two weeks ago what I know now, I wouldn’t have left our home, for however long it takes.
I can’t do much about my situation now, I’ve got to ride this thing out and hope for the best. But there’s lots you can do. If this message can make you re-think how seriously you’re taking COVID-19, I will feel like my message is successful .....even while I’m lying here in my bed. I’m encouraging you and cheering you on to be smart, for yourself and the rest of us. I don’t want to see any more of my friends getting sick.
Rosemary S Harris symptoms are gone...thank goodness. If you see her walking our dogs, please avoid her and do not pet our dog. We are trying to stay away from them but they aren’t having it and we are worried it’s on their fur.
This will not be over by Easter. Cuomo seems to be the truth teller right now. Over 600 are waiting for tests from St. Francis. I know our city is doing all we can but please do your part. I am in awe of our first responders. Truly.
I will post again in a few days. Please don’t call us. Our phones are off. We don’t need one thing.
Please stay safe. Much love to all.

Mark I am so sorry to hear about your friends getting sick. I have also had family and friends get sick during the last few weeks. I myself have health issues which makes me very vulnerable to any viral infection. I have to take precautions always. Anyway, there is some good news as Dr. Fauci has made a statement:

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the US front man for managing the "pandemic," has just written an article that ought to be titled: I WAS WRONG AND THIS IS MY CONFESSION.

Fauci, New England Journal of Medicine, March 26, "Covid-19 -- Navigating the Uncharted":

"If one assumes that the number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic cases is several times as high as the number of reported cases, the case fatality rate may be considerably less than 1%. This suggests that the overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%) or a pandemic influenza (similar to those in 1957 and 1968)..."

In case there is any doubt, those "pandemic influenza seasons" of 1957 and 1968 did NOT result in any lockdowns. People went outdoors. They mingled. They sat in stadiums. They went to their jobs.

SO TURN THE ECONOMY BACK ON NOW. End the insanity.

Unfortunately, no surprise, the major media are still highlighting fear, so it's up to people to spread this message in any and every way they can: TIME TO GO BACK TO WORK. TURN ON THE ECONOMY.

When the man in charge of an unprecedented global operation says the product he was selling was defective, when he admits the whole basis for it was over-promoted...that is gigantic. Don't expect Fauci to apologize abjectly and lie down in the street and let a steamroller flatten him. Understand? This is as good as it'll get.
 

ZEROPILOT

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The fact remains that our hospital systems are already overloaded and out of supplies, room and staff.
Having less responsible activity would surely equal more infected people and for a more prolonged period of time and with many more deaths.
So while it's TRUE that we can't know what the death rate is because we still don't know the number of the truly, currently infected....We DO know that we are ALREADY unable to deal with the quantity of humans that already require hospitalization.
People that are actually sick and are actually dying have already outnumbered what we as a nation are able to handle. Whatever "percentage" that number ends up being. I think that would be pretty irrelevant if one of them ended up being you or one of your loved ones. And you got infected and died directly because some irresponsible person thought it was no big deal.
The number of Americans already requiring hospitalization has already brought us to our limits. The known quantity is already too many. And no one is arguing that this won't get much larger before it slows down.
There's a bigger picture here.
 

Gijoux

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Here's where we get into conjecture and not real data and numbers. The numbers come after the fact.

We do have a pretty good understanding of how new-viruses spread once we can categorize its transmission path and contagion level. It seems we do have a handle on that now. We know C19 started in wuhan, China. Probably mid November 2019, even though the first case of "unknown" origin was only reported on Dec 1. The goal is to contain the virus to that area. China did their best to lock down that province. The action strategy from that point is whenever a new case is discovered outside that area (since they now know what they were looking for) to isolate and very importantly track the route of possible infection - how that virus got to that new area. The quote you misquoted from WHO in January, in direct reference to this plan of action is that they were not yet positive that the virus was contagious while the infected person is asymptomatic. That would make it easier to track. We very soon learned it indeed was extremely contagious at the earliest stages.

We still can track the spread, just not be complete in isolating as it would indeed spread prior to symptoms. But the "big brotheresque" concern you voice is the catch 22. Knowing as much as possible about where an infected individual has been since any POSSIBLE contraction of the virus allows the best isolation of further spread. People of known contact need to be quarantined as well. We all saw the quarantine of cruise ships here on the west coast. Extensive interviewing and tracking is done at this stage to try to isolate. Although not certainly 100% effective, it does still give a pretty clear picture of how the spread progresses, especially reviewing the spread of cases after the fact. Then you KNOW where the virus has gone.

So getting to a more direct answer to your question, I think we can safely say it is extremely unlikely the virus was in the US before mid January. It was first found outside of China on Jan 13 in Thailand, and Jan 15 in Japan. Then Jan 21 in the US. All of these cases were people who had just returned from the Wuhan, China area. So I think we have a compelling timeline of the beginnings of the spread. It is social media rumor that only the severely ill and "on their way out anyway" are tested. The criteria initially and for the past 2 months is to test anyone showing symptoms AND have a positive link to a probable contamination source. Since the prevalent flu in the US late 2019 to now has almost identical symptoms, it was just not prudent to test on symptoms alone with limited testing available. Those severely ill with other complication also could get tested as it was important to know if it was C19 as it is so far resistant to any of the treatments / drugs we use to treat other flu or corona viruses. It is also important to realize the testing is not 100% accurate. It is quite good, but its not the false positives that are the biggest concern in trying to isolate. It is the false negatives. The last thing you want when trying to isolate spread is a person with a false negative out in the community. So better to vet testing to seriously ill and those with symptoms PLUS probable source of contact. With probable source of contact, you quarantine even with a negative. Is all this perfect? Absolutely not. But it is very possibly the best we can do with our current bandwidth.

Has 1/2 of American been exposed? NO way. That will very much probably be the case by end of year. And by then that will be enough to call in a herd immunity effect - that will be a huge difference. Not now. The first community spread cases were not found until the beginning of this month in the US. If you look at the trajectory curve of cases, we are still just at the very beginning of true community spread.

Also if you look at the curve / rate of spread of both cases and deaths, you see the trend at its very beginning and indeed the death rate calculation getting higher each day, Yet testing is becomes more widespread. The post I did of the graphs above to give the 1.5% rate has changed already. I see numbers as of today (2 days later) now at 135,500 cases and 2384 deaths in the US as of today. That's now a 1.76% death rate. I'm not saying the death rate will follow that trend forever. IT will get worse for a while until the number of cases that has had time for the illness run its course catches up with the number of newly infected. It will level off and then drop as more and more testing is available. Eventually we can then even apply numbers like I see often used in "regular" flu calculations, where with this type virus we would probably assume for every "known" illness case there is 2.6 asymptomatic cases.

Will this be as bad as the effects of our shelter in place? None of us have seen something like this in our lifetime. The closest thing we can look at is the "Spanish Flu" pandemic in 1918. That killed between 20 million and 50 million people worldwide. 675,000 people in the US died. With a population at that time of 104 million that is a 0.67% death rate on total population, not infected!

We must flatten the curve of how this is growing. The only practical way to do that is take away the "food" for the virus. That is new people who have never been exposed to this type virus.

@Fluffy @Tom @jaizei

With the first cases of C-19 in November 2019 and China making no mention of it until Dec. 31, 2019, allowed many thousands of travelers from Wuhan to the rest of the world to spread C-19. I work closely with UCR and they hosted many a student during that time including much travel of Chinese students/faculty and US students/faculty, that was not halted until late February 2020. This is not the only University with programs abroad. Northern Italy has a huge Chinese population that also continued to travel between countries for far longer. It is quite feasible to have had early exposures here in our country from Nov/Dec and of course we were not going to get a Dx of C-19 if we were not testing for it. The first positive case outside of China was January only because nobody was testing for it before that date. You have to test for it directly and we didn't have any tests available until quite recently. We continue to have a shortage of dependable tests, so I assure you these tests are reserved for the very sick. You are wrong about it being a "social media" rumor about only the very ill being tested, because I personally have treated many sick patients who were not provided testing even though they were exhibiting all the symptoms. I couldn't order the tests for these patients, because there weren't any tests available. The stats would be very different if we had been testing earlier and testing more people. The curve wouldn't look anything like it does now if more testing had been done earlier. I would also like to point out that last I looked we had only 25,000 deaths THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE WORLD at the supposed peak of this pandemic, of the supposed worst highly contagious disease that has been predicted to be 2.2 million deaths. A whole lot of people better die real soon for this prediction to come to fruition. Some of us have seen something like this with the Polio outbreaks during the 1950's. Even then the country didn't get shut down. By the time they got a vaccine available, herd immunity had already happened and the number of cases were falling rapidly. In the end the vaccine had to be changed to Sabin's killed vaccine, because the vaccine Salk rushed to production was CAUSING more POLIO cases than the wild disease.

Historically throughout the world, the chaos that a situation like this creates is exactly when takeovers occur. Breaking the country financially sets up a perfect opportunity for "Big Brother/Pharma" to take over every aspect of our lives. People will soon be begging the government to "save" them and Socialism will be here to stay. Over 3 million people have had to apply for unemployment already and more will come. How long will a check for $1200 last. We will have to pay it back anyway in the form of taxes. All the unemployment will have to be paid back in the form of taxes. Everything is going to cost more in the form of taxes...WAKE UP AMERICA!!
 
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ZEROPILOT

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With the first cases of C-19 in November 2019 and China making no mention of it until Dec. 31, 2019, allowed many thousands of travelers from Wuhan to the rest of the world to spread C-19. I work closely with UCR and they hosted many a student during that time including much travel of Chinese students/faculty and US students/faculty, that was not halted until late February 2020. This is not the only University with programs abroad. Northern Italy has a huge Chinese population that also continued to travel between countries for far longer. It is quite feasible to have had early exposures here in our country from Nov/Dec and of course we were not going to get a Dx of C-19 if we were not testing for it. The first positive case outside of China was January only because nobody was testing for it before that date. You have to test for it directly and we didn't have any tests available until quite recently. We continue to have a shortage of dependable tests, so I assure you these tests are reserved for the very sick. You are wrong about it being a "social media" rumor about only the very ill being tested, because I personally have treated many sick patients who were not provided testing even though they were exhibiting all the symptoms. I couldn't order the tests for these patients, because there weren't any tests available. The stats would be very different if we had been testing earlier and testing more people. The curve wouldn't look anything like it does now if more testing had been done earlier. I would also like to point out that last I looked we had only 25,000 deaths THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE WORLD at the supposed peak of this pandemic, of the supposed worst highly contagious disease that has been predicted to be 2.2 million deaths. A whole lot of people better die real soon for this prediction to come to fruition. Some of us have seen something like this with the Polio outbreaks during the 1950's. Even then the country didn't get shut down. By the time they got a vaccine available, herd immunity had already happened and the number of cases were falling rapidly. In the end the vaccine had to be changed to Sabin's killed vaccine, because the vaccine Salk rushed to production was CAUSING more POLIO cases than the wild disease.

Historically throughout the world, the chaos that a situation like this creates is exactly when takeovers occur. Breaking the country financially sets up a perfect opportunity for "Big Brother/Pharma" to take over every aspect of our lives. People will soon be begging the government to "save" them and Socialism will be here to stay. Over 3 million people have had to apply for unemployment already and more will come. How long will a check for $1200 last. We will have to pay it back anyway in the form of taxes. All the unemployment will have to be paid back in the form of taxes. Everything is going to cost more in the form of taxes...WAKE UP AMERICA!!
The bailout will in fact need to be paid back and it will take a long time. And I believe that this is just phase one of it.
 

jaizei

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And? So? Your are still reading stuffed penned or typed by a person, just as I'm typing this. Anyone can put any spin on it they want, even going so far as to lie, falsify, exaggerate, or omit inconvenient data.

You pick any subject you want and you can find 10 "sources" to support or dismiss any premise. People on each side will vehemently argue how the other side's statistics and methods are false and flawed. I could spend hours searching out whatever citations I want. You then, could spend hours searching out and citing sources to refute what my sources said. What's the point? Its nothing more than a time wasting pissing contest to test who spends more time and effort looking to discredit the other.

I'm having a conversation about MY opinions and what I see. If you want to have a conversation about the opinions and views your information sources are, well, that is a different conversation. My opinions and views are based on the information I see and read, and yours are based on yours. Where does that get us? Why don't you tell us what YOU think instead of always citing what other people think. I know... Its a novel concept. Doesn't seem to be in your wheelhouse based on past experience. You should give a try. Of course, someone just like you might come along with their citations and try to make you and your opinion look stupid. Its a risk to be sure.

You've never liked the way I do "business". You cut apart and try tear it down whenever the mood strikes you. Yet you contribute very little to the discussion, make few assertions yourself, and do little to help anyone with their tortoises here. You are a critic. You are not a producer of helpful info. You don't make the movies. You spend your time, effort, and considerable research skills telling everyone else what's wrong with the movies. You use your research skills to refute, but not to help.

Sorry but the quality of sources matter, and as I said I tend to go to the primary material as much as possible. For example, if a headline and article says "Nevada governor bans malaria drugs for coronavirus patients", I read the actual text and can say that it is misleading. That is actually both my opinion and a fact that you can verify yourself because I've linked to it twice now.

You state "facts" but then run behind "opinion" when pressed. And then try to insult. I am confident with my intelligence. I know I'm not stupid, so no one can make me look stupid. If you think I haven't posted my opinion, idk what to say, maybe look harder. But this thread isn't about me. So any other opinions you have of me can be made elsewhere.
 

jaizei

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Dr. Anthony Fauci, the US front man for managing the "pandemic," has just written an article that ought to be titled: I WAS WRONG AND THIS IS MY CONFESSION.

Fauci, New England Journal of Medicine, March 26, "Covid-19 -- Navigating the Uncharted":

"If one assumes that the number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic cases is several times as high as the number of reported cases, the case fatality rate may be considerably less than 1%. This suggests that the overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%) or a pandemic influenza (similar to those in 1957 and 1968)..."

In case there is any doubt, those "pandemic influenza seasons" of 1957 and 1968 did NOT result in any lockdowns. People went outdoors. They mingled. They sat in stadiums. They went to their jobs.

SO TURN THE ECONOMY BACK ON NOW. End the insanity.

Unfortunately, no surprise, the major media are still highlighting fear, so it's up to people to spread this message in any and every way they can: TIME TO GO BACK TO WORK. TURN ON THE ECONOMY.

When the man in charge of an unprecedented global operation says the product he was selling was defective, when he admits the whole basis for it was over-promoted...that is gigantic. Don't expect Fauci to apologize abjectly and lie down in the street and let a steamroller flatten him. Understand? This is as good as it'll get.

Yes, a lower fatality rate was always a possibility and has been reflected in the models from the start. The point is to slow it down, flatten the curve, to attain those lower rates. Reading this would only be surprising to someone who reads headlines and snippets. If appropriate steps had been taken in January/February to identify cases and isolate them, then less severe restrictions would have had greater impact.
 

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Gov Abbott passed something today that makes it illegal to drive into Texas from Louisiana....

As far as I have seen, it just extends self-quarantining to those that enter Texas driving from Louisiana, as well as expanding quarantine to air travelers from more places.
 

jaizei

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I prefer to not take things to heart.
My mother is in a nursing home in Albany Georgia. Wynfeild Park. She has very limited breathing and most days can only talk in whispers. If at all.
Albany Georgia is a small town in south western Georgia.
The primary hospital is Phoebe. Phoebe is absolutely overrun with COVID-19 cases and there is now 1 case in my mothers nursing home. The nursing home is next door to the hospital.
The situation is so critical that it made national news (on the Rachel Maddow show.)
So, know that while I'm trying to make jokes and keep things light, some of us ARE already in this. It's why I mentioned last week that I had a fever. I wasn't going to go any further.
I wasn't going to mention this. But I thought I'd point out that we are all reacting in our own way. And this is no where near over.
I chose to remain calm.
All of the facts aren't in yet. And some of the facts are not facts at all.
I want this post to reflect what the situation is in your part of the country. Or in your country.
There will be time to hurl insults afterwards.

My mom has COPD but she seems to have read the same things others in this thread have read about this being just like the flu.

Its more than just nursing homes we have to worry about, there's been a shift in how seniors are living over the last few decades. "Senior living" facilities have been one of the most lucrative portions of the construction industry for at least the last 10-20 years. Some facilities are basically glamorous nursing homes, but usually also include "independent living" portions that are more like apartments. I think this makes comparisons to previous pandemics harder because not only is the world more interconnected, I think there are more clusters of vulnerable people now. I don't want to say thankfully, but the cluster of cases arising from the LifeCare facility in Washington was probably the slap in the face needed to get things rolling in the United States. At least a little faster.
 

Yvonne G

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I just tried to buy some dry cat food using my chewy.com account and all of the "common" Purina brands are "out of stock." People are treating this lock down like some sort of end of the world apocalypse. Since I'm almost out of cat food, I had to buy a sack of the more expensive brand.

I have 6 rolls of T-paper left in the linen closet. There have been no paper products on the store shelves for weeks. Price gouging is illegal, however, trying to buy T-paper online costs way more than in the stores, plus there's shipping. I started off at Walmart.com, and all their T-paper says, "in store sales only." Yeah, right. (I do have a nicely growing banana plant that @Turtulas-Len sent me a couple years ago, but I doubt that'll be very absorbing.
 
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