The second highest positivity rate in the world comes from Bolivia, which has been ranging between 55-62% for more than a week. The official numbers might not seem terrible to our exhausted and jaded selves (54,156 cases, 1,984 deaths) but the same factors apply as elsewhere: massive undertesting (see: positivity rate) and an oppressive authoritarian government. Remember the US-backed right-wing coup last year? The rabid Dominionist leader of that coup who had herself declared president has tested positive for coronavirus along with ministers in her government, which is just a sign of how widespread it is, not a sign that she's going to do a damn thing about it (see: Bolsonaro, Boris Johnson).
So desperate Bolivians have been tricked into drinking bleach. Conspiracy theories, like right-wing ideology, has been internationalized, so of course there have been people pushing the magic chlorine dioxide cures in Bolivia too. At least ten people have been poisoned from it and it's almost certain to get worse because even their Congress is now pushing it, passing a bill for emergency “manufacture, marketing, supply and use of chlorine dioxide solution for the prevention and treatment of coronavirus.”
This has been your second update on how the Western Hemisphere south of Canada is fucked.
Wait...what? The right wing crazies push people taking hydroxychloroquine, an actual anti-malaria medicine that doesn't help covid and probably hurts people. Not chlorine dioxide! Where the hell did that come from? Quite literally "just drink bleach"?!?
Trump literally advocated for injecting and/or ingesting disinfectant as a potential solution to COVID. As fucked up as it is, the US President’s “thoughts” are signal boosted to pretty much the entire planet.
Also, Trump can be used as a bellwether for the trends of the uninformed. If he thinks drinking bleach might help, plenty of others have had the same thought. Then you just have to find the kind of people who will exploit that ignorance to make a buck and here we are. Trump's media presence probably provides strong reinforcement of bad ideas, but people can come up with their own bad ideas independently
Cloth masks are good for the person wearing them as well as the people around them. Basically, even though virus particles can go through the mask, you're less likely to die or get seriously ill if you're wearing a mask, simply because you inhaled fewer virus particles. Even if it doesn't protect you completely, it's still a good thing to do.
(This may also help explain Japan's weirdly low death rate from this.)
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MayabirdPecking at the keyboardRegistered Userregular
Cloth masks are good for the person wearing them as well as the people around them. Basically, even though virus particles can go through the mask, you're less likely to die or get seriously ill if you're wearing a mask, simply because you inhaled fewer virus particles. Even if it doesn't protect you completely, it's still a good thing to do.
(This may also help explain Japan's weirdly low death rate from this.)
Inversely also explains the high death rate of doctors and nurses, including young healthy ones - they are the most likely to be getting mega-doses of virus particles so their systems can get overwhelmed all the faster. It's something I'd been speculating about for a while.
In updates, the President of Iran told state TV that the government estimates 25 million of 83 million Iranians have been infected by SARS2. The virus has been spreading basically unchecked since early March if not earlier (there have been half-assed attempts at lockdowns and controls that weren't really followed or obeyed) and that's lead to almost a third of the country having been infected over four-five months. Which yeah, exponential growth does that, but if that number is correct that also means two thirds have yet to be infected so all those dipshits online who are still bleating about a quick and easy herd immunity can fuck right off. This won't just go away over a month and then you get the economy rolling again and everything's fine. Another four to five months in the US - oh that gets us to the start of flu season with over half the population still yet to get infected?
This exact number of course should also be taken with a pinch of salt since President Rouhani only admits to about 14,000 deaths, which is the current official death toll and a giant undercount. The main takeaway is that Iran is kinda sorta admitting that yes, it's on that order of magnitude of being just as bad as people like me have been speculating, and this is a hint of how bad it will get as SARS2 continues to burn through populations.
So desperate Bolivians have been tricked into drinking bleach. Conspiracy theories, like right-wing ideology, has been internationalized, so of course there have been people pushing the magic chlorine dioxide cures in Bolivia too. At least ten people have been poisoned from it and it's almost certain to get worse because even their Congress is now pushing it, passing a bill for emergency “manufacture, marketing, supply and use of chlorine dioxide solution for the prevention and treatment of coronavirus.”
I remember hearing about a bunch of similar things going on in Iran. A rumor went around that drinking ethyl alcohol cured covid, but drinking is illegal there, so people made and sold bootleg alcohol to sell to believers. Except it wasn't bootleg alcohol, it was methyl alcohol with bleach because methyl alcohol is colored there so people know not to drink it, and the bleach covers that. A whole bunch of people drank it and died.
I know we want to look for the helpers, but sometimes that is just really hard to do when the terrible is so... terrible.
The methyl alcohol thing is a bit more complicated than that, and actually something that goes back to prohibition in the US.
In places where alcohol is illegal or taxed, ethyl alcohol is usually still used for industrial processes and fuel purposes. To keep people from just watering down industrial alcohol (since it is functionally identical to neutral spirit like everclear) it is common practice to mix alcohol with a small amount of a noxious or toxic chemical that makes it unpleasant or dangerous to drink. Usually in things that are intended for consumer use (for example, disinfectant alcohol) this is done with a non-toxic chemical that causes a bad taste or nausea. For industrial or fuel alcohol, however, the go-to denaturant is methanol because it has similar properties to ethanol and is interchangeable for most purposes. Methanol looks and tastes almost exactly like ethanol, but concentrations of relatively low amounts can be fatal if consumed, especially in heavy drinkers. It is usually dyed to indicate toxicity.
The thing is, if you are in a place with prohibition, you can make ethanol fairly easily with a still and mash (or even beer or wine in places where that is legal but higher concentration drinks are not). However, that requires a lot of equipment which is hard to explain and adds a lot of risk for getting caught. Or you can just put some bleach in denatured industrial ethanol to get rid of the dye, and have a drink that looks and tastes like alcohol until someone actually binge drinks it at which point they end up dead or in the hospital.
There's a lot of public policy questions there (like maybe its not that great to intentionally poison alcohol that would otherwise be harmless for humans just to keep people from avoiding taxes or religious prohibitions?). But that’s the rub of what’s going on in Iran, and its a problem that has cropped up repeatedly around the world. Just a few weeks ago, there was an instance of a company possibly inadvertently using an ethanol denatured with methanol to make hand sanitizer and poisoning some people.
Jealous Deva on
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daveNYCWhy universe hate Waspinator?Registered Userregular
Whelp, things are starting to go down the crapper here. 212 new cases yesterday with the total active cases at 5046 (new record). The extra fun bit is that 56 got the COVID and 120 people in quarantine due to being at a club in Prague 2 (which is a fairly big chunk of area that covers a number of potential plague pits) so we're back to looking at super fun times again. They're talking about spinning up the mask requirements again, which will help, but frankly they probably should dial up the controls to shutting down the clubs and limiting places to outdoor seating only. Might need to go further depending on the exact concentration of the cases, but when we were re-opening, going to outdoor seating didn't really move the numbers too much and outdoor seating opens up a whole lot of options for restaurants and bars since every place with an inch of sidewalk dragged out a bunch of tables and started serving.
We'll see, maybe we'll get the stupids and try and ignore the upswing until it's too late.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
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daveNYCWhy universe hate Waspinator?Registered Userregular
And the Czech Republic is going back to all the face masks starting Monday, plus some unspecified as of yet limitations on the size of indoor gatherings. It's at least two days too late, but at least things are happening.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
Ohio is finally enforcing a statewide mask mandate starting today at 6pm local.
Also a travel advisory for people coming in from other states to self isolate for two weeks, but I don’t know how enforceable it is. It’s also not all states, just the top 15 hardest hit like AZ, FL, CA, TX, etc
No word yet on statewide school opening policy. I know my district is offering online courses, which I’m having my kids do. I know my oldest will be fine with that, however my youngest is a special needs child and teaching her online will be more difficult.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
We signed our kids up for the online option with our district. While it may cost us some sanity, I expect STHTF when schools open so this way they'll have consistency and be safe in the lag time before their peers all get put online anyway.
So far, the data is positive. The vaccines appear to be generally safe, and they spur immune responses against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. But whether these immune responses are enough to protect people from infection and disease remains an important unknown.
So far, the data is positive. The vaccines appear to be generally safe, and they spur immune responses against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. But whether these immune responses are enough to protect people from infection and disease remains an important unknown.
I'm very excited about all this, but you know what makes me pretty sad about this. If we had invested wisely after SARS and MERS then we could have been right here, ready to step up large scale testing and evaluate performance on like, day 15 of the outbreak as soon as we had decent virus samples.
So far, the data is positive. The vaccines appear to be generally safe, and they spur immune responses against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. But whether these immune responses are enough to protect people from infection and disease remains an important unknown.
Yeah, seeing immune responses are good, but whether that's sufficient is the main concern. Given history with vaccines regards this kind of virus.
The other issue that'll matter is duration. Even if the vaccine is massively effective, but only grants immunity for months, or maybe only weeks, then the efficacy of mass vaccination is severely hindered.
While it's good to see that there's some optimism from the trials so far, the combination of "for profit" pharma* and 2020 just being an unrelenting shitshow, I'm going to remain at least a little skeptical until the evidence is a little more secure.
* I'm not so much counting the governmental and educational institutions, and if they come up with something, I'll be a little more optimistic. But if it's big pharma spouting success rates, less so.
So far, the data is positive. The vaccines appear to be generally safe, and they spur immune responses against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. But whether these immune responses are enough to protect people from infection and disease remains an important unknown.
Yeah, seeing immune responses are good, but whether that's sufficient is the main concern. Given history with vaccines regards this kind of virus.
The other issue that'll matter is duration. Even if the vaccine is massively effective, but only grants immunity for months, or maybe only weeks, then the efficacy of mass vaccination is severely hindered.
While it's good to see that there's some optimism from the trials so far, the combination of "for profit" pharma* and 2020 just being an unrelenting shitshow, I'm going to remain at least a little skeptical until the evidence is a little more secure.
* I'm not so much counting the governmental and educational institutions, and if they come up with something, I'll be a little more optimistic. But if it's big pharma spouting success rates, less so.
AZD1222 (The astra zenica/oxford) vaccine was invented by a lab at one of the top two universities in the UK which is a non profit vaccine development lab.
They have partnered with AstraZenica to complete the trials because its too big for them to do alone, but its absolutely a government/educational institution driving the research work, analyzing the data and publishing it. AstraZenica is just making the manufacturing plans. They are also managed/overseen by these people
Which is a independent organization who makes sure clinical trials are done fairly and without bias in the UK.
Your concerns regarding, "Will it actually work" are completely valid, but I see no reason to suspect even slightly that Oxford/Astra are cooking the books here.
So far, the data is positive. The vaccines appear to be generally safe, and they spur immune responses against the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. But whether these immune responses are enough to protect people from infection and disease remains an important unknown.
Yeah, seeing immune responses are good, but whether that's sufficient is the main concern. Given history with vaccines regards this kind of virus.
The other issue that'll matter is duration. Even if the vaccine is massively effective, but only grants immunity for months, or maybe only weeks, then the efficacy of mass vaccination is severely hindered.
While it's good to see that there's some optimism from the trials so far, the combination of "for profit" pharma* and 2020 just being an unrelenting shitshow, I'm going to remain at least a little skeptical until the evidence is a little more secure.
* I'm not so much counting the governmental and educational institutions, and if they come up with something, I'll be a little more optimistic. But if it's big pharma spouting success rates, less so.
AZD1222 (The astra zenica/oxford) vaccine was invented by a lab at one of the top two universities in the UK which is a non profit vaccine development lab.
They have partnered with AstraZenica to complete the trials because its too big for them to do alone, but its absolutely a government/educational institution driving the research work, analyzing the data and publishing it. AstraZenica is just making the manufacturing plans. They are also managed/overseen by these people
Which is a independent organization who makes sure clinical trials are done fairly and without bias in the UK.
Your concerns regarding, "Will it actually work" are completely valid, but I see no reason to suspect even slightly that Oxford/Astra are cooking the books here.
Oh, I'm not concerned with this specific trial. But there's something like 150 vaccines at various stages being worked on, I believe. And a good portion of those WILL be "for profit" pharma. And I fully don't trust that announcements from those will be completely open and honest. Already seen some significant manipulation for stock market motives on testing kits. Imagine we'll see the same for vaccines.
While pharma does has a role in our lives, it being a big factor in public health is as much a curse as a blessing.
The overwhelming majority of those probably won't reach Stage 2 or 3 trials, at least.
That said it's going to be a mess when there's something in a Stage 1 sort of situation where the president thinks there's money for him in it...
I think the only concern I would have regarding the miracle situation where we think we have a vaccine that works and can be distributed by October would be the situation where...
Vaccine 1 has excellent data to back it up, is effective, but painful at the injection site and requires two shots and only claims 6 months of protection
Vaccine 2 has marginal supporting data, claims to be effective, requires 1 shot, has no side effects and claims 10 years of protection or something
Without question everyone else in the world would deploy Vaccine 1, whereas Trump would roll out Vaccine 2. He is always going to pick the highest potential upside, with minimum known downside, regardless of potential overall risk. Which I guess is what you are saying. I could easily see Trump ignoring a proven candidate with downsides, over their next gen version which hasn't been properly shown to work yet.
edit - But wait, then the vaccine wouldn't have been built yet. Literally the only ones which are deployable even potentially in the US this year are the 4 which are entering phase 3 now, because those are the only ones being built right now.
The overwhelming majority of those probably won't reach Stage 2 or 3 trials, at least.
That said it's going to be a mess when there's something in a Stage 1 sort of situation where the president thinks there's money for him in it...
and/or a chance that it'll boost his numbers and chance of getting re-elected.
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ceresWhen the last moon is cast over the last star of morningAnd the future has past without even a last desperate warningRegistered User, Moderatormod
NYT has a tracker to keep up with vaccine progress. It looks like the CanSinoBIO vaccine (in Phase II according to the tracker) has limited approval for use on the Chinese military as of this month which... yeah, but if it proves effective and doesn't kill a whole bunch of people I wonder how Trump is going to square that with all the China hate he's putting out there.
Separately, I'm wary of anything that has Pfizer's fingerprints on it. I mean awesome if it works but like.. their executives can go first, because Pfizer is an industry parasite that ruins everything it touches.
And it seems like all is dying, and would leave the world to mourn
NYT has a tracker to keep up with vaccine progress. It looks like the CanSinoBIO vaccine (in Phase II according to the tracker) has limited approval for use on the Chinese military as of this month which... yeah, but if it proves effective and doesn't kill a whole bunch of people I wonder how Trump is going to square that with all the China hate he's putting out there.
Separately, I'm wary of anything that has Pfizer's fingerprints on it. I mean awesome if it works but like.. their executives can go first, because Pfizer is an industry parasite that ruins everything it touches.
'Pretend he never said it and how dare you insinuate otherwise' has worked pretty well for him so far. If it saves lives then let baby have his bottle, on this one at least.
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daveNYCWhy universe hate Waspinator?Registered Userregular
The infectious nature of aerosol collected in this study further suggests that airborne transmission of COVID-19 is possible, and that aerosol prevention measures are necessary to effectively stem the spread of SARS-CoV-2.
Preprint article, so grain of salt, but it's something more to throw at anyone who isn't on board with masks.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
The infectious nature of aerosol collected in this study further suggests that airborne transmission of COVID-19 is possible, and that aerosol prevention measures are necessary to effectively stem the spread of SARS-CoV-2.
Preprint article, so grain of salt, but it's something more to throw at anyone who isn't on board with masks.
Non-medical grade masks don't block aerosol transmission; that's been one of the anti-maskers rallying cries from the start, that they don't work.
ceresWhen the last moon is cast over the last star of morningAnd the future has past without even a last desperate warningRegistered User, Moderatormod
Nevada has been invited to participate in the Vaccine Administration Management System (VAMS) Pilot testing. Nevada was one of four states accepted to participate in this program.
This project is designed to develop a COVID-19 vaccination registry that allows for timely and accurate collection of data from our provider community and for reporting and analysis.
o__O
And it seems like all is dying, and would leave the world to mourn
Nevada has been invited to participate in the Vaccine Administration Management System (VAMS) Pilot testing. Nevada was one of four states accepted to participate in this program.
This project is designed to develop a COVID-19 vaccination registry that allows for timely and accurate collection of data from our provider community and for reporting and analysis.
o__O
Do you have any indication of what it actually is? I was reading an article yesterday regarding how the US desperately needs to start setting up systems to monitor how many people need vaccines, and how many places have like, fridges and people trained to do injections and how many people those places can treat a day etc.
Nevada has been invited to participate in the Vaccine Administration Management System (VAMS) Pilot testing. Nevada was one of four states accepted to participate in this program.
This project is designed to develop a COVID-19 vaccination registry that allows for timely and accurate collection of data from our provider community and for reporting and analysis.
o__O
Do you have any indication of what it actually is? I was reading an article yesterday regarding how the US desperately needs to start setting up systems to monitor how many people need vaccines, and how many places have like, fridges and people trained to do injections and how many people those places can treat a day etc.
...What's sad is that we should already have this data at the CDC or something. "Who needs vaccines" is just population - infections (-immunocompromised), that's easy. And someone should already have a rough idea of the vaccination capacity based on existing well-developed infrastructure for flu shots (my understanding is that all the ones going into phase III atm are the standard upper arm injection, so... exactly the same as a flu shot).
The infectious nature of aerosol collected in this study further suggests that airborne transmission of COVID-19 is possible, and that aerosol prevention measures are necessary to effectively stem the spread of SARS-CoV-2.
Preprint article, so grain of salt, but it's something more to throw at anyone who isn't on board with masks.
Non-medical grade masks don't block aerosol transmission; that's been one of the anti-maskers rallying cries from the start, that they don't work.
The problem there is masks were never recommended for those kinds of conditions. For aerosol transmission you're talking long term exposure in a contained space with sick people. a cloth mask isn't going to help you much in a church or hospital. But it will help in the conditions most people are exposed ie outside or in passing in enclosed places like stores.
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ceresWhen the last moon is cast over the last star of morningAnd the future has past without even a last desperate warningRegistered User, Moderatormod
Searching for "vaccine administration management system" brought up these pages and not much more
So... I have no idea what it is. NV has tracked vaccinations for a long time, there's a statewide database of who's had what. Maybe that's why we're participating?
And it seems like all is dying, and would leave the world to mourn
Nevada has been invited to participate in the Vaccine Administration Management System (VAMS) Pilot testing. Nevada was one of four states accepted to participate in this program.
This project is designed to develop a COVID-19 vaccination registry that allows for timely and accurate collection of data from our provider community and for reporting and analysis.
o__O
Do you have any indication of what it actually is? I was reading an article yesterday regarding how the US desperately needs to start setting up systems to monitor how many people need vaccines, and how many places have like, fridges and people trained to do injections and how many people those places can treat a day etc.
...What's sad is that we should already have this data at the CDC or something. "Who needs vaccines" is just population - infections (-immunocompromised), that's easy. And someone should already have a rough idea of the vaccination capacity based on existing well-developed infrastructure for flu shots (my understanding is that all the ones going into phase III atm are the standard upper arm injection, so... exactly the same as a flu shot).
I can't find the blooming article right now, but the big issue is the lack of communication and strategy between the people who give the vaccines and the people who decide who get the vaccines. There's no real system in the US to tell like, kaiser Permanente that patients A and B can have a vaccine and patient C can't for non medical (rationing) reasons. We'll want to like, immunize grocery store clerks and cooks in the first wave, and lots of them don't have healthcare coverage and so on. The major vaccine distribution systems in the US are either Flu (untracked) or childhood vaccinations (tracked, but given to kids not adults and not tracked consistantly). We don't really have a route to give 2x as many vaccines as we do in flu seasons, in 6 months, to adults who will all need a booster shot. One can be built, but, its going to be a big stretch. Heck, we still need to decide who gets it first.
Nevada has been invited to participate in the Vaccine Administration Management System (VAMS) Pilot testing. Nevada was one of four states accepted to participate in this program.
This project is designed to develop a COVID-19 vaccination registry that allows for timely and accurate collection of data from our provider community and for reporting and analysis.
o__O
Do you have any indication of what it actually is? I was reading an article yesterday regarding how the US desperately needs to start setting up systems to monitor how many people need vaccines, and how many places have like, fridges and people trained to do injections and how many people those places can treat a day etc.
...What's sad is that we should already have this data at the CDC or something. "Who needs vaccines" is just population - infections (-immunocompromised), that's easy. And someone should already have a rough idea of the vaccination capacity based on existing well-developed infrastructure for flu shots (my understanding is that all the ones going into phase III atm are the standard upper arm injection, so... exactly the same as a flu shot).
Well.
I mean you have several plans.
If your vaccine can only make say 100k every month, you have a plan where those go to health care workers and nursing home staff first while keeping their patients / residents isolated.
If you can make 1m a month, you might instead prioritize vaccinating the residents and immune compromised population instead of or along with the workers.
The big things is you have a number of plans based on a number of variables, and then pages of addendum that says 'do X if the disease ends up tearing through preschools instead of nursing homes'.
Nevada has been invited to participate in the Vaccine Administration Management System (VAMS) Pilot testing. Nevada was one of four states accepted to participate in this program.
This project is designed to develop a COVID-19 vaccination registry that allows for timely and accurate collection of data from our provider community and for reporting and analysis.
o__O
Do you have any indication of what it actually is? I was reading an article yesterday regarding how the US desperately needs to start setting up systems to monitor how many people need vaccines, and how many places have like, fridges and people trained to do injections and how many people those places can treat a day etc.
...What's sad is that we should already have this data at the CDC or something. "Who needs vaccines" is just population - infections (-immunocompromised), that's easy. And someone should already have a rough idea of the vaccination capacity based on existing well-developed infrastructure for flu shots (my understanding is that all the ones going into phase III atm are the standard upper arm injection, so... exactly the same as a flu shot).
I can't find the blooming article right now, but the big issue is the lack of communication and strategy between the people who give the vaccines and the people who decide who get the vaccines. There's no real system in the US to tell like, kaiser Permanente that patients A and B can have a vaccine and patient C can't for non medical (rationing) reasons. We'll want to like, immunize grocery store clerks and cooks in the first wave, and lots of them don't have healthcare coverage and so on. The major vaccine distribution systems in the US are either Flu (untracked) or childhood vaccinations (tracked, but given to kids not adults and not tracked consistantly). We don't really have a route to give 2x as many vaccines as we do in flu seasons, in 6 months, to adults who will all need a booster shot. One can be built, but, its going to be a big stretch. Heck, we still need to decide who gets it first.
MayabirdPecking at the keyboardRegistered Userregular
Things may have finally gotten bad enough in North Korea that Kim Jong Un is willing to admit that there's a case, or maybe they've just reached a point where they know the rest of the world will find out. Kaesong, the border city that's partially a special industrial zone for South Korean investment, has been put on lockdown, supposedly due to a single case imported from South Korea, also supposedly a former defector who came back across for some unknown but presumably nefarious reason while infected. It seems more likely that, with South Korea's excellent contact tracing, they would quickly figure out if an outbreak was coming from North Korean workers in Kaesong, blab it to the world, and it would look bad for the regime in possibly some destabilizing way.
A major contributor to the pandemic explosion in the Western Hemisphere is our media filled with lies, bullshit, conspiracies, and straight out cons. From the US through Latin America, all the usual suspects from right-wing politicians to religious con men hawk magic cures and claim that the whole thing is a hoax and the populations are full of people willing to trust some asshole who wants their money over the evidence of their eyes. This includes the people drinking bleach in Bolivia right now, which I had mentioned before.
Four of the highest (known) positivity rates in the world come from Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, and Costa Rica. Brazil might be worse than those four but they haven't been reporting how many tests they've been performing for a couple months now.
In a silver lining though, Australia's having the best flu season ever thanks to actions put into place to control the spread of SARS2. Masks, proper hand washing, physical distancing, etc. stop influenza just as much - the number of flu cases are down 99% from the same time last year. It is, after all, winter in the south. Other countries in the southern hemisphere with good coronavirus controls are seeing similar results. I would not be surprised if, say, New Zealand actually saw significantly fewer deaths than normal in 2020 by nearly eradicating other respiratory diseases at the same time and preventing deaths by pneumonia.
I thought Costa Rica had a pretty strong public health system? At least they used to?
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MayabirdPecking at the keyboardRegistered Userregular
Costa Rica does have a strong public health system, but they were undertesting for coronavirus for the longest time. A bit of arrogance/hubris maybe, thinking their better health system was why they weren't getting lots of COVID-19 cases, when in reality, they were just lucky until June. In June, the case numbers suddenly spiked and health officials realized they needed to ramp up testing, but it's been too little, too late since then.
Fighting SARS2 must be proactive, not reactive. Vietnam, for instance - shut the borders to China very early, initiate quarantines early, shut down a town after finding a single case, mandate masks, and test like crazy. Vietnam just found its first case of community transmission in over three months and they're already planning new lockdowns. Stamp out any ember before it can become an exponential flame.
Things may have finally gotten bad enough in North Korea that Kim Jong Un is willing to admit that there's a case, or maybe they've just reached a point where they know the rest of the world will find out. Kaesong, the border city that's partially a special industrial zone for South Korean investment, has been put on lockdown, supposedly due to a single case imported from South Korea, also supposedly a former defector who came back across for some unknown but presumably nefarious reason while infected. It seems more likely that, with South Korea's excellent contact tracing, they would quickly figure out if an outbreak was coming from North Korean workers in Kaesong, blab it to the world, and it would look bad for the regime in possibly some destabilizing way.
A major contributor to the pandemic explosion in the Western Hemisphere is our media filled with lies, bullshit, conspiracies, and straight out cons. From the US through Latin America, all the usual suspects from right-wing politicians to religious con men hawk magic cures and claim that the whole thing is a hoax and the populations are full of people willing to trust some asshole who wants their money over the evidence of their eyes. This includes the people drinking bleach in Bolivia right now, which I had mentioned before.
Four of the highest (known) positivity rates in the world come from Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, and Costa Rica. Brazil might be worse than those four but they haven't been reporting how many tests they've been performing for a couple months now.
In a silver lining though, Australia's having the best flu season ever thanks to actions put into place to control the spread of SARS2. Masks, proper hand washing, physical distancing, etc. stop influenza just as much - the number of flu cases are down 99% from the same time last year. It is, after all, winter in the south. Other countries in the southern hemisphere with good coronavirus controls are seeing similar results. I would not be surprised if, say, New Zealand actually saw significantly fewer deaths than normal in 2020 by nearly eradicating other respiratory diseases at the same time and preventing deaths by pneumonia.
That's good news and all, but our "second wave" is now right on track to be considerably worse than our first wave ever was. I believe we were down to < 100 cases, the bars and restaurants were starting to open back up, then bam, back to lockdown, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Things may have finally gotten bad enough in North Korea that Kim Jong Un is willing to admit that there's a case, or maybe they've just reached a point where they know the rest of the world will find out. Kaesong, the border city that's partially a special industrial zone for South Korean investment, has been put on lockdown, supposedly due to a single case imported from South Korea, also supposedly a former defector who came back across for some unknown but presumably nefarious reason while infected. It seems more likely that, with South Korea's excellent contact tracing, they would quickly figure out if an outbreak was coming from North Korean workers in Kaesong, blab it to the world, and it would look bad for the regime in possibly some destabilizing way.
A major contributor to the pandemic explosion in the Western Hemisphere is our media filled with lies, bullshit, conspiracies, and straight out cons. From the US through Latin America, all the usual suspects from right-wing politicians to religious con men hawk magic cures and claim that the whole thing is a hoax and the populations are full of people willing to trust some asshole who wants their money over the evidence of their eyes. This includes the people drinking bleach in Bolivia right now, which I had mentioned before.
Four of the highest (known) positivity rates in the world come from Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, and Costa Rica. Brazil might be worse than those four but they haven't been reporting how many tests they've been performing for a couple months now.
In a silver lining though, Australia's having the best flu season ever thanks to actions put into place to control the spread of SARS2. Masks, proper hand washing, physical distancing, etc. stop influenza just as much - the number of flu cases are down 99% from the same time last year. It is, after all, winter in the south. Other countries in the southern hemisphere with good coronavirus controls are seeing similar results. I would not be surprised if, say, New Zealand actually saw significantly fewer deaths than normal in 2020 by nearly eradicating other respiratory diseases at the same time and preventing deaths by pneumonia.
That's good news and all, but our "second wave" is now right on track to be considerably worse than our first wave ever was. I believe we were down to < 100 cases, the bars and restaurants were starting to open back up, then bam, back to lockdown, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Even if there is Covid19, its still a good thing for people to not get the flu! The flu may be nothing new and exciting, but its still more than capable of killing you.
"That is cool" - Abraham Lincoln
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No-QuarterNothing To FearBut Fear ItselfRegistered Userregular
Things may have finally gotten bad enough in North Korea that Kim Jong Un is willing to admit that there's a case, or maybe they've just reached a point where they know the rest of the world will find out. Kaesong, the border city that's partially a special industrial zone for South Korean investment, has been put on lockdown, supposedly due to a single case imported from South Korea, also supposedly a former defector who came back across for some unknown but presumably nefarious reason while infected. It seems more likely that, with South Korea's excellent contact tracing, they would quickly figure out if an outbreak was coming from North Korean workers in Kaesong, blab it to the world, and it would look bad for the regime in possibly some destabilizing way.
A major contributor to the pandemic explosion in the Western Hemisphere is our media filled with lies, bullshit, conspiracies, and straight out cons. From the US through Latin America, all the usual suspects from right-wing politicians to religious con men hawk magic cures and claim that the whole thing is a hoax and the populations are full of people willing to trust some asshole who wants their money over the evidence of their eyes. This includes the people drinking bleach in Bolivia right now, which I had mentioned before.
Four of the highest (known) positivity rates in the world come from Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, and Costa Rica. Brazil might be worse than those four but they haven't been reporting how many tests they've been performing for a couple months now.
In a silver lining though, Australia's having the best flu season ever thanks to actions put into place to control the spread of SARS2. Masks, proper hand washing, physical distancing, etc. stop influenza just as much - the number of flu cases are down 99% from the same time last year. It is, after all, winter in the south. Other countries in the southern hemisphere with good coronavirus controls are seeing similar results. I would not be surprised if, say, New Zealand actually saw significantly fewer deaths than normal in 2020 by nearly eradicating other respiratory diseases at the same time and preventing deaths by pneumonia.
That's good news and all, but our "second wave" is now right on track to be considerably worse than our first wave ever was. I believe we were down to < 100 cases, the bars and restaurants were starting to open back up, then bam, back to lockdown, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Even if there is Covid19, its still a good thing for people to not get the flu! The flu may be nothing new and exciting, but its still more than capable of killing you.
It will also tax your immune system and make it easier to get/ be more severely affected by Covid. It's a one/punch .
I got the flu shot with this thought specifically in mind, and I urge others to do so if they haven't already.
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daveNYCWhy universe hate Waspinator?Registered Userregular
Things may have finally gotten bad enough in North Korea that Kim Jong Un is willing to admit that there's a case, or maybe they've just reached a point where they know the rest of the world will find out. Kaesong, the border city that's partially a special industrial zone for South Korean investment, has been put on lockdown, supposedly due to a single case imported from South Korea, also supposedly a former defector who came back across for some unknown but presumably nefarious reason while infected. It seems more likely that, with South Korea's excellent contact tracing, they would quickly figure out if an outbreak was coming from North Korean workers in Kaesong, blab it to the world, and it would look bad for the regime in possibly some destabilizing way.
A major contributor to the pandemic explosion in the Western Hemisphere is our media filled with lies, bullshit, conspiracies, and straight out cons. From the US through Latin America, all the usual suspects from right-wing politicians to religious con men hawk magic cures and claim that the whole thing is a hoax and the populations are full of people willing to trust some asshole who wants their money over the evidence of their eyes. This includes the people drinking bleach in Bolivia right now, which I had mentioned before.
Four of the highest (known) positivity rates in the world come from Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, and Costa Rica. Brazil might be worse than those four but they haven't been reporting how many tests they've been performing for a couple months now.
In a silver lining though, Australia's having the best flu season ever thanks to actions put into place to control the spread of SARS2. Masks, proper hand washing, physical distancing, etc. stop influenza just as much - the number of flu cases are down 99% from the same time last year. It is, after all, winter in the south. Other countries in the southern hemisphere with good coronavirus controls are seeing similar results. I would not be surprised if, say, New Zealand actually saw significantly fewer deaths than normal in 2020 by nearly eradicating other respiratory diseases at the same time and preventing deaths by pneumonia.
That's good news and all, but our "second wave" is now right on track to be considerably worse than our first wave ever was. I believe we were down to < 100 cases, the bars and restaurants were starting to open back up, then bam, back to lockdown, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Even if there is Covid19, its still a good thing for people to not get the flu! The flu may be nothing new and exciting, but its still more than capable of killing you.
It will also tax your immune system and make it easier to get/ be more severely affected by Covid. It's a one/punch .
I got the flu shot with this thought specifically in mind, and I urge others to do so if they haven't already.
I'm not sure there's any studies on this, but I'm guessing that getting COVID and the flu is basically an express ticket to the ICU. Hopefully they guess right on what flavor of flu will be en vogue this year, and there's enough manufacturing capacity to pump out enough vaccines for pretty much everyone. That last bit has me especially worried since COVID has all the focus right now and there's a lot of work to prepare to produce whichever COVID vaccine(s) test out successfully. I have zero idea if that work is going to be using up vaccine production capacity that might otherwise be used for the flu vaccine. Might be a problem, might not.
And in the glorious Czech Republic the new restrictions on the nation are of the 'LOL you're joking' type. Groups of 100 or more must wear masks, but that's organized groups. So if you're throwing some party with 100 peeps, it's mask time. If you're just at some bar that has 100 randos in it, then masks aren't required. At the very least the Prague mayor needs to step up and mandate masks on all public transportation. I saw a few more people wearing them on the tram this morning, but not even remotely enough.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
In Belgium they had expanded the “bubbles” of 5 people to 15 people, but they might reduce them again because everything is flaring up again.
They did have to explain on the news that a “bubble of 15 people” is 15 people for the period of time, NOT “you’re allowed to visit 15 different people a day”
/facepalm
EDIT: They’re getting very nervous in Belgium and the bubbles have been reduced to 5 again. And no more couples-shopping; only one person may go into a shop (max. 30 minutes).
I’m guessing it’s going to go up the next two weeks because I saw this weekend plenty of people way too close to eachother without masks on tables outsides bars, pubs and cafés. The goverment is pulling is back to almost the strictest rules so far.
"And more children in Florida are requiring hospitalization. As of July 16, 246 children had been hospitalized with coronavirus. By July 24, that number had jumped to 303."
Just to place that in context, 400 people are being hospitalized every day with the virus in Florida. More kids are being hospitalized because more people are being hospitalized. Children are fortunately still not being frequently hospitalized by the virus compared to any other group.
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Also, Trump can be used as a bellwether for the trends of the uninformed. If he thinks drinking bleach might help, plenty of others have had the same thought. Then you just have to find the kind of people who will exploit that ignorance to make a buck and here we are. Trump's media presence probably provides strong reinforcement of bad ideas, but people can come up with their own bad ideas independently
Cloth masks are good for the person wearing them as well as the people around them. Basically, even though virus particles can go through the mask, you're less likely to die or get seriously ill if you're wearing a mask, simply because you inhaled fewer virus particles. Even if it doesn't protect you completely, it's still a good thing to do.
(This may also help explain Japan's weirdly low death rate from this.)
Inversely also explains the high death rate of doctors and nurses, including young healthy ones - they are the most likely to be getting mega-doses of virus particles so their systems can get overwhelmed all the faster. It's something I'd been speculating about for a while.
In updates, the President of Iran told state TV that the government estimates 25 million of 83 million Iranians have been infected by SARS2. The virus has been spreading basically unchecked since early March if not earlier (there have been half-assed attempts at lockdowns and controls that weren't really followed or obeyed) and that's lead to almost a third of the country having been infected over four-five months. Which yeah, exponential growth does that, but if that number is correct that also means two thirds have yet to be infected so all those dipshits online who are still bleating about a quick and easy herd immunity can fuck right off. This won't just go away over a month and then you get the economy rolling again and everything's fine. Another four to five months in the US - oh that gets us to the start of flu season with over half the population still yet to get infected?
This exact number of course should also be taken with a pinch of salt since President Rouhani only admits to about 14,000 deaths, which is the current official death toll and a giant undercount. The main takeaway is that Iran is kinda sorta admitting that yes, it's on that order of magnitude of being just as bad as people like me have been speculating, and this is a hint of how bad it will get as SARS2 continues to burn through populations.
The methyl alcohol thing is a bit more complicated than that, and actually something that goes back to prohibition in the US.
In places where alcohol is illegal or taxed, ethyl alcohol is usually still used for industrial processes and fuel purposes. To keep people from just watering down industrial alcohol (since it is functionally identical to neutral spirit like everclear) it is common practice to mix alcohol with a small amount of a noxious or toxic chemical that makes it unpleasant or dangerous to drink. Usually in things that are intended for consumer use (for example, disinfectant alcohol) this is done with a non-toxic chemical that causes a bad taste or nausea. For industrial or fuel alcohol, however, the go-to denaturant is methanol because it has similar properties to ethanol and is interchangeable for most purposes. Methanol looks and tastes almost exactly like ethanol, but concentrations of relatively low amounts can be fatal if consumed, especially in heavy drinkers. It is usually dyed to indicate toxicity.
The thing is, if you are in a place with prohibition, you can make ethanol fairly easily with a still and mash (or even beer or wine in places where that is legal but higher concentration drinks are not). However, that requires a lot of equipment which is hard to explain and adds a lot of risk for getting caught. Or you can just put some bleach in denatured industrial ethanol to get rid of the dye, and have a drink that looks and tastes like alcohol until someone actually binge drinks it at which point they end up dead or in the hospital.
There's a lot of public policy questions there (like maybe its not that great to intentionally poison alcohol that would otherwise be harmless for humans just to keep people from avoiding taxes or religious prohibitions?). But that’s the rub of what’s going on in Iran, and its a problem that has cropped up repeatedly around the world. Just a few weeks ago, there was an instance of a company possibly inadvertently using an ethanol denatured with methanol to make hand sanitizer and poisoning some people.
We'll see, maybe we'll get the stupids and try and ignore the upswing until it's too late.
Also a travel advisory for people coming in from other states to self isolate for two weeks, but I don’t know how enforceable it is. It’s also not all states, just the top 15 hardest hit like AZ, FL, CA, TX, etc
No word yet on statewide school opening policy. I know my district is offering online courses, which I’m having my kids do. I know my oldest will be fine with that, however my youngest is a special needs child and teaching her online will be more difficult.
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
I'm very excited about all this, but you know what makes me pretty sad about this. If we had invested wisely after SARS and MERS then we could have been right here, ready to step up large scale testing and evaluate performance on like, day 15 of the outbreak as soon as we had decent virus samples.
Yeah, seeing immune responses are good, but whether that's sufficient is the main concern. Given history with vaccines regards this kind of virus.
The other issue that'll matter is duration. Even if the vaccine is massively effective, but only grants immunity for months, or maybe only weeks, then the efficacy of mass vaccination is severely hindered.
While it's good to see that there's some optimism from the trials so far, the combination of "for profit" pharma* and 2020 just being an unrelenting shitshow, I'm going to remain at least a little skeptical until the evidence is a little more secure.
* I'm not so much counting the governmental and educational institutions, and if they come up with something, I'll be a little more optimistic. But if it's big pharma spouting success rates, less so.
AZD1222 (The astra zenica/oxford) vaccine was invented by a lab at one of the top two universities in the UK which is a non profit vaccine development lab.
https://www.ovg.ox.ac.uk/about
They have partnered with AstraZenica to complete the trials because its too big for them to do alone, but its absolutely a government/educational institution driving the research work, analyzing the data and publishing it. AstraZenica is just making the manufacturing plans. They are also managed/overseen by these people
https://www.ukcrc-ctu.org.uk/default.aspx
Which is a independent organization who makes sure clinical trials are done fairly and without bias in the UK.
Your concerns regarding, "Will it actually work" are completely valid, but I see no reason to suspect even slightly that Oxford/Astra are cooking the books here.
Oh, I'm not concerned with this specific trial. But there's something like 150 vaccines at various stages being worked on, I believe. And a good portion of those WILL be "for profit" pharma. And I fully don't trust that announcements from those will be completely open and honest. Already seen some significant manipulation for stock market motives on testing kits. Imagine we'll see the same for vaccines.
While pharma does has a role in our lives, it being a big factor in public health is as much a curse as a blessing.
That said it's going to be a mess when there's something in a Stage 1 sort of situation where the president thinks there's money for him in it...
I think the only concern I would have regarding the miracle situation where we think we have a vaccine that works and can be distributed by October would be the situation where...
Vaccine 1 has excellent data to back it up, is effective, but painful at the injection site and requires two shots and only claims 6 months of protection
Vaccine 2 has marginal supporting data, claims to be effective, requires 1 shot, has no side effects and claims 10 years of protection or something
Without question everyone else in the world would deploy Vaccine 1, whereas Trump would roll out Vaccine 2. He is always going to pick the highest potential upside, with minimum known downside, regardless of potential overall risk. Which I guess is what you are saying. I could easily see Trump ignoring a proven candidate with downsides, over their next gen version which hasn't been properly shown to work yet.
edit - But wait, then the vaccine wouldn't have been built yet. Literally the only ones which are deployable even potentially in the US this year are the 4 which are entering phase 3 now, because those are the only ones being built right now.
and/or a chance that it'll boost his numbers and chance of getting re-elected.
Separately, I'm wary of anything that has Pfizer's fingerprints on it. I mean awesome if it works but like.. their executives can go first, because Pfizer is an industry parasite that ruins everything it touches.
'Pretend he never said it and how dare you insinuate otherwise' has worked pretty well for him so far. If it saves lives then let baby have his bottle, on this one at least.
Preprint article, so grain of salt, but it's something more to throw at anyone who isn't on board with masks.
Non-medical grade masks don't block aerosol transmission; that's been one of the anti-maskers rallying cries from the start, that they don't work.
Even 10% reduction would be 10000+ lives saved and a flatter curve.
But they'll believe some unbacked/unquantified thing because it "may" work and have a good feeling about it.
uh huh.. deaths per week.. uh huh.. weekly growth rate, oh nice, it's going dow--wait whaaaaat
o__O
Do you have any indication of what it actually is? I was reading an article yesterday regarding how the US desperately needs to start setting up systems to monitor how many people need vaccines, and how many places have like, fridges and people trained to do injections and how many people those places can treat a day etc.
...What's sad is that we should already have this data at the CDC or something. "Who needs vaccines" is just population - infections (-immunocompromised), that's easy. And someone should already have a rough idea of the vaccination capacity based on existing well-developed infrastructure for flu shots (my understanding is that all the ones going into phase III atm are the standard upper arm injection, so... exactly the same as a flu shot).
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The problem there is masks were never recommended for those kinds of conditions. For aerosol transmission you're talking long term exposure in a contained space with sick people. a cloth mask isn't going to help you much in a church or hospital. But it will help in the conditions most people are exposed ie outside or in passing in enclosed places like stores.
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/hcp/admin/admin-protocols.html
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/vtrcks/index.html
So... I have no idea what it is. NV has tracked vaccinations for a long time, there's a statewide database of who's had what. Maybe that's why we're participating?
I can't find the blooming article right now, but the big issue is the lack of communication and strategy between the people who give the vaccines and the people who decide who get the vaccines. There's no real system in the US to tell like, kaiser Permanente that patients A and B can have a vaccine and patient C can't for non medical (rationing) reasons. We'll want to like, immunize grocery store clerks and cooks in the first wave, and lots of them don't have healthcare coverage and so on. The major vaccine distribution systems in the US are either Flu (untracked) or childhood vaccinations (tracked, but given to kids not adults and not tracked consistantly). We don't really have a route to give 2x as many vaccines as we do in flu seasons, in 6 months, to adults who will all need a booster shot. One can be built, but, its going to be a big stretch. Heck, we still need to decide who gets it first.
Well.
I mean you have several plans.
If your vaccine can only make say 100k every month, you have a plan where those go to health care workers and nursing home staff first while keeping their patients / residents isolated.
If you can make 1m a month, you might instead prioritize vaccinating the residents and immune compromised population instead of or along with the workers.
The big things is you have a number of plans based on a number of variables, and then pages of addendum that says 'do X if the disease ends up tearing through preschools instead of nursing homes'.
There’s an article here goes in to this I think.
A major contributor to the pandemic explosion in the Western Hemisphere is our media filled with lies, bullshit, conspiracies, and straight out cons. From the US through Latin America, all the usual suspects from right-wing politicians to religious con men hawk magic cures and claim that the whole thing is a hoax and the populations are full of people willing to trust some asshole who wants their money over the evidence of their eyes. This includes the people drinking bleach in Bolivia right now, which I had mentioned before.
Four of the highest (known) positivity rates in the world come from Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, and Costa Rica. Brazil might be worse than those four but they haven't been reporting how many tests they've been performing for a couple months now.
In a silver lining though, Australia's having the best flu season ever thanks to actions put into place to control the spread of SARS2. Masks, proper hand washing, physical distancing, etc. stop influenza just as much - the number of flu cases are down 99% from the same time last year. It is, after all, winter in the south. Other countries in the southern hemisphere with good coronavirus controls are seeing similar results. I would not be surprised if, say, New Zealand actually saw significantly fewer deaths than normal in 2020 by nearly eradicating other respiratory diseases at the same time and preventing deaths by pneumonia.
Fighting SARS2 must be proactive, not reactive. Vietnam, for instance - shut the borders to China very early, initiate quarantines early, shut down a town after finding a single case, mandate masks, and test like crazy. Vietnam just found its first case of community transmission in over three months and they're already planning new lockdowns. Stamp out any ember before it can become an exponential flame.
That's good news and all, but our "second wave" is now right on track to be considerably worse than our first wave ever was. I believe we were down to < 100 cases, the bars and restaurants were starting to open back up, then bam, back to lockdown, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Even if there is Covid19, its still a good thing for people to not get the flu! The flu may be nothing new and exciting, but its still more than capable of killing you.
It will also tax your immune system and make it easier to get/ be more severely affected by Covid. It's a one/punch .
I got the flu shot with this thought specifically in mind, and I urge others to do so if they haven't already.
I'm not sure there's any studies on this, but I'm guessing that getting COVID and the flu is basically an express ticket to the ICU. Hopefully they guess right on what flavor of flu will be en vogue this year, and there's enough manufacturing capacity to pump out enough vaccines for pretty much everyone. That last bit has me especially worried since COVID has all the focus right now and there's a lot of work to prepare to produce whichever COVID vaccine(s) test out successfully. I have zero idea if that work is going to be using up vaccine production capacity that might otherwise be used for the flu vaccine. Might be a problem, might not.
And in the glorious Czech Republic the new restrictions on the nation are of the 'LOL you're joking' type. Groups of 100 or more must wear masks, but that's organized groups. So if you're throwing some party with 100 peeps, it's mask time. If you're just at some bar that has 100 randos in it, then masks aren't required. At the very least the Prague mayor needs to step up and mandate masks on all public transportation. I saw a few more people wearing them on the tram this morning, but not even remotely enough.
They did have to explain on the news that a “bubble of 15 people” is 15 people for the period of time, NOT “you’re allowed to visit 15 different people a day”
/facepalm
EDIT: They’re getting very nervous in Belgium and the bubbles have been reduced to 5 again. And no more couples-shopping; only one person may go into a shop (max. 30 minutes).
I’m guessing it’s going to go up the next two weeks because I saw this weekend plenty of people way too close to eachother without masks on tables outsides bars, pubs and cafés. The goverment is pulling is back to almost the strictest rules so far.
"And more children in Florida are requiring hospitalization. As of July 16, 246 children had been hospitalized with coronavirus. By July 24, that number had jumped to 303."
Just to place that in context, 400 people are being hospitalized every day with the virus in Florida. More kids are being hospitalized because more people are being hospitalized. Children are fortunately still not being frequently hospitalized by the virus compared to any other group.