Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[mission27]

5 minutes ago, vikesfan89 said:

Really? I haven't heard that

https://time.com/5818547/ventilators-coronavirus/ for example

In layman's terms the issue is unlike bacterial pneumonia once you go on a ventilator for COVID it could be weeks before you're off it and the O2 pressure damages the lungs + other potential complications, so it may not be the ideal treatment even in some very severe cases

New York City says 80% of people who go on a vent do not survive and I guess some doctors are suggesting the vents are doing more harm than good 

Sounds like folks are exploring other therapeutic approaches to getting oxygen levels up and trying to avoid ventilators when at all possible

[rob_shadows]

44 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

The model with the 60,000 death figure you're quoting assumes constant social distancing through August 4th (and doesn't simulate beyond then). See the relevant portion of the article below, or click the FAQ link on this page https://covid19.healthdata.org/united-states-of-america:

That type of model works really well for informing your decision making for this wave, but doesn't account for any cases/deaths when restrictions are loosened or when this goes on long enough that compliance drops. This is acknowledged directly as a missing component:

That 97% figure is hugely important given the news that we just learned from this paper, which is that the higher R0 means the bar for successful herd immunity is now much higher. From the paper:

 

To look at these results in tandem and conclude that this was an overreaction or hysteria is basically an admission you either aren't reading or understanding the fine print or even really the point of the model estimates that we are currently using. I don't want that to come off as mean here, but it kinda is what it is. 

tl;dr battle is looking better, war has just begun

The projections have always assumed we keep social distancing in place so it's still meaningful to see them drop.

And I certainly never insinuated we stop social distancing measures either, I'm not one of the people bothered by them... I rarely go out and do anything anyway so it isn't impacting me much at all. 

No one is saying... Well I'm sure there are people who are but I'M not saying that the reduced projections mean we shouldn't have taken this seriously. 60,000 deaths is still 60,000 deaths... All I'm saying is it's a massive change from when this whole thing first started and certain media outlets were trying to push stories projecting millions of deaths in the U.S alone. 

I agree it's foolish for anyone to day this issue isn't a serious one... But it's also correct to say that some people strongly overreacted and caused far more panic than was necessary... Both statements can be and are true.

[Xenos]

4 minutes ago, rob_shadows said:

The projections have always assumed we keep social distancing in place so it's still meaningful to see them drop.

And I certainly never insinuated we stop social distancing measures either, I'm not one of the people bothered by them... I rarely go out and do anything anyway so it isn't impacting me much at all. 

No one is saying... Well I'm sure there are people who are but I'M not saying that the reduced projections mean we shouldn't have taken this seriously. 60,000 deaths is still 60,000 deaths... All I'm saying is it's a massive change from when this whole thing first started and certain media outlets were trying to push stories projecting millions of deaths in the U.S alone. 

I agree it's foolish for anyone to day this issue isn't a serious one... But it's also correct to say that some people strongly overreacted and caused far more panic than was necessary... Both statements can be and are true.

Because that was what would have happened if we didn't take these extraordinary steps. What would have happened if we had taken the UK's initial stance and tried to do herd immunity instead? I don't agree that this was an overreaction at all.

[ramssuperbowl99]

2 minutes ago, rob_shadows said:

The projections have always assumed we keep social distancing in place so it's still meaningful to see them drop.

And I certainly never insinuated we stop social distancing measures either, I'm not one of the people bothered by them... I rarely go out and do anything anyway so it isn't impacting me much at all. 

No one is saying... Well I'm sure there are people who are but I'M not saying that the reduced projections mean we shouldn't have taken this seriously. 60,000 deaths is still 60,000 deaths... All I'm saying is it's a massive change from when this whole thing first started and certain media outlets were trying to push stories projecting millions of deaths in the U.S alone. 

I agree it's foolish for anyone to day this issue isn't a serious one... But it's also correct to say that some people strongly overreacted and caused far more panic than was necessary... Both statements can be and are true.

If you're desperate enough to vilify the media somehow that you'll try and claim they overreacted to something that forced us to fundamentally alter day to day life for the majority of Americans like we haven't seen since polio and is still going to infect millions/kill tens of thousands in just the first wave, well, you do you I guess.

[ramssuperbowl99]

11 minutes ago, Xenos said:

Because that was what would have happened if we didn't take these extraordinary steps. What would have happened if we had taken the UK's initial stance and tried to do herd immunity instead? I don't agree that this was an overreaction at all.

And that was exactly the point of those models. You don't shut the economy down and place the entire freaking country under house arrest unless the worst case scenario is really, really bad.

Or, if you choose, "number was big now number is small so it must be TV man's fault" .

[Xenos]

1 minute ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

And that was exactly the point of those models. You don't shut the economy down and place the entire freaking country under house arrest unless the worst case scenario is really, really bad.

Or, if you choose, "number was big now number is small so it must be TV man's fault" .

Maybe I'm wrong here but I would be more worried if the numbers didn't get lower after everything that we just did. The point is to find a way to get back to some level of normalcy even if a vaccine was a long ways a way.

[ramssuperbowl99]

4 minutes ago, Xenos said:

Maybe I'm wrong here but I would be more worried if the numbers didn't get lower after everything that we just did. The point is to find a way to get back to some level of normalcy even if a vaccine was a long ways a way.

From the previous article:

Quote

Our results suggest that a combination of control measures, including early and active surveillance, quarantine, and especially strong social distancing efforts, are needed to slow down or stop the spread of the virus. If these measures are not implemented early and strongly, the virus has the potential to spread rapidly and infect a large fraction of the population, overwhelming healthcare systems. Fortunately, the decline in newly confirmed cases in China and South Korea in March 2020 and the stably low incidences in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore strongly suggest that the spread of the virus can be contained with early and appropriate measures.

 

The goal here should be to get new active cases down to the point where we can start being selective about who is quarantined.

[rob_shadows]

9 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

And that was exactly the point of those models. You don't shut the economy down and place the entire freaking country under house arrest unless the worst case scenario is really, really bad.

Or, if you choose, "number was big now number is small so it must be TV man's fault" .

No one ever said it was "tv man's fault", it's no ones fault... The virus came from nature and spread to humans... There was nothing anyone could have done to stop it and there will be more viruses in the future and no one can do anything to stop that either.. It's just an unfortunate part of nature. You're sensationalizing what I said to say the least. 

 

[rob_shadows]

7 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

From the previous article:

 

The goal here should be to get new active cases down to the point where we can start being selective about who is quarantined.

Pretty sure that's the idea although I haven't heard any government sources outline a plan yet (probably because it's too early to even do so) but one advantage we do have in being behind everyone else is that we'll get to see how the sectionalized reopening of countries has worked elsewhere and go from there.

Edited April 10, 2020 by rob_shadows

[ramssuperbowl99]

Just now, rob_shadows said:

No one ever said it was "tv man's fault", it's no ones fault... The virus came from nature and spread to humans... There was nothing anyone could have done to stop it and there will be more viruses in the future and no one can do anything to stop that either.. It's just an unfortunate part of nature. You're sensationalizing what I said to say the least. 

 

I'll make it matter of fact then: Your initial reaction to a projection of 60,000 dead after a month of quarantine is to immediately start blaming the media because you didn't take the time to read or understand the purpose of the models the media was reporting.

[vikesfan89]

47 minutes ago, Xenos said:

This was the initial estimate based on scientific projections during a time when NY was the epicenter of all this. And lest we forget, other people need ventilators as well that are not Covid19 related. Glad things seem to be peaking for NY right now but let's not jump the gun yet.

I think this was a couple weeks ago. People didn't think that the governor should even be questioned.

I assume that the New York had enough ventilators to deal with the other patients otherwise they were lacking before this started. The 30,000 was in addition to what they already had unless I am mistaken.

It is too early to make any kind of conclusions but hopefully things keep getting better

[mission27]

7 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

If you're desperate enough to vilify the media somehow that you'll try and claim they overreacted to something that forced us to fundamentally alter day to day life for the majority of Americans like we haven't seen since polio and is still going to infect millions/kill tens of thousands in just the first wave, well, you do you I guess.

I mean look I agree the numbers getting better when social distancing in and of itself can't be evidence that we overreacted, but that doesn't mean we didn't overreact 

If it turns out the CFR of this is only like 0.1% or 0.2% and there are many more people in the community with antibodies than we realize and the healthcare system overload was purely the result of an insanely high R0 and we shut down everyone's lives, tanked the global economy, put off weddings and funerals to prevent or more likely just delay some infections, then we overreacted.  But it was probably justified given the uncertainty

And that's what we have to hope is the case.  Because we'll have the antibody surveys pretty soon and know a lot more about hospitalization and fatality rates and if those are a lot lower than the WHO estimates (which they probably are), that info + increased healthcare system capacity + testing should allow us to go back to more or less normal shortly 

Whereas if the CFR is really 3% and this is just the tip of the iceberg we need to be more confident in our containment mechanisms although IMO still need to find a way to lift lockdown by some point in May

---

Btw separately but related the officials and media out there saying or promoting things like "we will never go back to normal" or "we wont go back to normal for a year or two" are being very alarmist and counter productive.  That's simply not an option.  People will rightly choose massive numbers of deaths over permanent loss of our way of life and frankly 1 to 2 years may as well be permanent in a lot of people's minds.  They NEED to stop saying things like that if they want people to follow social distancing.  People are willing to do this for a short period of time to save lives and get back to our lives.  But nobody is going to accept this long term especially since there would be a strong feeling that public officials "tricked" us into lockdown by saying it would be a week or two and aren't lifting it because they dont want to take responsibility 

It comes down to the definition of normal

I dont think the Fauci's of the world are suggesting we give up our way of life.  They're suggesting we'll have to wash our hands more and maybe wear face masks in crowded places and avoid cruise ships for a while and test often. 

But when you give those statements a megaphone without context you scare people, because they hear that and think I wont be able to eat out or see friends and family or go on a vacation or even return to work ever again or at least for years and for most people that's scarier than dying of this 

So this is the one place I think the media deserves criticism.  They are taking these comments way out of context and amplifying doomsday prophets in our society in a way that scares people and makes people question whether listening to social distancing is worth it, because being alarmist gets attention.  That 100% needs to stop.  

[rob_shadows]

12 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

I'll make it matter of fact then: Your initial reaction to a projection of 60,000 dead after a month of quarantine is to immediately start blaming the media because you didn't take the time to read or understand the purpose of the models the media was reporting.

I understood it perfectly, I also understood that there was no reason to create a panic by telling people millions were going to die when at that particular time it really WAS just speculation with no models backing it up because it had literally just started spreading and there were no models to even create yet. 

The only models that were available at that time were models based on what was happening in other countries and there was no evidence whatsoever to suggest a death toll in the millions. 

You can say "well that's what would have happened if we didn't do anything!" All you want but there was never a realistic chance we aren't going to do anything. There was a question of how far we were going to go sure, but we were always going to be doing something to slow the spread... No one with half a brain every actually thought no action would be taken.

 

 

Edited April 10, 2020 by rob_shadows

[ramssuperbowl99]

8 minutes ago, rob_shadows said:

I understood it perfectly, I also understood that there was no reason to create a panic by telling people millions were going to die

The truly sad part of these back to back sentences is that the 2nd one shows you don't understand it at all and still haven't read past the final result. 

No model is the history of models just says "millions are going to die". The models which said we could see tens of millions infected and millions dead if we don't do anything. That model was accurately reported by the media to get people to start social isolation. You don't shut the global economy down because a few thousand people die of the flu.

Don't blame your laziness to read past the first sentence or your inability to understand how assumptions work in mathematics on the media.

Edited April 10, 2020 by ramssuperbowl99

[ramssuperbowl99]

16 minutes ago, mission27 said:

I mean look I agree the numbers getting better when social distancing in and of itself can't be evidence that we overreacted, but that doesn't mean we didn't overreact 

If it turns out the CFR of this is only like 0.1% or 0.2% and there are many more people in the community with antibodies than we realize and the healthcare system overload was purely the result of an insanely high R0 and we shut down everyone's lives, tanked the global economy, put off weddings and funerals to prevent or more likely just delay some infections, then we overreacted.  But it was probably justified given the uncertainty

And that's what we have to hope is the case.  Because we'll have the antibody surveys pretty soon and know a lot more about hospitalization and fatality rates and if those are a lot lower than the WHO estimates (which they probably are), that info + increased healthcare system capacity + testing should allow us to go back to more or less normal shortly 

Whereas if the CFR is really 3% and this is just the tip of the iceberg we need to be more confident in our containment mechanisms although IMO still need to find a way to lift lockdown by some point in Mayts attention.  That 100% needs to stop.  

I agree with everything except your hopes and dreams that the CFR is going to be that low or that we will resume normalcy shortly.

16 minutes ago, mission27 said:

Btw separately but related the officials and media out there saying or promoting things like "we will never go back to normal" or "we wont go back to normal for a year or two" are being very alarmist and counter productive.  That's simply not an option.  People will rightly choose massive numbers of deaths over permanent loss of our way of life and frankly 1 to 2 years may as well be permanent in a lot of people's minds.  They NEED to stop saying things like that if they want people to follow social distancing.  People are willing to do this for a short period of time to save lives and get back to our lives.  But nobody is going to accept this long term especially since there would be a strong feeling that public officials "tricked" us into lockdown by saying it would be a week or two and aren't lifting it because they dont want to take responsibility 

It comes down to the definition of normal

I dont think the Fauci's of the world are suggesting we give up our way of life.  They're suggesting we'll have to wash our hands more and maybe wear face masks in crowded places and avoid cruise ships for a while and test often. 

But when you give those statements a megaphone without context you scare people, because they hear that and think I wont be able to eat out or see friends and family or go on a vacation or even return to work ever again or at least for years and for most people that's scarier than dying of this 

So this is the one place I think the media deserves criticism.  They are taking these comments way out of context and amplifying doomsday prophets in our society in a way that scares people and makes people question whether listening to social distancing is worth it, because being alarmist gets attention.  That 100% needs to stop.  

I would argue the worst thing segments of our media did in this was downplay and attempt to politicize this issue in the early going where social distancing could have helped slow down or maybe even prevent the critical mass of cases that lead to exponential growth. But people who constantly look to criticize the media aren't going to talk about that.

Edited April 10, 2020 by ramssuperbowl99