Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Xenos]

I'm getting weird Cartman vibes from this guy. Give me muh Freedom!

 

[theJ]

1 minute ago, Xenos said:

I'm getting weird Cartman vibes from this guy. Give me muh Freedom!

 

How did he get that far to fill a cart without someone stopping him?

[ET80]

3 minutes ago, theJ said:

How did he get that far to fill a cart without someone stopping him?

I think he was trying to get internet famous - wore a mask to get in, then took it off and started the camera phone.

[Xenos]

2 minutes ago, ET80 said:

I think he was trying to get internet famous - wore a mask to get in, then took it off and started the camera phone.

I'm assuming the guy who took it away is also a manager. No one probably wanted to confront him before either. It's a difficult situation when it comes to conflict and confrontation. As someone who had to deal with things like this in the past (I worked at a bank for a long time), it's incredibly hard on my nerves especially when I was in a supervisory role. You want to ease conflict but sometimes customers just lack common sense. I remember being yelled at and threatened because I wouldn't give this guy tens of thousands of dollars because he forgot his ID. Obviously, I should have recognized him right off the bat and given him exactly what he wanted since he was such a valuable customer

[Forge]

13 minutes ago, ET80 said:

I think he was trying to get internet famous - wore a mask to get in, then took it off and started the camera phone.

That's what I am thinking as well. 

 

[mistakey]

1 hour ago, rob_shadows said:

And yet had testing not increased the number wouldn't have gone up but those people were still infected regardless. That's the point people are trying to make when they argue looking at the percentage of positive tests vs the cumulative number of positive tests.

I'm just pointing out that there are multiple ways to look at it. Ultimately it's not really possible for us to know if the number of cases is actually climbing or if we're just finding more because we're testing a lot more... At least short of testing literally every person in the country which obviously isn't going to happen.

Yeah wasnt talking about the cumulative number of tests.  That would be 2 days, one with double the testing capacity yet lower rate of infection, which is what people are championing.

In terms of raw positives its bad, which is bad no matter how you look at it

[mission27]

3 hours ago, rob_shadows said:

To be fair isn't that largely because of significantly increased testing? If I remember correctly last I saw the percentage of tests coming back positive wasn't actually increasing just that there are a lot more tests being done.

Taking it one state at a time. 

There really has been no increase in Georgia, unless you are calling 1 day (today) an increase.  Case numbers are flat to slightly declining for over 1.5 months now.  They are now testing about 5x as many people as they were at the beginning of that 1.5 month slow decline period.  So I think its very safe and fair to say that in reality there has been a meaningful reduction in cases in Georgia.  Today was a weird day as they reported very few tests and a bunch of positives but important not to fixate on any one day, the 7 or 14 day moving averages are much more telling.  

Florida had a big bump at the end of March and a steady decline before a bit of an uptick over the past 7 days.  However, testing has also increased dramatically in that 7 days compared to Florida's testing historically (more than 50% increase).  Today was the highest number of cases in a while but they also conducted 40k tests after conducted 45k yesterday and overall around 2% of tests have come back positive which is a really good number, comparable to what many countries in Europe are running.  A month ago they were 5-10k a day and ~7-8% were coming back positive.  Which wasn't bad per se, but like Georgia, they've expanded testing by 5x in the past month or month and a half and so if the epidemic were stable or especially if it were growing as some have suggested you would expect a lot more cases, which is not what we've seen.  

Finally Texas I think you'd have the best argument because cases have been steadily building.  But again they are testing 5-10x as many as they were a month ago.  My guess here is the reason Texas' curve looks different from Georgia and Florida is that Texas didn't have the same spike at the beginning due to a mini outbreak, because of less traffic from the northeast, so you aren't seeing the gains from getting a real outbreak like occurred in parts of Georgia and Florida under control.  What you are seeing is a long plateau or gradual decline at a low number of per capita cases that looks like case growth due to expanded testing.  Importantly, Texas started to see cases increase again around April 24th.  The Texas shelter in place order didn't get lifted until April 30th so if that were the cause you wouldn't have expected to see a spike until May 15th - May 20th.  So the timeline doesn't make sense.  What did happen around April 24th was Texas started to aggressively ramp up testing to get ready for re-opening (which is a good thing!) and so yes they found more cases.  But I'd wait until we see testing stabilize or pull back and cases continuing to rise before saying there's a real second wave in Texas.  

Here are the 7 day trailing averages:

[WizeGuy]

If there's one thing we can all agree on it's this- the world needs to learn from this pandemic. When another one hits we need to be better prepared.

That comes in the form of putting more resources into science and medicine. We need scientists getting paid more. We need experts paid attention to. We need tolerance and collaboration with all countries. We need honesty and genuiness in all our numbers and from all of our leaders. Unfortunately politics will always get in the way and the common man(and woman) will ultimately pay.

Edited May 22, 2020 by WizeGuy

[Glen]

1 minute ago, WizeGuy said:

If there's one thing we can all agree on it's this- the world needs to learn from this pandemic. When another one hits we need to be better prepared.

That comes in the form of putting more resources into science and medicine. We need scientists getting paid more. We need experts paid attention to. We need tolerance and collaboration with all countries. We need honesty and genuiness in all our numbers and from all of our leaders. Unfortunately politics will always get in the way and the common man(and woman) will ultimately pay.

And if there’s one thing we all can agree on is that humanity will certainly not do any of that unfortunately 

[mission27]

Slight bump in cases today vs. one week ago, although the average for this week will likely still come in lower.  Deaths significantly lower than a week ago and the moving average of deaths is now more than 40% below its peak from just 4 weeks ago, which is good progress. 

[mission27]

4 hours ago, Xenos said:

You're confusing the US (with its warts and all) with actual authorian government like the Chinese. You would probably never even survive in a place like New Zealand either.

Speaking of which, can the MOL include the Kiwis? @mission27

Of course

[mistakey]

16 minutes ago, WizeGuy said:

If there's one thing we can all agree on it's this- the world needs to learn from this pandemic. When another one hits we need to be better prepared.

That comes in the form of putting more resources into science and medicine. We need scientists getting paid more. We need experts paid attention to. We need tolerance and collaboration with all countries. We need honesty and genuiness in all our numbers and from all of our leaders. Unfortunately politics will always get in the way and the common man(and woman) will ultimately pay.

Dont worry with quantum computing and AI we will be able to find vaccines and cures increasingly fast

[mission27]

5/21/2020 MoL Scores:

Methodology and disclaimer: MoL score is a simple metric for measuring rate of spread of the novel coronavirus within communities.  The metric was developed by mission and TLO and has not been subjected to academic peer review.  The MoL looks at a trailing average of daily new cases and compares this to trailing active cases within the community.  These rankings do not represent the opinion of anyone other than mission and TLO and should not be taken as advice of any kind.  Please note while the numbers themselves are objective calculations, smugness and Taylor Swift lyrics may factor into our commentary and decisions on tiers.  The MoL reserves the right to make changes to this methodology at any time.  Please follow all relevant governmental and/or WHO/CDC guidance.  We will defeat this virus.

"They say home is where the heart is

But God, I love the English"

- Taylor Swift

Today TLO has a special day and Baby Bart is born in the UK

Tier 1: Outbreak under control, safe to begin relaxing social distancing measures

Tier 1 countries are pretty,... pretty... pretty good

How to safely open up in Tier 1? Take a look at the MoL method for proper easing, otherwise known as the MoL public health cost benefit matrix.

Israel: 0.4

Netherlands: 0.4

France: 0.5

Japan: 0.8

Italy: 0.9

Belgium: 0.9

New Zealand (New): 1.0

Portugal: 1.0

UK: 1.1

Spain: 1.8

South Korea: 1.9

Czech Republic: 2.0

USA: 2.2 

Switzerland: 2.2

Australia: 2.3

Philippines: 2.5

Singapore: 2.6

Sweden: 2.6

Turkey: 3.4

Germany: 3.5

Hong Kong: 4.4

Austria: 4.8

China: 5.4

Tier 2: New case growth is minimal suggesting social distancing is working, likely a few weeks away from breaking into tier 1

Tier 2 countries aren't  doing as well as Tier 1 countries, but eh, we'll give 'em a pass, why not!  Especially since Larry doesn't want to get fatwahed again.

Ireland: 2.8

Global: 3.1

Canada: 3.6 (JBURGE horrible Ontario holding back the country now tbh)

Denmark: 4.9

Russia: 4.8

Tier 3: Countries in this group that are showing increased MoLs have the potential to go deep into the danger zones, but countries with falling MoLs may only be a couple of days from tier 2 status and may have already peaked in gross # of new cases

These countries could really do a lot better if they followed common decency standards, like washing their hands or respecting wood 

India: 10.1

Iran: 12.3

Brazil: 14.1

Tier 4: Aggressive growth, still likely have not peaked in single day cases, and likely a week or two minimum from peak in deaths (however many of these countries are still slowing down)

We feel very bad for the last Tier 4 country remaining on our list, the Mexico.  Its like that time Funkhauser became an orphan at 60 (RIP Funkhauser).

Mexico: 26.1

USA State Level MoLs

Texas numbers were reported after the state by state cutoff, so don't read too much into that.  Pretty solid improvement across the board from the tier 1 countries.

MoL Deaths

Another solid drop in the death rate which is now 41% below the all-time high of 4 weeks ago.  

Canada

For the first tie in a long time Ontario actually has a higher MoL than Quebec.  While Quebec has more cases per capita still, its trajectory has shown real improvement the last week or two while Ontario has begun to backslide.  Maybe those smug Ontario folk like D Ford can get a grip and stop blaming outsiders for all their problems. 

@JBURGE

The MoL would like to thank everyone for their contributions to this important work including @ET80 @acowboys62 @dtait93 @Dome @naptownskinsfan @kingseanjohn @Malfatron @Shady Slim @malagabears @daboyle250 @vikesfan89 @ramssuperbowl99 @sdrawkcab321 @Nazgul @kingseanjohn  @TwoUpTwoDown @Xenos @Nex_Gen @FinneasGage @TVScout @seriously27 @N4L and the others who love us so much

We'd even like to thank @pwny @Glen and others for their critical attitude because of the attention it brings to the great work MoL is doing 

@TLO

The message of this gif is that the MoL is signing out until tomorrow (although we reserve the right to **** on anyone who questions our authority on these matters)

[naptownskinsfan]

5 hours ago, LETSGOBROWNIES said:

The number of hospitalizations will definitely increase, the real question is will they increase to a point the strain the system?

That’s my main reason for preferring a measured, slower reopening.  With a 14 day incubation period, that’s a hard bell to unring if things go sideways.

Measure twice, cut once, etc, etc.

The last few days, at least here in my corner of the world, the wheels have fallen off.  Went to ACE hardware and nobody was wearing masks, employees included. People are acting like this is over.

I just hope the 20 something year old kids working the entry level job know more than the worlds leading virologists.

The way MD's governor talks about masks, it seems like they are here for the foreseeable future.  While I am not a fan of masks, I completely understand it at this point.  

I don't necessarily believe the 20 somethings are to blame here, at least in broad strokes.  It seems like the older workforce, those closer to retirement, are the ones really pushing a lot of this.  

[naptownskinsfan]

8 hours ago, acowboys62 said:

Will never know if this is COVID related or just a freak situation, and I think I mentioned this back in the early days of this thread but in my area we have been getting more and more "alert" messages about crimes in the area.  And the preface to this is normally the area I live and the few surrounding towns, the most criminal thing that happens is DUI, occasional minor drug charge or a dog without a registration, there is no real crime. 

Since about late April about 2x per week I have been getting alerts about an increase in daytime car burglaries (seems risky given most people are WFH)  and a surge in "accessory structure" break-ins (garages, sheds, basements (would argue this is not accessory)).  I backup to a park which has about 20-25 ft or thick woods separating the yards from the park and last week my neighbor had the backdoor of their garage kicked in (nothing taken) and my outdoor camera last night around 4 am picked up movement along the fence line (could have been anything from animals to wind), weird times and weird targets.  I am not sure what one gains from breaking into a sheds and such, seems awfully inconvenient to try and make off with a lawn mower or some fertilizer.  

 

It wouldn't surprise me if it is Covid related.  I am actually surprised I am not hearing about more crime coming out of Baltimore, DC and Annapolis right now.  Maybe because those places are still under states of emergency.  I expect crime rates to soar once those orders are over.