Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Xenos]

10 hours ago, kingseanjohn said:

Either COVID related or just a terrible coincidence.

 

Posted the NPR article in the other page. It's rare but still super annoying to hear as a parent.

[acowboys62]

20 minutes ago, rob_shadows said:

I don't know the details enough to really be able to comment on that.

I will say this... This whole situation has shown that there are definitely certain advantages for authoritarian governments.

Well there's something I never thought I'd say 

Umm, there are zero advantages to authoritarian governments, you should never want your government to have control of what you can and cannot do...that is craziness. 

[vikesfan89]

48 minutes ago, TVScout said:

Not much new in today's free article:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/coronavirus/

Not free:

Experiment shows human speech generates droplets that linger in the air for more than 8 minutes

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/experiment-shows-human-speech-generates-droplets-that-linger-in-the-air-for-more-than-8-minutes/2020/05/13/7f293ba2-9557-11ea-82b4-c8db161ff6e5_story.html

Why didn't they know this already?

[ramssuperbowl99]

29 minutes ago, acowboys62 said:

Umm, there are zero advantages to authoritarian governments, you should never want your government to have control of what you can and cannot do...that is craziness. 

This reads really dogmatic, and I don't want to take the conversation past a point of no return so I'm not going to be replying, but instead of relying on that black/white "never" type belief, I'd encourage you to go about your daily life and watch for regulations that make everyone's lives a lot better. (They aren't hard to spot.)

It's a good thing that everyone drives on the right side of the road and that stoplights aren't free for alls. It's a good thing that every plug fits into every outlet. It's a good thing that I can't go to a public park right now and start littering.

As much as we'd all love to take "live and let live" as far as we can, there are times when people agreeing to a set of rules - whether that's "drive on the right" or "we need to stay at home there's a pandemic" - just works better than anything else. And, yes, the government is the mechanism from which those rules come from.  Obviously I'm not advocating for extremism the other direction, and I'm sensitive to why stay at home orders in particular are a sensitive subject for people. What I'm advocating for, and what I'd hope you try to appreciate, is that society is not one size fits all. Sometimes we don't need rules, and that's great. Other times we do.

The state of Wisconsin yesterday is an excellent example of a situation where we really needed a rule saying "here's the CDC guidance, we all have to follow it", and not only was that rule taken away, it was taken away in spite of the voters who wanted it in place.

[rob_shadows]

48 minutes ago, acowboys62 said:

Umm, there are zero advantages to authoritarian governments, you should never want your government to have control of what you can and cannot do...that is craziness. 

I didn't say there were advances to authoritarian governments, I said there are certain advantages for authoritarian governments... Big difference in meaning.

[mission27]

Cases generally spike on Thursday and Friday, so I'd expect higher numbers today.  We were around 30k last Thursday and Friday, anything below that is progress.

[WizeGuy]

Good news regarding the Oxford vaccine. The paper hasn't been peer reviewed yet.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.13.093195v1

Tell me how to feel

@Shanedorf

[ramssuperbowl99]

1 minute ago, WizeGuy said:

Good news regarding the Oxford vaccine. The paper hasn't been peer reviewed yet.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.13.093195v1

Tell me how to feel

@Shanedorf

Oooh this is Animal Rule stuff. I'm interested.

They've now shown efficacy in monkeys and mice, so we have 2 species that are very different each and the vaccine appears functional. You never know what could happen moving from monkeys to humans, there are differences and unfortunately some of the biggest are in the immune system. But 2 preclinical species showing efficacy is an excellent sign.

[TVScout]

27 minutes ago, WizeGuy said:

Good news regarding the Oxford vaccine. The paper hasn't been peer reviewed yet.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.13.093195v1

Tell me how to feel

@Shanedorf

It says pneumonia. What about everything else?

[mission27]

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/14/opinion/reopen-america-coronavirus-lockdown.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

[Shanedorf]

43 minutes ago, WizeGuy said:

Good news regarding the Oxford vaccine. The paper hasn't been peer reviewed yet.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.13.093195v1

 

Key phrases here:

"eliciting a robust humoral and cell-mediated response.
This response was not Th2 dominated, as demonstrated by IgG subclass and cytokine expression profiling

The first part they are telling us that the vaccine created both an antibody response and a cellular response ( T-cells, natural killer cells etc)
I don't understand the 2nd part about "Th2 dominated"
More details needed and this is really @seriously27 area of expertise.

And while mice are far away from humans in many ways, their immune system is the main model for a lot of immunology research work
In some cases they remove the mouse immune system and seed it with human cells, so you have a human immune system inside a mouse
As noted above the monkey work is also critical, they're our closest cousins. This sounds like very promising news IF it holds up.

[ramssuperbowl99]

13 minutes ago, Shanedorf said:

And while mice are far away from humans in many ways, their immune system is the main model for a lot of immunology research work

Admittedly, I'd add a caveat here that primate data is far and away the most important. We really use mouse because it's closer than rat, they're well studied already, and you need animals with different body weights and body surface areas for cross species scaling to humans.

[seriously27]

25 minutes ago, Shanedorf said:

Key phrases here:

"eliciting a robust humoral and cell-mediated response.
This response was not Th2 dominated, as demonstrated by IgG subclass and cytokine expression profiling

The first part they are telling us that the vaccine created both an antibody response and a cellular response ( T-cells, natural killer cells etc)
I don't understand the 2nd part about "Th2 dominated"
More details needed and this is really @seriously27 area of expertise.

And while mice are far away from humans in many ways, their immune system is the main model for a lot of immunology research work
In some cases they remove the mouse immune system and seed it with human cells, so you have a human immune system inside a mouse
As noted above the monkey work is also critical, they're our closest cousins. This sounds like very promising news IF it holds up.

Cytokines are the hormonal messengers responsible for most of the biological effects in the immune system, such as cell mediated immunity and allergic type responses.

T lymphocytes are a major source of cytokines. Helper T cells are normally called Th1 and TH2. In excess, Th2 responses will counteract the Th1 mediated microbicidal action. The optimal scenario would  seem to be that humans should produce a well balanced Th1 and Th2 response, suited to the immune challenge. 

SO basically having a response that is Th2 dominated would be a bad thing and would show they were not getting the immunity response they were looking for. 

[mission27]

Big spikes today in Michigan and Illinois

Michigan spike was apparently due to a testing backlog 

Illinois was also pretty similar positive test % compared to May 7th (last Thursday) on more tests, but not as encouraging as the numbers the last few days

Still big parts of California and Texas outstanding, plus Massachusetts, and some of the western states so its too early to say for sure how todays numbers will look.  If I had to guess... they will be a clear improvement over last Thursday but not as clear as the improvement we've seen the last 3-4 days

[naptownskinsfan]

I firmly believe that we are all experiencing a lack of leadership right now that has sadly started at the top.  Maryland pledged that Stage 1 would begin tomorrow but it is up to individual counties to make that call, much like the governors were left to make their own decisions.  

I am posting the link for the county I live and work in, and it's not really Stage 1.  Retail can only open for curbside (why even bother opening for that, especially as some stores are already doing .com orders for their company.). Car washes as automatic only, which makes no sense as there is just as much risk involved for other car washes during payment as there is at a fast food drive-thru- just don't do the interior of the car.  Beauty and barbershops can serve non-essential personnel, but only one person in the shop at a time, so good luck getting an appointment now, and good luck if you are essential personnel and need to get one for work reasons in a reasonable time.  And no religious facility can open.  Full link- https://www.eyeonannapolis.net/2020/05/anne-arundel-county-executive-pittman-announces-covid-19-re-opening-plan/ 

Our county is also the same distance from DC and Baltimore, both cities who have extended their stay at home orders, as well as the state capital Annapolis, where I work.  I am sure this is going to frustrate people, and at this point, our county has essentially kept the stay at home order in place.  I didn't see any issues with Phase 1 of reopening Maryland aside from religious gatherings- 50% capacity is still a lot of people in some church communities- and it would be difficult for everyone to practice social distancing even in that environment.  Personally, I am very active at my church, and am unsure if I would go to mass if we had one right now.