[QUOTE=Till;543257]These dark figures are indeed very high. Do you have references?[/QUOTE]These figures are cause for optimism, not gloom. Testing positive for live virus is very different from testing positive for antibodies that defend against the virus.
There are multiple articles reflecting studies which establish 30-40% prevalence of antibodies for Covid19 in sample populations of hundreds each in Massachusetts.
[URL]https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.12.20059618v1[/URL] is one done at a homeless shelter.
See also [URL]https://www.mersenneforum.org/showpost.php?p=543079&postcount=656[/URL] for corroborating links posted earlier in this thread; random anonymous sampling of people on the street, and a test of the sewage system's viral debris load.

Santa Clara County California: in a study sampling the status of over 3300 individuals, antibodies test results indicate antibody presence and so previous exposure, to a fraction of the population 50 to 85 times as high as the official case count. [QUOTE]The unadjusted prevalence of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in Santa Clara
County was 1.5% (exact binomial 95CI 1.11-1.97%), and the
population-weighted prevalence was 2.81% (95CI 2.24-3.37%). Under the
three scenarios for test performance characteristics, the population
prevalence of COVID-19 in Santa Clara ranged from 2.49% (95CI
1.80-3.17%) to 4.16% (2.58-5.70%). These prevalence estimates represent a
range between 48,000 and 81,000 people infected in Santa Clara County
by early April, 50-85-fold more than the number of confirmed cases.[/QUOTE] [URL]https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.14.20062463v1[/URL]

That so many people have encountered the virus and did not have enough adverse effects from it to run to the doctor, get diagnosed, and get added to the official case count, is very encouraging. If these samples are representative of the US population as a whole, around 10 million to 100 million Americans have already had the virus, and most didn't even know it. Many in my community and I may be among them.

Not only is it rare to become diagnosed after exposure, but these results in both California and Massachusetts may mean there is a vast pool of people that could donate plasma with antibodies and help the seriously ill. Similar would apply to other hard hit areas.

In combination, the prevalence of antibodies and fatality totals put this in the rough numerical range of a bad influenza season.

The high Massachussetts figures from multiple studies indicate a considerable step toward establishing herd immunity there; nearly half way.

And yes, I have multiple references on my resume, but I'm not job hunting now.

The Santa Clara study looks representative, the others do not.
But the Santa Clara study only talks about 1.5% infected, not 33% ?


Btw. with "dark figures" I did not mean bad ones or "gloom", just numbers that we can only speculate on, if you understand...


Sorry I am off for today. Good evening to all !

[QUOTE=Till;543287] Btw. with "dark figures" I did not mean bad ones or "gloom", just numbers that we can only speculate on, if you understand...[/QUOTE]I had wondered if it might be a language issue.


Dein Englisch ist viel besser als mein Deutsch.

Most Wisconsin counties have no or very fewCovid19 cases. Yet the whole state is under stay at home order for another 5 weeks 18 hours, while businesses suffer or die, students go uneducated, biopsies and other needed medical procedures go unperformed, etc. [URL]https://newstalk1130.iheart.com/featured/common-sense-central/content/2020-04-20-most-of-wisconsin-has-seen-almost-no-coronavirus-cases/[/URL]
Weeks longer than any neighboring state. Wisconsin is doing well compared to most of its neighbors. [url]https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/[/url]

Re. antibody tests, I see 2 huge red-flag issues:

[1] Studies involving self-selection, i.e. the people voluteering to be tested are likely showing some kinds of symptoms of flu-like illness, and thus not a representative sample of the population at large;

[2] It seems few or none of the antibody tests currently being used in various parts of the world is "gold standard" reliable - lots of false positives and negatives. I've heard only PCR-based assays have shown the needed reliability, and they are not being done at scale.

Lastly, on the does-exposure-generate-immunity question, here is a useful backgrounder from [url=https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/03/20/819038431/do-you-get-immunity-after-recovering-from-a-case-of-coronavirus]NPR[/url]:
[quote]Researchers do know that reinfection is an issue with the four seasonal coronaviruses that cause about 10 to 30% of common colds. These coronaviruses seem to be able to sicken people again and again, even though people have been exposed to them since childhood.

"Almost everybody walking around, if you were to test their blood right now, they would have some levels of antibody to the four different coronaviruses that are known," says Ann Falsey of the University of Rochester Medical Center.

After infection with one of these viruses, she says, antibodies are produced but then the levels slowly decline and people become susceptible again.

"Most respiratory viruses only give you a period of relative protection. I'm talking about a year or two. That's what we know about the seasonal coronaviruses," says Falsey.

In studies, human volunteers who agreed to be experimentally inoculated with a seasonal coronavirus showed that even people with preexisting antibodies could still get infected and have symptoms.

That happens even though these viruses aren't as changeable as influenza, which mutates so quickly that a new vaccine has to be developed every year.

"We work with some common cold coronaviruses. We have samples from 30 years ago, strains that were saved from 30 years ago, and they're not appreciably different than the ones that are circulating now," says virologist Vineet Menachery of the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.

Still, seasonal coronaviruses probably do mutate a bit over time to evade the body's defenses, says Frieman. But there's little known about what those changes might look like, since researchers don't do annual surveillance of coronaviruses as they do for influenza.

It's also possible that, for some reason, the body's immune response to seasonal coronaviruses is just not that robust or that something about the infection itself may inhibit the body's ability to develop long-term immunity.

"Maybe the antibodies are not protective, and that is why, even though they are present, they don't work very well," says Frieman.

The other known human coronaviruses, severe acute respiratory syndrome and Middle East respiratory syndrome, can cause more severe disease, and basically nothing is known about the possibility of reinfection with those viruses.

Some people sickened by SARS, the dangerous coronavirus that emerged in China in 2002, did develop a measurable immune response that lasted a long time.

"We've gone back and gotten samples from patients who had SARS in 2003 and 2004, and as of this year, we can detect antibodies," says Stanley Perlman of the University of Iowa. "We think antibodies may be longer lasting than we first thought, but not in everybody."

Still, it's hard to predict how those survivors' bodies would react if they were exposed to the SARS virus again. "There were 8,000 cases, the epidemic was basically brought to an end within six months or eight months of the first case, so we don't have anyone who was reinfected that we know of," says Perlman.

The other severe coronavirus, MERS, emerged in the Middle East in 2012. "We have almost no information about reinfection because there has only been a total of 2,500 cases over eight years," says Perlman, who notes that the odds of anyone getting reinfected with that virus are not great, especially considering that 35 percent of people who had it died. Survivors of MERS did generate an immune response to the virus that can be detected up to two years later, he says. And the more ill the patient was, the more robust and long-lasting the immune response.

Until the recent emergence of SARS-Cov2, the official name of the current coronavirus, and this pandemic, scientists say, there just hasn't been much of a research push to fully understand how and why reinfection with coronaviruses can occur.

"You get colds over and over again, and I don't think we think that we're really so well protected against any of them, second time around," says Perlman. "You don't care, either, because it's just a cold virus. I mean, you'd like to not get a cold again, but it's not really a big deal."

This pandemic, he notes, "is a big deal."

He would bet that the virus that causes COVID-19 won't reinfect people. But he wouldn't guess how long their immunity might last.

What's more, some people might have stronger protection from reinfection than others.

"Based on other infections where you get a deep lung infection, you are usually protected against the second infection. If you just have a mild COVID-19 infection that involves your upper airway, maybe it will behave like a common cold coronavirus and maybe you can be reinfected again," says Perlman. "We just really don't know. It's even hard to speculate."

Understanding the natural immune response to this virus is important for vaccine development, he notes.

"If the natural infection doesn't do very well in giving you immunity, what is going to happen with the vaccine?" says Perlman. "How are we going to make sure that that vaccine not only induces a response that works for the next six months, but two to three years?"[/quote]

[QUOTE=ewmayer;543308]Re. antibody tests, I see 2 huge red-flag issues:

[1] Studies involving self-selection, i.e. the people volu(n)teering to be tested are likely showing some kinds of symptoms of flu-like illness, and thus not a representative sample of the population at large;

[2] It seems few or none of the antibody tests currently being used in various parts of the world is "gold standard" reliable - lots of false positives and negatives. I've heard only PCR-based assays have shown the needed reliability, and they are not being done at scale.

Lastly, on the does-exposure-generate-immunity question, here is a useful backgrounder from [URL="https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/03/20/819038431/do-you-get-immunity-after-recovering-from-a-case-of-coronavirus"]NPR[/URL]:[/QUOTE]
Testing is a true SNAFU. I think the Feds are sitting on supplies for viral testing because Cheeto in Chief would not like the "FAKE NEWS" numbers. He would not have minded sinking a couple of cruise ships to keep "the numbers" down, if he could have gotten away with it.

[QUOTE=ewmayer;543308]Re. antibody tests, I see 2 huge red-flag issues:

[1] Studies involving self-selection, i.e. the people voluteering to be tested are likely showing some kinds of symptoms of flu-like illness, and thus not a representative sample of the population at large;

[2] It seems few or none of the antibody tests currently being used in various parts of the world is "gold standard" reliable - lots of false positives and negatives. I've heard only PCR-based assays have shown the needed reliability, and they are not being done at scale.[/QUOTE]
I'm curious, what do you base the conclusion of self-selection upon?

In the Santa Clara County study: "Participants were recruited using Facebook ads targeting a representative sample of the county by demographic and geographic characteristics." I read that as they took pains to avoid self-selection type errors.

In the Massachusetts homeless shelter study, they tested all clients of the shelter. Is being in a given homeless shelter self-selection? This testing was by PCR. [URL]https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.12.20059618v1[/URL]

In the Massachusetts sewage system study, the only self-selection that may be occurring is who uses indoor plumbing vs. going on the sidewalk or elsewhere in a way it won't find its way into the sewage system. This study was done by quantitative PCR, by "a team involving scientists from startup Biobot Analytics, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard University, and Brigham and Women's Hospital". If they can't get it right, who can? [URL]https://www.newsweek.com/coronavirus-traces-massachusetts-wastewater-levels-higher-expected-1497141[/URL]

In the Massachusetts random selection on the street study, "While the participants appeared healthy, about half told the doctors that they experienced at least one symptom of COVID-19 in the past four weeks." And a third of the tests of that group showed antibodies. So the rate of antibody production and also experiencing symptoms was somewhwere between zero and up to 2/3. Having had at least one symptom could easily mean they had a bout with a normal flu strain. There's a great deal of symptom overlap, and not enough symptoms to go around among the many diseases and strains. [URL]https://www.foxnews.com/science/third-blood-samples-massachusetts-study-coronavirus[/URL] The Biomedomics test is described here: [URL]https://www.bd.com/en-us/company/news-and-media/press-releases/bd-biomedomics-announce-launch-of-rapid-serology-test-to-detect-exposure-to-covid-19[/URL]
From what I've read, PCR is not applicable to antibodies, it's applicable to DNA and RNA.

The concern and yet to be answered well questions about extent and duration of immunity are included in the link I posted earlier, [URL]https://www.bostonherald.com/2020/04/05/massachusetts-lab-launches-coronavirus-antibody-test/[/URL].

Posted earlier was [URL]https://chicagocitywire.com/stories/530092711-roseland-hospital-phlebotomist-30-of-those-tested-have-coronavirus-antibody[/URL] which indicates 30-50% of those tested at Roseland in Chicago have antibodies, 10-20% live virus, from a combination of in-hospital and drive-up, so some substantial self-selection there.

Same article has a link to Gangelt Germany study article [URL]https://www.bccourier.com/these-are-the-first-lessons-of-the-heinsberg-study/[/URL]
High points: 15% infected, 0.37% fatality probability. "it can be assumed that the severity of the disease could be reduced through hygiene measures." “The number of pathogens affects the severity of the disease in the case of initial infections.” Subject selection method not stated.

It's disappointing how much air time the major media have wasted without getting much of this out or right.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543336]I'm curious, what do you base the conclusion of self-selection upon?[/QUOTE]Self selection means someone can decline to participate.

[QUOTE=retina;543338]Self selection means someone can decline to participate.[/QUOTE]Sounds like self-deselection to me.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543339]Sounds like self-deselection to me.[/QUOTE]Same thing.

[QUOTE=Uncwilly;541477]Epoch Times is a biased media source. As is Breirbart.[/QUOTE]The chinese undercounting has now been confirmed by the Chinese government's upward revision. That doesn't mean necessarily the new count is accurate either.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543342]The chinese undercounting has now been confirmed by the Chinese government's upward revision. That doesn't mean necessarily the new count is accurate either.[/QUOTE]
The UK will have to do a lot of updating, too, when they start catching up on nursing home deaths. Does that make them deceitful?

[QUOTE=kladner;543347]The UK will have to do a lot of updating, too, when they start catching up on nursing home deaths. Does that make them deceitful?[/QUOTE]In my view, no. The have been quite open in acknowledging that the data is incomplete.

Apply Hanlon's Razor.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543342]The chinese undercounting has now been confirmed by the Chinese government's upward revision. That doesn't mean necessarily the new count is accurate either.[/QUOTE]I posted about an upward revision several days ago, [url=https://www.mersenneforum.org/showpost.php?p=542950&postcount=638]here[/url].

[QUOTE=xilman;543348]In my view, no. The have been quite open in acknowledging that the data is incomplete.

Apply Hanlon's Razor.[/QUOTE]
My point exactly. Everyone's numbers are incomplete. UK is the case for which I had seen the update and its cause.

Re. the Stanford antibody-prevalence study and potential problems with it:
[quote]Here is a peer reviewing the Stanford study:

[url]https://medium.com/@balajis/peer-review-of-covid-19-antibody-seroprevalence-in-santa-clara-county-california-1f6382258c25[/url]

The above reviewer is skeptical of the conclusion because:
– test may have high false positive rate
– sample may be enriched for COVID-19
– study implies faster spread than past pandemics

The manufacturer of antibody test has a false positive rate high enough to negate the overall non adjusted test results.

They asked people if they had been feeling ill in the recruitment ad. Could this have allowed them to skew the sample towards more sick people?

If you wonder “why would they be less than honest”. Look up one of the authors, Jay Bhattacharya, on youtube and see what he has been saying since February. The study he worked on ‘proves’ the hypothesis he was sharing all along. Could he have fallen prey to the desk drawer effect and included more potentially sick people, so he didnt end up with egg on his face?

Hard to say anything for sure, the study might be correct, or it could be wrong.

It is interesting to see so many people running with the ball on the 50-85x conclusion as a proven fact, with no provisos at all.[/quote]

=====================

[url=https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/21/he-ran-marathons-why-did-coronavirus-almost-kill-him/]He ran marathons and was fit. So why did Covid-19 almost kill him?[/url] - STAT: On cytokine storms, which may have been one of the reasons the 1918 flu pandemic was unusually lethal to younger adults in the prime of life and health. In the case described in the article, note the desperate resort to off-label use of anti-inflammatory drug normally used to treat rheumatoid arthritis.

[url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/opinion/coronavirus-testing-pneumonia.html]Opinion | The Infection That’s Silently Killing Coronavirus Patients[/url] - The New York Times
[quote]We are just beginning to recognize that Covid pneumonia initially causes a form of oxygen deprivation we call “silent hypoxia” — “silent” because of its insidious, hard-to-detect nature.

Pneumonia is an infection of the lungs in which the air sacs fill with fluid or pus. Normally, patients develop chest discomfort, pain with breathing and other breathing problems. But when Covid pneumonia first strikes, patients don’t feel short of breath, even as their oxygen levels fall. And by the time they do, they have alarmingly low oxygen levels and moderate-to-severe pneumonia (as seen on chest X-rays). Normal oxygen saturation for most persons at sea level is 94 percent to 100 percent; Covid pneumonia patients I saw had oxygen saturations as low as 50 percent.

To my amazement, most patients I saw said they had been sick for a week or so with fever, cough, upset stomach and fatigue, but they only became short of breath the day they came to the hospital. Their pneumonia had clearly been going on for days, but by the time they felt they had to go to the hospital, they were often already in critical condition.

In emergency departments we insert breathing tubes in critically ill patients for a variety of reasons. In my 30 years of practice, however, most patients requiring emergency intubation are in shock, have altered mental status or are grunting to breathe. Patients requiring intubation because of acute hypoxia are often unconscious or using every muscle they can to take a breath. They are in extreme duress. Covid pneumonia cases are very different.

A vast majority of Covid pneumonia patients I met had remarkably low oxygen saturations at triage — seemingly incompatible with life — but they were using their cellphones as we put them on monitors. Although breathing fast, they had relatively minimal apparent distress, despite dangerously low oxygen levels and terrible pneumonia on chest X-rays.

We are only just beginning to understand why this is so. The coronavirus attacks lung cells that make surfactant. This substance helps the air sacs in the lungs stay open between breaths and is critical to normal lung function. As the inflammation from Covid pneumonia starts, it causes the air sacs to collapse, and oxygen levels fall. Yet the lungs initially remain “compliant,” not yet stiff or heavy with fluid. This means patients can still expel carbon dioxide — and without a buildup of carbon dioxide, patients do not feel short of breath.

Patients compensate for the low oxygen in their blood by breathing faster and deeper — and this happens without their realizing it. This silent hypoxia, and the patient’s physiological response to it, causes even more inflammation and more air sacs to collapse, and the pneumonia worsens until oxygen levels plummet. In effect, patients are injuring their own lungs by breathing harder and harder. Twenty percent of Covid pneumonia patients then go on to a second and deadlier phase of lung injury. Fluid builds up and the lungs become stiff, carbon dioxide rises, and patients develop acute respiratory failure.

By the time patients have noticeable trouble breathing and present to the hospital with dangerously low oxygen levels, many will ultimately require a ventilator.

Silent hypoxia progressing rapidly to respiratory failure explains cases of Covid-19 patients dying suddenly after not feeling short of breath. (It appears that most Covid-19 patients experience relatively mild symptoms and get over the illness in a week or two without treatment.)

A major reason this pandemic is straining our health system is the alarming severity of lung injury patients have when they arrive in emergency rooms. Covid-19 overwhelmingly kills through the lungs. And because so many patients are not going to the hospital until their pneumonia is already well advanced, many wind up on ventilators, causing shortages of the machines. And once on ventilators, many die.

Avoiding the use of a ventilator is a huge win for both patient and the health care system. The resources needed for patients on ventilators are staggering. Vented patients require multiple sedatives so that they don’t buck the vent or accidentally remove their breathing tubes; they need intravenous and arterial lines, IV medicines and IV pumps. In addition to a tube in the trachea, they have tubes in their stomach and bladder. Teams of people are required to move each patient, turning them on their stomach and then their back, twice a day to improve lung function.

There is a way we could identify more patients who have Covid pneumonia sooner and treat them more effectively — and it would not require waiting for a coronavirus test at a hospital or doctor’s office. It requires detecting silent hypoxia early through a common medical device that can be purchased without a prescription at most pharmacies: a pulse oximeter.

Pulse oximetry is no more complicated than using a thermometer. These small devices turn on with one button and are placed on a fingertip. In a few seconds, two numbers are displayed: oxygen saturation and pulse rate. Pulse oximeters are extremely reliable in detecting oxygenation problems and elevated heart rates.

Pulse oximeters helped save the lives of two emergency physicians I know, alerting them early on to the need for treatment. When they noticed their oxygen levels declining, both went to the hospital and recovered (though one waited longer and required more treatment). Detection of hypoxia, early treatment and close monitoring apparently also worked for Boris Johnson, the British prime minister.

Widespread pulse oximetry screening for Covid pneumonia — whether people check themselves on home devices or go to clinics or doctors’ offices — could provide an early warning system for the kinds of breathing problems associated with Covid pneumonia.[/quote]

WI Stats 323.10: "Declaration by governor. The governor may issue an executive order declaring a state of emergency for the state or any portion of the state if he or she determines that an emergency resulting from a disaster or the imminent threat of a disaster exists. If the governor determines that a public health emergency exists, he or she may issue an executive order declaring a state of emergency related to public health for the state or any portion of the state and may designate the department of health services as the lead state agency to respond to that emergency. If the governor determines that the emergency is related to computer or telecommunication systems, he or she may designate the department of administration as the lead agency to respond to that emergency. A state of emergency shall not exceed 60 days, unless the state of emergency is extended by joint resolution of the legislature. A copy of the executive order shall be filed with the secretary of state. The executive order may be revoked at the discretion of either the governor by executive order or the legislature by joint resolution." [URL]https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/statutes/statutes/323[/URL]

The initial executive order declaring a public health emergency is dated March 12 2020. [URL]https://evers.wi.gov/Documents/EO/EO072-DeclaringHealthEmergencyCOVID-19.pdf[/URL] It even references the above statute section. But it gives no end date, so appears to be written as indefinite or perpetual. Sixty days after March 12 is May 11. The order if enforced after that date without extension of the state emergency by joint resolution of the legislature is illegal.

Department of Health Services Secretary-designee Andrea Palm has issued emergency order 28, extending restrictions until May 26 2020. [URL]https://evers.wi.gov/Documents/COVID19/EMO28-SaferAtHome.pdf[/URL]

[URL]https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/misc/lfb/misc/109_summary_of_provisions_of_lrb_5904_1_and_lrb_5920_p2_3_24_20.pdf[/URL] discusses such a proposed joint resolution permitting extension and providing funding.

April 21: "...Republican legislative leaders filed suit against Governor Tony Evers, challenging his decision to extend the state’s Safer At Home” order until May 26th." [URL]https://www.channel3000.com/vp-pence-makes-visit-to-madison/[/URL]
That would imply no joint resolution permitting the extension of a state of emergency has passed.

Legislature Asks State Supreme Court to Rein In Sec.-Designee Andrea Palm [URL]https://rightwisconsin.com/2020/04/21/legislature-asks-state-supreme-court-to-rein-in-sec-designee-andrea-palm[/URL]

Republican state leaders sue Wisconsin governor over stay-at-home order [URL]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/21/wisconsin-republican-democrats-trump-coronavirus-us[/URL]

This is the same new governor who tried, via executive order, including less than 20 hours before the polls were to open, under the pretext that it was too dangerous to hold elections, to unilaterally postpone elections specified in statute to occur on a specific date, and was rebuffed by both houses of the state legislature, a federal court, the Wisconsin supreme court, and the US supreme court. Much effort was spent to identify who became infected as a result of the election occurring as scheduled. A total of seven individuals have been attributed as election related infections, in this state of over 5 million people; there have been no deaths identified to date. "It is not certain that the seven people contracted the virus at the polls. The possible connection was made because local health officials are now asking newly infected people whether they participated in the election." (see guardian link above)

It's the gubernatorial equivalent of the Keystone cops. Except that lives, businesses, and the Wisconsin economy are being outrageously lawlessly altered, to ruinous effect, by the governor and his unconfirmed appointee. Extreme measures are being applied statewide despite vastly different clinical experience county by county. The northwestern half of the state has very few Covid19 cases; 8 hospitalized, last I looked.

George Galloway- 15 minute rant
 

[YOUTUBE]9Rx1EfbY9h4[/YOUTUBE]
I agree with a lot he says, and I enjoy hearing him. @xilman Is his accent North England or South Scotland?
FYI: The opening salvo is about Trump and Covid19


The following are parodies of old standard songs: The Lion Sleeps Tonight, and Old Man River.

And...as long as I'm on YouTube, here's something an idled (like me) coworker sent. Don't be drinking anything when you watch!
[YOUTUBE]TkU1ob_lHCw[/YOUTUBE]


Another from the same artist. This one is for Mitch McConnell.
[YOUTUBE]MLvw4Wo_QZM[/YOUTUBE]

Calfornia beach skate park filled with many tons of sand to discourage skateboarders, increase distancing. The dirt bikers are loving it. [URL]https://www.instagram.com/p/B_LtZqnle3l[/URL]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543473]Calfornia beach skate park filled with many tons of sand to discourage skateboarders, increase distancing. The dirt bikers are loving it. [URL]https://www.instagram.com/p/B_LtZqnle3l[/URL][/QUOTE]

:picard::picard::picard::picard::swellman::tantrum:

[QUOTE=kladner;543468]
I agree with a lot he says, and I enjoy hearing him. @xilman Is his accent North England or South Scotland?
[/QUOTE]


Given that his (nick-)name is Galloway I'ld guess that he is scottish?


"Led by dangerous fools": I'ld see it similarly but wonder why there is still so much support for Trump or BoJo. One explanation is that governments use to get a high support in crisis times; but another one might be that the opposition parties are doing a lousy job, too?

[QUOTE=Till;543477]Given that his (nick-)name is Galloway I'ld guess that he is scottish?


"Led by dangerous fools": I'ld see it similarly but wonder why there is still so much support for Trump or BoJo. One explanation is that governments use to get a high support in crisis times; but another one might be that the opposition parties are doing a lousy job, too?[/QUOTE]
His speech reminds me of my boyhood best friend's parents, who were Scottish immigrants. Their accents were much stronger.

Top economist: US coronavirus response is like 'third world' country
 

[URL]https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/apr/22/top-economist-us-coronavirus-response-like-third-world-country-joseph-stiglitz-donald-trump[/URL]
"Joseph Stiglitz attacks Donald Trump, saying US on course for second Great Depression"
[QUOTE]Donald Trump’s botched handling of the [URL="https://www.theguardian.com/world/coronavirus-outbreak"]Covid-19[/URL] crisis has left the US looking like a “third world” country and on course for a second Great Depression, one of the world’s leading economists has warned.

In a withering attack on the president, Joseph Stiglitz said millions of people were turning to [URL="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/17/us-food-banks-over-budget-demand-coronavirus"]food banks[/URL], turning up for work due to a [URL="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/09/lack-paid-sick-leave-will-leave-millions-us-workers-vulnerable-coronavirus"]lack of sick pay[/URL] and dying because of health inequalities.

The Nobel prize-winning economist said: “The numbers turning to food banks are just enormous and beyond the capacity of them to supply. It is like a third world country. The public social safety net is not working.”

Stiglitz, a long-term critic of Trump, said 14% of the population was dependent on food stamps and predicted the social infrastructure could not cope with an unemployment rate that could hit 30% in the coming months.

“We have a safety net that is inadequate. The inequality in the US is so large. This disease has targeted those with the poorest health. In the advanced world, the US is one of the countries with the poorest health overall and the greatest health inequality.”
[/QUOTE]

I think that the "top economist" has not been to a third world country. Third world countries are coping much better.

The amount of :poop: spouted by the so-called "experts" ... they don't know what they are talking about.

[QUOTE=retina;543501]I think that the "top economist" has not been to a third world country. Third world countries are coping much better.

The amount of :poop: spouted by the so-called "experts" ... they don't know what they are talking about.[/QUOTE]
I suspect that may have been a bit of hyperbole. Stiglitz does have credentials, and he is, at least, people-centered. He intended to shock with the metaphor.

[QUOTE=kladner;543502]I suspect that may have been a bit of hyperbole. Stiglitz does have credentials, and he is, at least, people-centered. He intended to shock with the metaphor.[/QUOTE]It's disrespectful to the third world countries to say that USA is also one. :devil:

[QUOTE=retina;543510]It's disrespectful to the third world countries to say that USA is also one. :devil:[/QUOTE]
NOW you're Talking! :tu:

[QUOTE=retina;543501]I think that the "top economist" has not been to a third world country. Third world countries are coping much better.[/QUOTE]
+1.

Here's a map of case count variation by zip code within a Pennsylvania county. [url]https://patch.com/pennsylvania/abington/montgomery-county-zip-codes-most-coronavirus-cases[/url]

[QUOTE=kladner;543502]I suspect that may have been a bit of hyperbole. Stiglitz does have credentials[/QUOTE]Credentials may correlate with competence in the specific area(s) to which the credentials relate. Those areas can be very narrow specialties. The correlation between holding credentials pertaining to a specific area of expertise, and the person's effectiveness in an unrelated area is much weaker. I have had credentials issued by a renowned university, and a government body, but that does not mean you want me as your surgeon, dentist, hair stylist, plumber, electrician, landscaper, pilot, etc. The correlation between people holding credentials and knowing and acknowledging the limits of their knowledge outside those credentialed areas is not so strong as one might hope. Expertise in a credentialed area can be a small island in an ocean of Dunning-Kruger effect. [url]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect[/url]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543530]Expertise in a credentialed area can be a small island in an ocean of Dunning-Kruger effect. [url]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect[/url][/QUOTE].

[QUOTE=Uncwilly;543534][url=https://www.mersenneforum.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=22085&d=1587645996]Attached thumbnail[/url].[/QUOTE]
Rather more stylish than Kool-Aid.

:tu:

I guess [i]Il Duce[/i] has been taking mighty swigs, even though he doesn't drink. He also seems to have known that hydroxychloroquine was an effective symptomatic treatment for COVID-19, but now maybe not so much.

That attachment looks like a magazine ad. Hmm, that guy furthest in the background is in the foyer, being greeted by the hostess, and has just taken off his [i]hat[/i]. Wow, that's got to be an [i]old[/i] ad.

I can make out the "Early Times" brand on both the neck and main labels. BTW, you've got the Brown-Forman Corporation on Line Two.

CDC on superspreading events and the increased hazard level of indoor time [URL]https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/6/20-0495_article[/URL]
"In a study of 110 case-patients from 11 clusters in Japan, all clusters were associated with closed environments, including fitness centers, shared eating environments, and hospitals, the odds for transmission from a primary case-patient were 18.7 times higher than in open-air environments (H. Nishiura et al., unpub. data)" [url]https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.28.20029272v2[/url]

[QUOTE=kladner;543499][URL]https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/apr/22/top-economist-us-coronavirus-response-like-third-world-country-joseph-stiglitz-donald-trump[/URL]
"Joseph Stiglitz attacks Donald Trump, saying US on course for second Great Depression"[/QUOTE]

Stiglitz of course omits the complicity of the economics profession and most of its leading 'lights' in the 40-plus-year neoliberal economic elite looting program which effectively turned the US into the worst of both worlds - a 3rd-world country as far as wealth disparities are concerned, and further one with a woefully inadequate social safety net, such as that possessed by many "banana republics". Stiglitz sounds like a typical liberal-elite victim of Trump Derangement Syndrome, mistaking a symptom of the above problems - the rise of populist demagogues like Trump - for the cause.

Now, admittedly, Stiglitz's [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Stiglitz]long record[/url] as an anti-monoplist, anti-austerity critic and critic of IMF-style "shock doctrine" policies which have wrecked what modest economic progress and social safety nets many 3rd-world nations have had - note said wrecking is of the "feature, not bug" variety - has more credibility on such issues than most of his colleagues, but as a top advisor to the neoliberal, deregulation-and-globalization-fetishizing Clinton administration, he was complicit to no small degree, in the classic "so when you actually had the power to do something, what did you do with it?" sense.

UN warns hundreds of thousands of children could die this year from the economic downturn created by the worldwide Covid19 response [URL]https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-children-un/u-n-warns-economic-downturn-could-kill-hundreds-of-thousands-of-children-in-2020-idUSKBN21Y2X7[/URL]

Articles like this one are casting serious doubt on recent low Chinese Covid19 case claims. [url]https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1186395.shtml[/url]

@Ernst: I looked up Stiglitz, and found that I had some serious blind spots. "Chief Economist and Senior Vice-President of the World Bank from 1997-2000" set me back a piece.

I tried to find an account of a story I heard about how he left the Council of Economic Advisers. [U]Supposedly[/U], there was a meeting including many Clinton admin honchos including Larry Summers. I don't remember what kind of policy was being discussed, but Summers [U]supposedly[/U] kept interjecting, " What will Goldman Sachs think?" Eventually Stiglitz asked him if that was really an appropriate guide to the deliberations.
This, according to the [U]anecdote[/U], led to his departure.

[url=https://apnews.com/891831132bb34b915fc9c844392f1a11]Probe sought in Trump administration's ouster of scientist[/url][quote]WASHINGTON (AP) — Calls mounted Thursday for an investigation into the ouster of a senior government scientist who says he's being punished for opposing widespread use of an unproven drug President Donald Trump touted as a remedy for COVID-19.

Rick Bright, former director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, says he was summarily removed from his job earlier this week and reassigned to a lesser role because he resisted political pressure to allow widespread use of hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug favored by Trump.

On Thursday, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Frank Pallone, D-N.J., joined in calling for an investigation by the Health and Human Services inspector general.

"Removing Dr. Bright in the midst of a pandemic would raise serious concerns under any circumstances, but his allegations that political considerations influenced this decision heighten those concerns and demand full accountability," Pallone said. The inspector general's office had no immediate response.

Bright is seeking to be reinstated as head of the research agency, said his lawyers Debra Katz and Lisa Banks. A performance review shows he received a top rating.[/quote]

[url=https://apnews.com/697d9ecef7f89cf5e9abb3b008c7faa7]Don't inject disinfectants, Lysol warns as Trump raises idea[/url][quote]WASHINGTON (AP) — The parent company of Lysol and another disinfectant warned Friday that its products should not be used as an internal treatment for the coronavirus after President Donald Trump wondered about the prospect during a White House briefing.

Trump noted Thursday that researchers were looking at the effects of disinfectants on the virus and wondered aloud if they could be injected into people, saying the virus "does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it would be interesting to check that."

That prompted a strong warning from the maker of disinfectants Lysol and Dettol, which said it was issuing a statement to combat "recent speculation."

"As a global leader in health and hygiene products, we must be clear that under no circumstance should our disinfectant products be administered into the human body (through injection, ingestion or any other route)," said the [url=https://www.rb.com/media/news/2020/april/improper-use-of-disinfectants/]statement from Reckitt Benckiser[/url].[/quote]

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;543634][URL="https://apnews.com/697d9ecef7f89cf5e9abb3b008c7faa7"]Don't inject disinfectants, Lysol warns as Trump raises idea[/URL][/QUOTE]
This is to protect the manufacturer from lawsuits after people attempt what a journalist asked about. Trump did not say people should try injecting themselves with cleaners, he asked about whether something analogous could be researched. Given how eager most of the media are to misconstrue in the worst possible way whatever he says or does or does not do, the statement was not a great choice. [URL]https://www.dailywire.com/news/fact-check-no-trump-did-not-tell-people-to-inject-themselves-with-disinfectant-or-drink-bleach[/URL] Now imagine it had happened during Obama's presidency. He might have said something like "that is tremendously encouraging news, Bill, and I propose that we quickly explore every opportunity it presents." The media would have been fawning over Obama for his vision and leadership.

A recent LA study also shows antibodies found in about 40. times as many people as confirmed case rate. [URL]https://reason.com/2020/04/22/shouldnt-covid-19s-lethality-inform-the-response-to-it/[/URL] Fatality rate vs. infection rate indicated by antibody test results is close to that of seasonal flu at this point.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543644]A recent LA study also shows antibodies found in about 40. times as many people as confirmed case rate. [URL]https://reason.com/2020/04/22/shouldnt-covid-19s-lethality-inform-the-response-to-it/[/URL] Fatality rate vs. infection rate indicated by antibody test results is close to that of seasonal flu at this point.[/QUOTE]

That's great news- we expect only 50x as many people to get infected by this virus as get the flu each year, so fatalities might only be 50x as bad if we just go back to business as usual.

See [URL]https://mersenneforum.org/showpost.php?p=543686&postcount=946[/URL] for follow up on the musical background for The Liar Sleeps Tonight. (above)
This was getting way too far afield.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543637]Trump did not say people should try injecting themselves with cleaners, he asked about whether something analogous could be researched.[/QUOTE]
[quote=the President]Is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning? Because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs. So it would be interesting to check that.[/quote]You be the judge.

tRump's cover story is that he was being sarcastic, because the reporters were being sarcastic. I wonder who thought it up for him.


EDIT: So much for the sarcasm tale.....

[URL]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus[/URL]
[QUOTE]The leader of the most prominent group in the US peddling potentially lethal industrial bleach as a “miracle cure” for coronavirus wrote to [URL="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/donaldtrump"]Donald Trump[/URL] at the White House this week.

In his letter, Mark Grenon told Trump that chlorine dioxide – a powerful bleach used in industrial processes such as textile manufacturing that can have fatal side-effects when drunk – is “a wonderful detox that can kill 99% of the pathogens in the body”. He added that it “can rid the body of Covid-19”.
[/QUOTE]

‘PPE is made for a 6ft 3in rugby player’
 

[url]https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/25/trump-handmaids-tale-coronavirus[/url]
[QUOTE]Health professionals and trade unions in the UK are warning that female healthcare workers’ lives are being put at risk because of ill-fitting personal protective equipment. “PPE is designed for a 6ft 3in bloke built like a rugby player,” one NHS worker said. While PPE may be designed with men in mind, [U][B]75% of women in the NHS are female.[/B][/U][/QUOTE]
Wow! Whoda thunk it?!

[QUOTE=kladner;543767][url]https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/25/trump-handmaids-tale-coronavirus[/url]
[QUOTE]Health professionals and trade unions in the UK are warning that female healthcare workers’ lives are being put at risk because of ill-fitting personal protective equipment. “PPE is designed for a 6ft 3in bloke built like a rugby player,” one NHS worker said. While PPE may be designed with men in mind, [U][B]75% of women in the NHS are female.[/B][/U][/QUOTE]
Wow! Whoda thunk it?![/QUOTE]Haha. So what are the other 25% of women if they aren't female?

Aliens! Run for your life! :alien:

I, for one, welcome our new alien overlords.

There's a couple in my neighborhood that has been through trying times of late. The husband has had dementia (Alzheimer's) for some years, and recently it began progressing more rapidly than it previously had been. But he still knew his two little dogs, and still doted on them. When the weather was good, I was able to get him out with the dogs to walk. I'd hold one leash, he'd hold the other.

At his most recent checkup, he was having difficulty speaking, and was experiencing some respiratory distress. The most recent occasion when I got him out with the dogs, he was wheezing and struggling to draw breath. We didn't walk very far.

His respiratory distress became worse. He was also becoming more lethargic. His wife, sensing it was something serious, repeatedly tried to get him in for diagnostic testing and possibly treatment. But as long as his blood pressure, temperature, and blood oxygen weren't too bad, it was nothing doing -- because of the danger from COVID-19.

A few days ago, she couldn't wake him up. His blood oxygen was dangerously low. She called the doctor and told him the readings. The doctor told her to have him transported to the hospital by ambulance. He was put on oxygen and transported. At the hospital, he was placed in the ICU and put on a ventilator.

Next day, his vitals were looking better. He was responding to verbal commands. They were talking about discharging him in a couple of days. Nobody was allowed into the hospital, of course, but family members could speak to him by phone to let him know he wasn't alone. A COVID-19 test came back negative. Cultures indicated bacterial pneumonia.

Yesterday, the wife returned from visiting her daughter who lives nearby. I was talking with someone when she arrived. She was in tears and at the point of collapse. Her husband was [i]dying[/i]. She had returned home to change into some nicer clothes. Me and my company, fearing she might not make it in time, both urged her to go immediately. "It's come as you are." But she just had to change her clothes. Before she left I told her I'd take care of the dogs while she was gone.

She took off, driving a bit shakily. But she made it intact and with hours to spare.

As her husband's death became imminent, family members were permitted, one by one, to go to his side. They managed video calls to relatives in other states. Their son drove in from out of state.

I talked to the son this morning. One of the things he said was, "COVID killed him, but he didn't have COVID."

Man dressed as grim reaper to visit Florida beaches that reopen too early
 

[QUOTE=retina;543769]Haha. So what are the other 25% of women if they aren't female?

Aliens! Run for your life! :alien:

I, for one, welcome our new alien overlords.[/QUOTE]
Does the Reaper count as an alien overlord?

[URL]https://mashable.com/article/daniel-uhlfelder-grim-reaper-florida-beaches/[/URL]
[QUOTE]Reopening worries some citizens, medical professionals, and elected officials, but one Florida man is dedicated to doing what he can to flatten the curve. Attorney [URL="https://www.indy100.com/article/coronavirus-us-beaches-grim-reaper-daniel-uhlfelder-florida-9483781"]Daniel Uhlfelder said he will tour the state's beaches[/URL] on May 1 to remind fellow Floridians to stay home.[INDENT] On May 1 I will be touring Florida in Grim Reaper attire reminding Floridians to stay home during the pandemic. [URL="https://t.co/VvWqxI48Ec"]pic.twitter.com/VvWqxI48Ec[/URL]
— Daniel Uhlfelder (@DWUhlfelderLaw) [URL="https://twitter.com/DWUhlfelderLaw/status/1253856167069208576?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"]April 25, 2020[/URL]
[/INDENT][/QUOTE]But wait! There's still more! The Onion proves yet again that it has become Real News!
[URL]https://local.theonion.com/man-just-buying-one-of-every-cleaning-product-in-case-t-1842493766[/URL]
[QUOTE]EVANSTON, WY—Throwing bottles of bleach, ammonia, and Drano into a cart at his local grocery store, area man Troy Mitchell was reportedly stocking up on one of every cleaning product he could find Wednesday in case President Donald Trump announces it is a coronavirus cure. “I got toilet bowl cleaner, carpet cleaner, Swiffer WetJet refills—you name it—just so me and my family will be ready if the president announces one of these things can treat Chinese virus,” [/QUOTE]Published 3/25/20. :ermm::shock::wink:

Haha, you guys, I had to read that 3 times :rofl:
So, you actually have women there which are not female?

(no issue, here we have them too!)

[QUOTE=VBCurtis;543646]That's great news- we expect only 50x as many people to get infected by this virus as get the flu each year, so fatalities might only be 50x as bad if we just go back to business as usual.[/QUOTE]
Infecting 50 times as many people in the US with Covid19 as the flu does normally would be a neat trick, given that [url]https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html[/url] shows 9.3 million to 45 million infected for a flu year in the US, and the population of the US is about 328 million; 9.3M to 45M x 50 is 465M to 2.25 Billion(1.42 to 6.86 times the total population)

[QUOTE=kladner;543762]tRump's cover story is that he was being sarcastic, because the reporters were being sarcastic. I wonder who thought it up for him.

EDIT: So much for the sarcasm tale.....

[URL]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus[/URL][/QUOTE]
Re chlorine dioxide,

they'll probably be using chlorine dioxide to disinfect the existing large halls in which temporary hospitals were created and later dismantled, before returning them to their prior public use. I doubt it is also applicable for air supply disinfection for occupied space such as hospitals. I suspect 254nm UV in the air handling units, well baffled is a better way to go. Aggressive chemicals in the air seem like a bad idea for people already suffering from lung damage. (See the bleach based mask thread.)
[URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorine_dioxide#Use_in_public_crises[/URL]
Chlorine dioxide has many applications as an oxidizer or disinfectant.[11] Chlorine dioxide can be used for air disinfection and was the principal agent used in the decontamination of buildings in the United States after the 2001 anthrax attacks.[32]
(link for [11] is only general; link for [32] failed to show related content)

[URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorine_dioxide#Safety_issues_in_water_and_supplements[/URL]
Chlorine dioxide is toxic, hence limits on exposure to it are needed to ensure its safe use. The United States Environmental Protection Agency has set a maximum level of 0.8 mg/L for chlorine dioxide in drinking water. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), an agency of the United States Department of Labor, has set an 8-hour permissible exposure limit of 0.1 ppm in air (0.3 mg/m3) for people working with chlorine dioxide.
[URL]https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxfaqs/tf.asp?id=581&tid=108[/URL]
[URL]https://web.archive.org/web/20121204035804/http://www.osha.gov/SLTC/healthguidelines/chlorinedioxide/recognition.html[/URL]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543801]I suspect 254nm UV in the air handling units, well baffled is a better way to go.[/QUOTE]

Can anyone point me to some scientifically (read: empirically) based information on how good UV is at killing this (and many other) thing(s)?

Being 13.2 degrees above the equator, I think leaving (for example) delivered documents of unknown provenance in the sun for an hour should be more than sufficient -- both the heat and the high-energy photons would break up the RNA really well within that time.

However, Linda doesn't trust that, and refuses to accept my (based on physics assumptions) modeling in my head. If anyone could provide data to settle this "discussion" between us, it would be appreciated. (Seriously.)

P.S. Barbados has only had 77 confirmed cases (with reasonably rational testing), and six deaths (population ~250K). The heat has (?) to have something to do with this -- we didn't shut-down until after there had already been confirmed community transfer.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543800]Infecting 50 times as many people in the US with Covid19 as the flu does normally would be a neat trick, given that [url]https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html[/url] shows 9.3 million to 45 million infected for a flu year in the US, and the population of the US is about 328 million; 9.3M to 45M x 50 is 465M to 2.25 Billion(1.42 to 6.86 times the total population)[/QUOTE]

I suggest we focus on deaths - 61,000 is [url=https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html]highest seasonal-flu death count in last 10 years[/url], so Covid-19 death count will surpass that in the coming week. 2 added key differences:

1. We have reasonably effective vaccines against flu, and many of the annual flu deaths could be prevented by wider use of same;

2. AFAWK, asymptomatic and multi-mode transmission are *way* higher for Covid-19, one of the reasons the global economy is in wide-scale shutdown mode. The attendant mass job losses as in the U.S. carry their own mortality and wellness risks. Those flu-death counts are with people doing their usual thing, including going to work sick because of job and income pressure - had we not done wide-scale shutdown and unprecedented social-distancing measures, the current Covid-19 death count would likely be several times higher.

[QUOTE=ewmayer;543803]I suggest we focus on deaths - 61,000 is [URL="https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html"]highest seasonal-flu death count in last 10 years[/URL], so Covid-19 death count will surpass that in the coming week. 2 added key differences:

1. We have reasonably effective vaccines against flu, and many of the annual flu deaths could be prevented by wider use of same;

2. AFAWK, asymptomatic and multi-mode transmission are *way* higher for Covid-19, one of the reasons the global economy is in wide-scale shutdown mode. The attendant mass job losses as in the U.S. carry their own mortality and wellness risks. Those flu-death counts are with people doing their usual thing, including going to work sick because of job and income pressure - had we not done wide-scale shutdown and unprecedented social-distancing measures, the current Covid-19 death count would likely be several times higher.[/QUOTE]
Conversely, often without even testing for the presence of Covid19, deaths are being attributed to it based on symptoms. There's a lot of symptom overlap. And in the case where there had not been a Covid19 virus at all, some number of those with comorbidities would have died anyway of one or more of their comorbidities, although the timing might be a little different. Even gauging which of several diseases is the primary issue is a judgment call. If the patient had Covid19, or was thought to have Covid19, Covid19 apparently is presumed to be the primary disease. The woman I rented a room from during college died of pneumonia at 92 (years ago). Someone in a similar situation in the same jurisdiction now would probably be counted toward Covid19. We'll never know what the net effect of Covid19 was on deaths. But we will know after the fact whether the net annual rate was higher or lower than the year before. And as Dr. Sardonicus' neighbor story shows, denial or postponement of medical care to people without Covid19 has a role in elevating the total death rate. Some fraction of the pandemic-period death rate is due to that, not the usual causes or the new cause. Meanwhile medical caregivers are being furloughed, cancer patients are going without biopsies, chemo or other procedures, etc.
Sweden and Israel are commonly referenced as cases where more measured responses were used. Sweden has about 2/3 the case rate per million population as the US currently does. Israel has about 2/3 the case rate and a considerably lower death rate per million. [URL]https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries[/URL]

Overall, from all causes, 8.88/1000 death rate is expected for the US in 2020. [URL]https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/death-rate[/URL] On a population of 328 million, that's about 2,912,640 Americans dying in 2020, about 48. times the flu rate you gave. Shifts in counting as cause A vs. cause B won't affect the total at all. Small percentage shifts in attribution to Covid19 instead of pneumonia or heart disease can affect (inflate) the Covid19 stats by a considerable percentage.
There was a prominent spike recently in pneumonia and influenz-like mortality. And also two years earlier. [url]https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm[/url]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543800]Infecting 50 times as many people in the US with Covid19 as the flu does normally would be a neat trick, given that [url]https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html[/url] shows 9.3 million to 45 million infected for a flu year in the US, and the population of the US is about 328 million; 9.3M to 45M x 50 is 465M to 2.25 Billion(1.42 to 6.86 times the total population)[/QUOTE]

I had 10 million in mind for 'normal' flu, and a nonzero reinfection rate for Covid. That is not what I said, as I used "people" rather than "cases". Mea culpa.

[QUOTE=chalsall;543802]Can anyone point me to some scientifically (read: empirically) based information on how good UV is at killing this (and many other) thing(s)?

Being 13.2 degrees above the equator, I think leaving (for example) delivered documents of unknown provenance in the sun for an hour should be more than sufficient -- both the heat and the high-energy photons would break up the RNA really well within that time.

However, Linda doesn't trust that, and refuses to accept my (based on physics assumptions) modeling in my head. If anyone could provide data to settle this "discussion" between us, it would be appreciated. (Seriously.)

P.S. Barbados has only had 77 confirmed cases (with reasonably rational testing), and six deaths (population ~250K). The heat has (?) to have something to do with this -- we didn't shut-down until after there had already been confirmed community transfer.[/QUOTE]
Start with a discussion of what level of reduction she would find acceptable, given that higher reduction ratios will take longer/cost more. If her position is that nothing less than 100.0000000% will do, it's over, surrender.

[QUOTE=chalsall;543802]Can anyone point me to some scientifically (read: empirically) based information on how good UV is at killing this (and many other) thing(s)?
[/QUOTE]
Here is a start [URL="https://www.ashrae.org/file%20library/technical%20resources/covid-19/i-p_a19_ch62_uvairandsurfacetreatment.pdf"]1[/URL], [URL="https://www.ashrae.org/file%20library/technical%20resources/covid-19/i-p_s16_ch17.pdf"]2[/URL], [URL="https://www.ashrae.org/file%20library/about/position%20documents/filtration-and-air-cleaning-pd.pdf"]3.[/URL] These are PDFs on the ASHRAE [American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers],
I work at an MEP engineering firm doing control design. UV lights have been standard in AHUs for hospitals, either at day one or for future installation.
One recent news release advises against home UV wands for home use [can't find the link ATM]. Normally they don't want untrained people causing more harm than good. Also you must us the correct type [UV-C].
Good luck and stay safe.

[QUOTE=ugly2dog;543810]I work at an MEP engineering firm doing control design. UV lights have been standard in AHUs for hospitals, either at day one or for future installation. One recent news release advises against home UV wands for home use [can't find the link ATM]. Normally they don't want untrained people causing more harm than good. Also you must us the correct type [UV-C]. Good luck and stay safe.[/QUOTE]

Thanks! You too.

This is one of the reasons I like hanging out on the MF. Ask a serious if rarified question, and you're certain to get a knowledgeable answer! :smile:

UVC is much more effective. Also the flux used in devices tends to be very high.

Here is a paper that tries to use UV254 to predict what solar UV might do.
[url]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1280232/[/url]
You will nee more than an hour per side. Alternately 70C for 5 minutes in the oven (what I heard an expert say would 'kill' it).
I recommended previously to some folks elsewhere (based upon my experience in a lab and data that I have seen about the virus): use a covered dish (metal foil tight to the top will work), a ramekin of ~250cc H[SUB]2[/SUB]0, place in oven, set oven for 150C, leave for 1 hour, turn off oven, uncover the dish, leave in close oven for 10 minutes.

In my erstwhile place of employment there is a grey water system. It was supposed to capture roof runoff from a very large roof. This was to be filtered, sanitized, and used to flush toilets. Sanitizing involved a chlorine (bleach) injector, followed by a UVC unit. This is a cylinder 4-5 feet long with connections on either end for 6 or 8 tubes. Servicing the chlorinating system ruined a lot of clothes. Long before I arrived there, they had given up on actual grey water processing. The system is now fed by city water and the sanitizing units are shut down.

One of my brothers gave our parents a high tech air purifier which included running the air through a UV chamber. The tube died once, and the brother who sought a replacement had to really convince the supplier that he knew what he was doing and that the fixture was enclosed.

Trump says briefings 'not worth the effort' amid fallout from disinfectant comments
 

[URL]https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/25/donald-trump-stays-away-from-briefings-amid-fallout-from-disinfectant-comments[/URL]
Let us hope the minders keep his muzzle on outside "Executive Time" areas. Hours of free TV again, as in the 2016 runup, has to stop and stay stopped. Not holding my breath, though. He's probably already jonesing bigly for his bullying pulpit.

[QUOTE]After more than a month of near-daily White House coronavirus press briefings, [URL="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/donaldtrump"]Donald Trump[/URL] stayed behind closed doors on Saturday after advisers reportedly warned the president that his appearances were hurting his campaign.

Trump himself referenced his absence when he wrote on Twitter that the briefings are “not worth the time & effort”. The president wrote the tweet on Saturday evening, when he would usually be taking the podium to address journalists.
“What is the purpose of having White House News Conferences when the Lamestream Media asks nothing but hostile questions, & then refuses to report the truth or facts accurately,” he wrote. “They get record ratings, & the American people get nothing but Fake News. [U]Not worth the time & effort!”[/U] [U]:missingteeth:[/U]

In recent weeks Trump has used the briefings to dole out unproven and debunked medical advice, suggesting that things like sunlight and an anti-malaria drug are cures to Covid-19, often causing his own medical experts to try to correct the record.
But on Friday Trump surprised observers by taking no questions and stalking out of the room after an unusually short briefing of just 22 minutes. Some took the move as an acknowledgement from Trump himself that he may have taken things too far when he said on Thursday that disinfectant could be used to cure Covid-19.
[/QUOTE]

A SPOONFUL OF CLOROX - A Randy Rainbow Song Parody
 

Nothing I can add. :smile:

[YOUTUBE]DPDPzbLFeP4[/YOUTUBE]

[QUOTE=kladner;543838]Nothing I can add. :smile:

[YOUTUBE]DPDPzbLFeP4[/YOUTUBE][/QUOTE]Magnificent!

Now distributed more widely.

Estimates of suicides plus OD deaths added by substantial unemployment due to covid19 countermeasures outnumber the projected covid19 death total. [url]https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/pandemic-2020-layoff-related-deaths-increase-covid-19-cordle-cfa[/url]

I think/hope he's a better doctor than statistician. There's likely to be a considerable selection bias in people who get tested during this time period. And when he quotes figures like "0.13 risk" the numbers immediately preceding are consistent with 0.13 PERCENT risk. The comments about immune system fade in the absence of exposure to a variety of normal pathogens are particularly interesting; shelter in place for long periods would make a person more prone to problem infection later.

"Why are we being pressured to add covid?"
Covid didn't kill them. Twenty five years of tobacco use killed them.
Why would you quarantine the healthy? It doesn't make any sense.
It is not statistically significant whether you lock down or not.
Isolation for months leads to a weaker immune system.
We think the risks of social isolation are too high.
[URL]https://youtu.be/xfLVxx_lBLU[/URL]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543851]Estimates of suicides plus OD deaths added by substantial unemployment due to covid19 countermeasures outnumber the projected covid19 death total. [url]https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/pandemic-2020-layoff-related-deaths-increase-covid-19-cordle-cfa[/url][/QUOTE]Meanwhile, the rest of the world doesn't suffer from these problems to anywhere the same extent as USA. Come on USA, get your :poop: together.

[QUOTE=retina;543853]Meanwhile, the rest of the world doesn't suffer from these problems to anywhere the same extent as USA. Come on USA, get your :poop: together.[/QUOTE]
Good one! When countries are ranked by suicides per hundred thousand people, the US is a fair way down the list.

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;543857]Good one! When countries are ranked by suicides per hundred thousand people, the US is a fair way down the list.[/QUOTE]

Good one! When folks are discussing "suicide plus OD deaths", you note only that we're not at the top of suicide deaths. Did you check where we are for OD deaths?

Hint: [url]https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/10-highest-overdose-and-drug-related-death-rates-in-the-world.html[/url]

The hint is merely the first link I clicked on, to see if your point applied to what they were actually discussing.

[QUOTE=VBCurtis;543862]Good one! When folks are discussing "suicide plus OD deaths", you note only that we're not at the top of suicide deaths. Did you check where we are for OD deaths?[/QUOTE]
I didn't check rankings for OD's. I [i]did[/i] check numbers of OD deaths in the US, which were higher than suicides, but was unsure about how many OD's were also suicides. The number of OD deaths I get for the US from the table you linked to (245.8 deaths per million times 327 million) is a bit higher than the 2018 figures I had looked up, but I'm not sure what year the table is for. The article refers to 2016 in the past tense, and the page was last updated in 2018. So I'm guessing 2016 or 2017.

But yes, OD's are currently killing more people in the US than suicides.

What the earlier post claimed was that there would be more suicides and OD's in the US [i]due to circumstances caused by anti-COVID-19 measures[/i] than COVID-19 deaths. Does that mean an [i]increase[/i] over current figures?

The number of COVID-19 deaths in the US is currently around 54,000.

[url=https://www.foxnews.com/us/states-spike-poison-control-calls]States see spike in poison control calls following Trump's comments on injecting disinfectant[/url][quote]Some poison control centers reported a spike in calls following President Trump's suggestion that injecting disinfectant might help people infected with coronavirus.
<snip>
In Maryland, the Emergency Management Agency received over 100 calls inquiring about the president's suggestion, forcing the service to issue an alert to remind citizens that "under no circumstances should any disinfectant product be administered into the body through injection, ingestion or any other route."
<snip>
More concerning, though, is the number of people who actually went ahead with the suggestion.

In New York City, the Daily News reported that the Poison Control Center saw 30 cases of "exposure to Lysol, bleach & other cleaners in 18 hours after Trump's suggestion" that cleaning products might be used to treat coronavirus. NYC Poison Control saw only 13 such cases in a similar period last year.[/quote]
The story also notes a large increase to calls to poison-control centers since March, related to COVID-19 and pertaining to improper use of disinfectants.

It is heartening to see that a number of people had enough sense to call and check before doing as the [strike]Jabbernowl[/strike] Jobbernowl Who Is God suggested.

Here is a great bit of COVID comic relief. It is spot on.
[url]https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/g8b0nf/dr_fauci_said_if_he_had_to_choose_someone_to_play/[/url]
It is about 3 minutes of video that is worth the watch.

Instilling such things as surfactants and antibiotics directly into lungs, via an injection technique, is a documented animal research method. [url]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3156004/[/url]
Inhalation works effectively for some drugs, such as nicotine or THC. Speaking as an engineer, not a trained medical person, fine aerosol as a delivery mechanism of drugs to diseased alveoli is an interesting approach, providing the aerosol generator does not use temperatures that damage the drug to be delivered or produce harmful byproducts, as slow combustion of tobacco or pot does. [url]https://sunrisehouse.com/cause-effect/path-drugs-take-body/[/url]
It reaches deeper in the respiratory system than inhalers, snorting, or nasal sprays will. [url]https://www.drugs.com/albuterol.html[/url]

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;543869]It is heartening to see that a number of people had enough sense to call and check before doing[/QUOTE]Yes. Closer to passing the old standard of parenting, "If someone told you to jump off a bridge, would you do it?"
[SPOILER](Me: not even with a bungee jumping cord and a backup chute.)[/SPOILER]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543851]Estimates of suicides plus OD deaths added by substantial unemployment due to covid19 countermeasures outnumber the projected covid19 death total. [URL]https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/pandemic-2020-layoff-related-deaths-increase-covid-19-cordle-cfa[/URL][/QUOTE]

From that reference:
[QUOTE]
On April 20, University of Washington (Institute of Health Metrics) Professor Ali Mokdad said, “The United States is already past the “peak” in terms of daily covid-19-related deaths.” The IMHE modelers recently revised projected coronavirus-related deaths sharply downward, estimating 60,300 coronavirus-related deaths by early August.
[/QUOTE]According to [url]https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries[/url], the US will be there in three days or so...

Is maximizing duration of physical survival moral? At what cost to yourself or others? [url]https://thefederalist.com/2020/04/23/how-cowardice-and-class-privilege-divide-support-for-coronavirus-lockdowns[/url]

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;543868]I didn't check rankings for OD's. I [i]did[/i] check numbers of OD deaths in the US, which were higher than suicides, but was unsure about how many OD's were also suicides. The number of OD deaths I get for the US from the table you linked to (245.8 deaths per million times 327 million) is a bit higher than the 2018 figures I had looked up, but I'm not sure what year the table is for. The article refers to 2016 in the past tense, and the page was last updated in 2018. So I'm guessing 2016 or 2017.[/QUOTE]

Perhaps we should refer to the landmark [url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/mar/28/deaths-of-despair-us-jobs-drugs-alcohol-suicide]2015 "deaths of despair" study by Case & Deaton[/url] here - that is a review by [i]The Guardian[/i], here is a link is to their 2017 followup study for the Brookings Institution, [url=https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/casetextsp17bpea.pdf]Mortality and morbidity in the 21st century[/url]. The study uses strictly per-100,000-people statistics and further breaks them down by age cohort, which is useful, but makes it hard to get a "big picture" feel for total-annual-deaths-of-despair estimates. [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diseases_of_despair]Wikipedia to the rescue[/url]:
[quote]The prevalence [of deaths of despair] increased markedly during the first decades of the 21st century, especially among middle-aged and older working class white Americans starting in 2010, followed by an increase in mortality for Hispanic Americans in 2011 and African Americans in 2014. It [sic] gained media attention because of its connection to the opioid epidemic. For 2018, some 158,000 U.S. citizens died from these causes, compared to 65,000 in 1995.[/quote]
So roughly 100,000 such deaths per year in the U.S.

From the Comments & Discussion section at the end of the Brookings paper:
[quote]This paper by Anne Case and Angus Deaton addresses one of the most important economic and demographic issues of our time: the rise of mortality among white non-Hispanics in the past 15 years. For some time, there has been scattered evidence that mortality rates have been increasing for certain groups of the population (Olshansky and others 2012; Meara, Richards, and Cutler 2008). Two years ago, in a widely cited paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Case and Deaton (2015) brought the data together, documenting the sys- tematic increase in mortality rates for white non-Hispanics since about the year 2000.

Their findings were shocking in two senses. First, mortality rates almost always decline over time. Between 1979 and 1999, for example, mortal- ity rates for whites age 45–54 declined by 1.7 percent annually. In con- trast, the mortality rates that Case and Deaton were looking at increased by 0.3 percent annually (this is for all whites, including Hispanics). Second, this pattern is dramatically different in the United States than in other rich countries. U.S. white non-Hispanics are becoming increasingly anomalous relative to their peers abroad.

A good deal of commentary was directed at these findings. Some discussions considered whether mortality rates were rising or were just flat (Gelman and Auerbach 2016). In the big picture, this is relatively immaterial— both historical trends and international comparisons lead one to expect declining mortality. Other discussions addressed whether the increase was largely confined to women, or was true for men as well (Achenbach and Keating 2016). The relative increase in mortality was greater for women than men, but both groups did poorly.

The bigger issue, however, is about why these trends are occurring and what can be done to reverse them. What is it about the economic, social, or medical landscape that is leading to higher mortality for a very large segment of the population?
Case and Deaton address these issues in their current paper. Relative to their earlier paper, the current paper extends the analysis for an additional two years. Not surprisingly, the trends noted in the earlier paper have continued. More importantly, however, Case and Deaton make a first pass at why they believe mortality is rising.

By cause of death, the two biggest factors in the mortality reversal are the slowing down in mortality reductions from heart disease and the increase in “deaths of despair”—deaths due to drug and alcohol abuse and suicide. In their earlier paper, Case and Deaton suggested that the ready availability of opioid drugs might have exacerbated the increased mortality, especially that resulting from accidental overdoses. In their current paper, their emphasis has changed a bit. Rather than emphasizing the supply of pills, they now focus on the social and economic circumstances that lead people to take them.

Their overall suggestion is very much in the tradition of Émile Durkheim (1897): People despair when their material and social circumstances are below what they had expected. This despair leads people to act in ways that significantly harm their health. This may have a direct impact on death through suicide, or an indirect impact through heavy drinking, smoking, drug abuse, or not taking preventive medications for conditions such as heart disease. At root is economic and social breakdown.[/quote]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543881]Is maximizing duration of physical survival moral? At what cost to yourself or others? [url]https://thefederalist.com/2020/04/23/how-cowardice-and-class-privilege-divide-support-for-coronavirus-lockdowns[/url][/QUOTE]
[quote]What is disheartening, on the other hand, is the intense poverty of moral vision that the response reveals. It takes for granted the moral irrelevance of work, study, human interaction, sightseeing, dating, going to the gym, attending sacred services, and all of the million and one things that the current restrictions have largely put on hold.[/quote]
What a bunch of errant nonsense.

The moral value of normal activities that have been put on hold is certainly irrelevant to the virus.

And it's not a matter of "maximizing duration of physical survival." It's a matter of keeping things under some semblance of manageability so our entire health care system, to say nothing of the means of dealing with dead bodies, gets completely swamped.

In my book, it's not so much the restrictions that are blameworthy. It's the Admin's incompetent response -- or perhaps I should say [i]failure[/i] to respond, essentially squandering two months of time in which we could have been preparing -- and in particular the lack of testing for COVID-19.

And, as to the restrictions hurting the "lower classes" disproportionately, a fair point as far as it goes. But it runs into Congress's efforts to use the COVID-19 relief efforts to help out the well-connected instead.

[quote]Jonathan Ashbach is a PhD student in politics at Hillsdale College.[/quote]

And I'm sure a fair number of R-Senators and Reps read [i]Imprimis[/i].

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;543903]It's a matter of keeping things under some semblance of manageability so our entire health care system, to say nothing of the means of dealing with dead bodies, gets completely swamped...
And, as to the restrictions hurting the "lower classes" disproportionately, a fair point as far as it goes. But it runs into Congress's efforts to use the COVID-19 relief efforts[/QUOTE]It's supposedly a matter of KEEPING THINGS FROM getting completely swamped. You know, the hospital ships that are not needed, temporary hospitals that were rushed into place and hardly used or not used at all, whole floors of existing hospitals emptied and closed, doctors and nurses furloughed, and reportedly some hospitals will close and not reopen, along with countless other businesses.

The combined economic output of the work force and capital is what supports the standard of living of a society, including necessities. Do less, have less. As one example, consider half a loaf in this old reference. [URL]http://www.fourwinds10.com/siterun_data/health/food/news.php?q=1212803067[/URL]
[URL]https://modernsurvivalblog.com/preps/the-us-national-grain-reserves-are-apparently-gone/[/URL]
Same emptying of reserves as pandemic response supplies, performed by previous administrations.

Meanwhile cancer patients and others go untreated, and some die.
Congress is being abused to press for wild damaging extravagant socialist programs as part of any actions toward Covid19 related matters. One bill, one purpose, is the way to go.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543916]
Congress is being abused to press for wild damaging extravagant socialist programs as part of any actions toward Covid19 related matters.[/QUOTE]
The passive voice should never be used. (William Safire, [u]Fumblerules[/u])

Who, exactly, is "abusing" Congress?

[url=https://apnews.com/3090e3154f1cacddd227c2f5a06f319d]Facing disaster, Russian businesses find Kremlin aid lacking[/url][quote]Desperate business owners in Russia have been pleading with the Kremlin for help in the pandemic shutdown. The response, however, has been slow and largely focused on big industries, leaving most smaller companies to fend for themselves and raising the prospect of massive unemployment and social unrest.

The Kremlin's anti-crisis measures reflect both its long-held emphasis on state-controlled companies and a fear of opening state coffers at a time when government revenue is drying up due to a plunge in oil prices and economic slump.

When President Vladimir Putin ordered most Russians to stay home through April 30 to contain the coronavirus, he said employees must continue to be paid. A joke soon went viral online: "Putin walks into a bar and declares: 'Beer for everyone. It's on the house!'"[/quote]

[QUOTE]Desperate business owners in Russia have been pleading with the Kremlin for help in the pandemic shutdown. [U]The response, however, has been slow and largely focused on big industries, leaving most smaller companies to fend for themselve[/U]s and raising the prospect of massive unemployment and social unrest.[/QUOTE]
Golly! That sure sounds familiar.

Coronavirus: 'I'm tattooing myself every day in lockdown, but I'm running out of space'
 

[url]https://www.bbc.com/news/in-pictures-52380883[/url]
[QUOTE]"I found myself pottering around, not knowing what to do and eating all the food in the cupboards," Chris says. "So the idea of tattooing myself every day was to give myself a bit of direction. Without structure people are at a complete loss." [/QUOTE]

The food supply chain is breaking [URL]https://twitter.com/AnaSwanson/status/1254416173854228489[/URL]

[QUOTE]
Desperate business owners in Russia have been pleading with the Kremlin for help in the pandemic shutdown. The response, however, has been slow and largely focused on big industries, leaving most smaller companies to fend for themselves and raising the prospect of massive unemployment and social unrest.
[/QUOTE]


[QUOTE=kladner;543949]Golly! That sure sounds familiar.[/QUOTE]

:thumbs-up:

Science says: It’s time to start easing the lockdowns [url]https://nypost.com/2020/04/26/science-says-its-time-to-start-easing-the-coronavirus-lockdowns/[/url]

Injectable Clorox is still not a thing, but note that inside-the-body UV therapy is being studied for lung infections:

[url]https://finance.yahoo.com/news/aytu-bioscience-signs-exclusive-global-120000824.html[/url]
[i]
ENGLEWOOD, CO / ACCESSWIRE / April 20, 2020 / Aytu BioScience, Inc. (AYTU) (the “Company”), a specialty pharmaceutical company focused on commercializing novel products that address significant patient needs announced today that it has signed an exclusive worldwide license from Cedars-Sinai to develop and commercialize the Healight Platform Technology (“Healight”). This medical device technology platform, discovered and developed by scientists at Cedars-Sinai, is being studied as a potential first-in-class treatment for coronavirus and other respiratory infections.

The Healight technology employs proprietary methods of administering intermittent ultraviolet (UV) A light via a novel endotracheal medical device.[/i]

[QUOTE=kriesel;543979]Science says: It’s time to start easing the lockdowns [url]https://nypost.com/2020/04/26/science-says-its-time-to-start-easing-the-coronavirus-lockdowns/[/url][/QUOTE]

The real headline here is that the NY Post has discovered "Science".

Looks like our MSM just can't help giving Trump more fake-news ammo:

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;543869][url=https://www.foxnews.com/us/states-spike-poison-control-calls]States see spike in poison control calls following Trump's comments on injecting disinfectant[/url]
[quote]...In New York City, the Daily News reported that the Poison Control Center saw 30 cases of "exposure to Lysol, bleach & other cleaners in 18 hours after Trump's suggestion" that cleaning products might be used to treat coronavirus. NYC Poison Control saw only 13 such cases in a similar period last year. [/quote]
The story also notes a large increase to calls to poison-control centers since March, related to COVID-19 and pertaining to improper use of disinfectants.[/QUOTE]

In fact, simply reading those last 2 snips should raise a bunch of red flags: the NYC Daily News reports "30 cases in 18 hours" but then compares said count to an similar period last *year*. Well, it might have been similar in the sense of being 18 hours long and hopefully the same day-of-the week to account for weekday-vs-weekend effects, but you see, there's this tiny difference between this year and the last. DrS's "large increase to calls to poison-control centers since March" is key, but he failed to note the possibility of that putting the lie to the preceding quoted snip.

[url=https://reason.com/2020/04/25/no-poison-control-calls-arent-suddenly-spiking-after-trumps-disinfectant-comments/]No, Poison Control Calls Aren't Suddenly Spiking After Trump's Disinfectant Comments[/url] | Reason.com
[quote]On Thursday, the president suggested that perhaps an "injection" of disinfectant could help cure people of COVID-19. Critics of Donald Trump went to town—and rightfully so!—while supporters scrambled to settle on a defense (both "he didn't really say that" and "he did but it was sarcasm" have been in play). By Saturday morning, social media was abuzz with articles about people calling poison control centers, each crafted to illustrate how Americans had apparently taken Trump's ramblings to heart and consumed household disinfectants like Lysol and bleach.

The problem? Articles shared as illustrations of this actually said no such thing.

One article making the rounds, from the New York Daily News, is headlined "A spike in New Yorkers ingesting household cleaners following Trump's controversial coronavirus comments." But the article makes no mention of anyone deliberately consuming household cleaners. It simply states that 30 people called the city's poison control hotline "over fears that they had ingested bleach or other household cleaners."

[i]Fearing[/i] that you ingested something doesn't jibe with having intentionally consumed that substance.

The authors of the Daily News piece, Anna Sanders and Chris Sommerfeldt, try to circumvent this inconvenient fact by noting that over the same time period in 2019, the Poison Control Center "only handled 13 similar cases." And while this time, nine calls were about possible Lysol exposure and 10 about bleach, last year's calls contained "no cases reported about Lysol exposure and only two were specifically in regards to bleach."

The paper doesn't present any other data about calls to Poison Control for comparison. But one needn't do a detailed analysis to surmise why exposure to things like Lysol and bleach—and fears about this exposure—might be up this month over April 2019. And one needn't reach for the ridiculous explanation that it's because people deliberately consumed it en masse after listening to Trump. We are in the midst of a pandemic right now, and we were not in April 2019. [i]Of course[/i] more people are being exposed to household disinfectants at the moment than were during this time last year.

The Daily News does note that none of the callers died or required hospitalization, which also suggests their exposure was minimal and not of the Lysol-mouthwash variety.

But the Daily News piece is far from the only poison-control story being framed misleadingly. A story out of Kentucky that's being shared as "evidence" people have been consuming household cleaners following Trump's Thursday statements is actually about calls to Kentucky poison control centers in March...[/quote]

[QUOTE=tServo;543986]The real headline here is that the NY Post has discovered "Science".[/QUOTE]
No. They were taking the Name in vain. :lol:

[QUOTE=rogue;543892]It appears that you accept that you might catch the virus and die from it. That is your choice. Are you willing to catch the virus and pass it on to someone else who could die from it? Whom would be to blame for that?[/QUOTE]

155,000 people a day die, none of which are down to this virus.

28,000 a day die from starvation which is ENTIRELY preventable.

Now tell me again why a few thousand dying from a flu virus is the end of the world??

It seems like the vast majority need to get a grip on reality.

[QUOTE=Chuck;543902]That's what I'm expecting; an annual Corona vaccine. Perhaps it can be combined with the annual flu vaccine.[/QUOTE]

Or the annual 6 month house arrest?

The general population who seem to have lost the ability to actually think for themselves are all sleep walking into oblivion and being scared like little children into doing what they are told is good for them...

[QUOTE=ewmayer;543981][url]https://finance.yahoo.com/news/aytu-bioscience-signs-exclusive-global-120000824.html[/url]
[i]
The Healight technology employs proprietary methods of administering intermittent ultraviolet (UV) A light via a novel endotracheal medical device.[/i][/QUOTE]
Fascinating. The article also says,[quote]"Our team has shown that administering a specific spectrum of UV-A light can eradicate viruses in infected human cells (including coronavirus) and bacteria in the area while preserving healthy cells," stated Dr. Pimentel of Cedars-Sinai.[/quote]I recall being informed in this very thread, that it was UV-C that killed microbes, and UV-A and UV-B were not all that effective -- at least for microbes on surfaces, as evidenced by a study of what was on the tanning beds in tanning salons.

This claims that the intermittent UV-A kills viruses [i]in infected cells[/i]. It also claims it eradicates "bacteria in the area" while "preserving healthy cells."

[QUOTE=Gordon;544010]155,000 people a day die, none of which are down to this virus.

28,000 a day die from starvation which is ENTIRELY preventable.

Now tell me again why a few thousand dying from a flu virus is the end of the world??[/QUOTE]The difference is that starvation only affects the little people, and more specifically the poor people, right? But a virus doesn't respect any political or wealth boundaries so the politicians and "authorities" are now concerned by it. So naturally they get scared and want to stop it. If that means shutting down the planet to protect themselves then they will do it.

We can't have non-authority-respecting things active in the world, right? The politicians don't like it.

[QUOTE=kriesel;543979]Science says: It’s time to start easing the lockdowns [url]https://nypost.com/2020/04/26/science-says-its-time-to-start-easing-the-coronavirus-lockdowns/[/url][/QUOTE]
The suggestion of isolating and protecting obviously-at-risk segments of the population (frail and elderly, mostly) while basically letting the younger, apparently less-likely-to-become-seriously-ill folks become infected, then presumably immune, does have a certain appeal. I note that

[quote]Scott W. Atlas, MD, is the David and Joan Traitel Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and a former chief of neuroradiology at Stanford Medical Center.[/quote]I imagine some folks here would see "Hoover Institution" and roll their eyes.

What got my attention in the description of the author, though, was "neuroradiology." Expertise in one area of medicine does not necessarily carry over to others. We learned from the Terri Schiavo case that, as a neurologist, Bill Frist was a great cardiologist. And it may be here that, as an epidemiologist/infectious disease expert, Dr. Atlas is a great neuroradiologist.

UVC is what is used in germicidal lamps. I used them back in the day in the lab. They work quickly. We could sterilize a clean and dry filtering funnel in under 5 minutes. (3 actually at the same time, top and bottom both parts. used 4 lamps ~ 25cm long.)

[QUOTE]The suggestion of isolating and protecting obviously-at-risk segments of the population (frail and elderly, mostly) while basically letting the younger, apparently less-likely-to-become-seriously-ill folks become infected, then presumably immune, does have a certain appeal.[/QUOTE][Dr Sardonicus, this is emphatically not aimed at you. I'm just jumping off from your paraphrase of the quoted material, which I found pithy and evocative.]
[URL]https://bgr.com/2020/04/07/coronavirus-symptoms-heart-damage-after-covid-19-infection/[/URL]
[QUOTE]However, an increasing number of doctors believe that not all COVID-19 patients will show signs of heart damage due to pulmonary failure and inflammation. The virus might infect the heart muscle directly.
Data from China, Italy, and the US shows that this is the case for a subset of patients. [URL="https://khn.org/news/mysterious-heart-damage-not-just-lung-troubles-befalling-covid-19-patients/"][I]KHN[/I] explains[/URL] that an initial study found cardiac damage in as many as 1 in 5 patients, which resulted in heart failure and even death. It happened in patients who didn’t show any signs of respiratory distress, not just in critical cases.
Two studies from China also looked at cardiac problems in COVID-19 patients. The larger of the two looked at [URL="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2763524?resultClick=1"]416 hospitalized patients[/URL], concluding that 19% showed signs of heart damage, and they were more likely to die. 51% of people with heart damage died, versus 4.5% of those who didn’t. What’s more troubling is that patients who didn’t have any preexisting heart conditions but developed heart damage during the infection were more likely to die than patients with known heart disease but no heart damage due to COVID-19.
[/QUOTE]I guess a few younger people (along with other age groups) having sudden fatal heart attacks and massive debilitating strokes is a small price to pay for...uh...excuse me, what would it be for?

The point is that severe effects continue to emerge. Strokes seem to involve runaway blood clotting.

Science is still finding its way with this disease. There have been too many impulsive and ill-informed decisions taken already.

We don't have anything within a parsec of proper testing in the US. I heard Gov Pritzker announcing over a hundred testing sites being opened around Illinois, which I commend. I did not catch all of the briefing, so I'm not sure if just anyone can get tested.

Mapping the degree and extent of infection is just a start on knowing how to deal effectively with the pandemic. We need information to rationally manage increased public interaction, and be prepared to deal with the resulting increase of exposure.