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Thread: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

  1. #41

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by antaeus View Post
    Like concerts around the world, a march wouldn't be a great vector for a virus. I'm sure it has become a popular beatup because its a womens march.

    But this disease is primarily transferred through surface contact, which is why it goes through families, retirement homes, public transport etc. A bunch of people not hugging, not touching stuff, but walking along isn't as efficient. And it's a red herring which takes focus away from real causes of transfer within the home.
    I don't see how a march would not be a breeding ground for a virus; bunch of people cramped up, occasionally shaking hands or giving a hug to a friend, with each other's face only a cough away.
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  2. #42
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    whats the point of talking about this? the Spanish government reacted late, the cases multiply due to those specific demonstrations ..?

  3. #43
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by PointOfViewGun View Post
    I don't see how a march would not be a breeding ground for a virus; bunch of people cramped up, occasionally shaking hands or giving a hug to a friend, with each other's face only a cough away.
    Same has been true of concerts. There are a number of examples of concerts of tens of thousands of people where someone with CV was in the midst, and no further cases emerged. Like I said. It's a red herring that gives people something to blame so that they don't have to feel guilty about themselves for touching their mouth, then a door handle at their parents house.
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  4. #44

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by mishkin View Post
    whats the point of talking about this? the Spanish government reacted late, the cases multiply due to those specific demonstrations ..?
    Whats the problem with talking about this? That particular demonstration that gathered a large crowd, which was an outlier, could have played a major role in the spread of the virus in Spain. Its a simple lesson to be learned to not be reckless.


    Quote Originally Posted by antaeus View Post
    Same has been true of concerts. There are a number of examples of concerts of tens of thousands of people where someone with CV was in the midst, and no further cases emerged. Like I said. It's a red herring that gives people something to blame so that they don't have to feel guilty about themselves for touching their mouth, then a door handle at their parents house.
    Absolutely not. It is this kind of avoidable reckless conduct that got this virus spread so much. You could kiss someone and still not get the virus. Just because someone was careful at a concert about touching others doesn't really make up a good argument in your case. That was simply good luck. The more you have of such cases the higher the chances of spreading the virus. It has nothing to do with not feeling guilty about touching yourself and a door knob.
    Last edited by PointOfViewGun; March 25, 2020 at 06:35 AM.
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    I find it a little curious to highlight these demonstrations. it was a sunday. If there had not been such a demonstration, that same people would have been walking through crowded streets, at the stadium watching football, on the beach, having a drink with friends, etc. But ok, of course it is possible that many people were infected in these manifestations.

  6. #46

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by mishkin View Post
    In Spain there was no coronavirus fear in early March
    If so, you'all evidently weren't paying much attention. From March 1st to March 8th, the number of confirmed cases in Spain grew from 82 to 625. There had already been 17 deaths.

    Quote Originally Posted by antaeus View Post
    Like concerts around the world, a march wouldn't be a great vector for a virus.
    As long as nobody was breathing anyway. You're probably correct regarding the most efficient means of transmission, but I think this fact was initially deliberately and dishonestly overemphasized by many official sources, along with their claims that masks don't help. The real concern was healthcare system was unprepared and they were afraid of shortages if the general population bought them all up.

    This FAQ for example is accurate:

    This virus is really transmissible and can spread easily from person to person even before a person develops symptoms. It’s carried on respiratory droplets when we talk, sneeze, and cough and these can land on surfaces or in someone’s mouth or nose. When it comes to respiratory droplets, 6 feet is the magic distance. That’s how far these tiny, infected droplets can travel. Being within 6 feet of someone who is sick can get you or your personal space contaminated with COVID-19.
    A more in depth explanation:

    AMID THE HOURLY updates on the new coronavirus, a single, calming fact stands out: a particle of happy news, hanging in a cloud of dread. The germ that causes Covid-19 may be responsible for a terrifying public-health disaster, but hallelujah, thank the lord, at least it isn’t airborne.

    This message is now dogma for news outlets and public health officials. They impress on us that droplets laced with the new coronavirus don’t remain aloft for long—that they only sail for six feet at the most before they fall onto the ground. That’s why we’re told that soap and water are the best protections one can find: 20 seconds’ worth of hand-related hygiene, repeated many times throughout the day. The virus isn’t airborne; so keep on washing when you can. The virus isn’t airborne; so you’d be wise to trade your grubby handshake for an elbow bump. The virus isn’t airborne; so don’t forget to keep your fingers off your face.

    But I’m afraid this standard line—this single, calming fact about the new coronavirus—may not be as simple as it seems. When health officials say the pathogen isn’t “airborne,” they’re relying on a narrow definition of the term, and one that’s been disputed by some leading scholars of viral transmission through the air. If these scholars’ fears bear out—if the new coronavirus does, in fact, have the potential to travel farther through the air than officials have been saying—then we might need to reevaluate our standards for protecting healthcare workers at the front lines of fighting Covid-19. In fact, we might need to make some tweaks to all our public-health advice.

    From early on, any spread of the new virus through the air has been downplayed from the top. World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus assured people on Twitter last week that “actually it’s not airborne.” He went on to clarify that “[i]t spreads from person to person through small droplets from the nose or mouth which are spread when a person with #COVID19 coughs or exhales.” According to this way of thinking, the blobs of viral particles that get expelled from coughs and exhales are too big to float around; so they mainly cause infection by landing onto someone close, or by dropping on a surface from which they’re later transferred to someone’s body via touch.

    For public health officials such as Tedros (who goes by his first name), a truly airborne virus is one that floats around for extended periods—like measles, which is known to be infectious in the air for at least half an hour. A pathogen like this can create a nightmare scenario. A sick person might ride an elevator, for instance, and shed some virus along the way. Later on, someone else who got into the same elevator might breathe in those germs and develop the disease.

    There are very good reasons to believe—and good reasons for public-health officials to assure the public—that the new coronavirus virus isn’t “airborne” in that specific and apocalyptic sense. But the definition used by these officials may also be obscuring vital details of transmission. In particular, it papers over all the nuances in how someone’s virus-laden cough or sneeze or breath really travels through the air. The authorities employ a rule of thumb for distinguishing what they call “droplets” from “aerosols.” Droplets are often defined as being larger than 5 microns in diameter, and forming a direct spray that is propelled by cough or sneeze up to 2 meters away from the source patient. Aerosols, in this scenario, are smaller gobs of potentially biohazardous material that may remain afloat for longer distances.

    This black-and-white division between droplets and aerosols doesn’t sit well with researchers who spend their lives studying the intricate patterns of airborne viral transmission. The 5-micron cutoff is arbitrary and ill-advised, according Lydia Bourouiba, whose lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology focuses on how fluid dynamics influence the spread of pathogens. "This creates confusion,” she says. First of all, it garbles terminology. Strictly speaking, the aerosols are droplets, too. When you breathe out or cough, you release bits of watery mucus from inside your body in a wide array of sizes, ranging from bigger, wetter ones to finer ones. All of these are droplets. The smallest droplets are commonly described as aerosols. Whatever you call them, though, any of these bits of mucus may be laced with viral pathogens. To make matters more complicated, when the water component of droplets dries up in the air, the remaining bits of floating virus are called “droplet nuclei,” which are even lighter and more apt to travel long distances. Aside from size, other factors, such as local humidity and any drafts of air, will also affect how far a droplet flies.

    Even the fattest droplets may not always fall right to the ground within a few feet. When you go to the ocean on a windy day and feel the sea spray on your face, you’ve just encountered droplets of a size that might be described as “not airborne” in a public-health briefing. Even breezes that are far more subtle than the ones coming off the ocean can lift and push a droplet. Oddly though, many traditional studies of droplet trajectories have made use of simplified models that don’t account for the gust of air released when a person coughs or sneezes, which gives those droplets an extra push. Bourouiba calls this a mistake. Her lab has found that coughs and sneezes, which they call “violent expiratory events,” force out a cloud of air that carries droplets of various sizes much further than they would go otherwise. Whereas previous modeling might have suggested that 5-micron droplets can travel only a meter or two—as we’ve heard about the new coronavirus—her work suggests these same droplets can travel up to 8 meters when taking into account the gaseous form of a cough.

    For researchers like Bourouiba, who study the physics of pathogens’ paths, any virus traveling in the air might as well be described as “airborne.” But there is no consensus among scientists as to which pathogens should get that label and which shouldn’t. Julian Tang, a virologist at the University of Leicester in England, coauthored a review article on this very topic last year. The paper noted that for some researchers, “airborne transmission” involves only fine aerosols. For others, it can involve both aerosols and larger droplets. Ultimately, in their paper, Tang and his colleagues settled on using the phrase to mean transmission by particles of fewer than 10 microns in diameter—a cutoff twice as large as what WHO has used.
    And according to these experiments, SARS-CoV-2 potentially remains infectious as an aerosol for three hours.
    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    You don't seem to be familiar with how the burden of proof works in when discussing social justice. It's not like science where it lies on the one making the claim. If someone claims to be oppressed, they don't have to prove it.


  7. #47
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by sumskilz View Post
    but I think this fact was initially deliberately and dishonestly overemphasized by many official sources, along with their claims that masks don't help. The real concern was healthcare system was unprepared and they were afraid of shortages if the general population bought them all up.
    Which was my point.

    Everything is politics. If you can point a finger at someone or something, then nobody is looking at you.
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  8. #48
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by sumskilz View Post
    If so, you'all evidently weren't paying much attention. From March 1st to March 8th, the number of confirmed cases in Spain grew from 82 to 625. There had already been 17 deaths..
    Fine, we werent, we (population, authorities and the media) did not found important 10 deaths (March 7).

  9. #49
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by antaeus View Post
    More likely the spike was a result of the upswing of testing picking up more existing cases. This is supported by research that works backwards from death rates to predict more accurate infection rates. Based on Spain's death rate, they should have many tens of thousands more cases, untested - broadly spreading in the community. Not just because of one march.

    This is a repeat pattern too. Countries with higher death rates relative to case numbers tend to be under detecting cases - and assuming they have 2 cases instead of 2000 (e.g. Italy). Undetected cases are what are leading to the compounding effect of death rates in hospitals. No time to prepare, no planning for where hot spots might occur, no ability to pre-locate and pre-train resources.

    The answer as to why Spain's infection rates haven't yet gone down? They probably had more cases than they thought - so it's spreading within family groups and close associates, and places that are exempt such as work and health care. This is added to the 3 or 4 week turnaround time to notice a drop in cases. The disease takes a week or 2 to show symptoms, and up to month to kill, therefore there's a large delay period where reported cases will climb even as actual cases (including unreported) will drop.

    This was seen in China, and South Korea - where there is clear evidence that shutdowns work - they just take weeks to show it.

    And countries with lower death rates and higher infection rates are more thorough testers - Germany, South Korea etc.
    Re Germany, it may be that the surprisingly low death rate is actually a result of not testing when people die. One would need to see if there is a spike in actual overall deaths, which doesn't get reported as coronavirus (cause only those who reach hospitals as coronavirus patients and die there are reported as such).
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...uzzles-experts

    Quote Originally Posted by from the above guardian article
    Unlike in Italy, there is currently no widespread postmortem testing for the novel coronavirus in Germany. The RKI says those who were not tested for Covid-19 in their lifetime but are suspected to have been infected with the virus “can” be tested after death, but in Germany’s decentralised health system this is not yet a routine practice.
    As a result, it is theoretically possible that there could be people who may have died in their homes before being tested and who do not show up in the statistics.
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  10. #50

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by mishkin View Post
    Fine, we werent, we (population, authorities and the media) did not found important 10 deaths (March 7).
    Spain was not at all unusual in that regard, but it was shortsighted. Based on the characteristics of the virus known from elsewhere, the current situation was entirely predictable.
    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    You don't seem to be familiar with how the burden of proof works in when discussing social justice. It's not like science where it lies on the one making the claim. If someone claims to be oppressed, they don't have to prove it.


  11. #51
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by ludicus
    I wonder why there aren't enough ventilators to cope with the coronavirus
    Because the factories that produce them have been shut-down & workers laid off. (º0º )
    I mean it should be fairly obvious that when you fock-up the economy there isn't going to be 'enough" of anything.
    The unemployment here is set to rise above 1 million in next few weeks as people are laid off as everything closes. Already huge bread lines at centrelink.
    I can't imagine the coalition will be too popular come next election.
    Last edited by Stario; March 25, 2020 at 08:18 AM.

  12. #52

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by mishkin View Post
    I find it a little curious to highlight these demonstrations. it was a sunday. If there had not been such a demonstration, that same people would have been walking through crowded streets, at the stadium watching football, on the beach, having a drink with friends, etc. But ok, of course it is possible that many people were infected in these manifestations.
    And when there was such a demonstration those people went along their days and continued to participate in other activities with other groups of people. The demonstration becomes an aggravating factor. Why it gets mentioned more than the others is because its an outlier event. You don't have a march every day. Hence, its a good example to demonstrate how the Spanish people cared little about the threat of the virus spreading as late as March 8th.
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by PointOfViewGun View Post
    Hence, its a good example to demonstrate how the Spanish people cared little about the threat of the virus spreading as late as March 8th.
    Until the following week people did not start to fear (hardly anyone wearing a mask on the street) and the government did not decree the state of alarm until the 16th. I still don't know why you focused on a demonstration and not on other massive events, such as football games, but all right.
    Last edited by mishkin; March 25, 2020 at 09:19 AM.

  14. #54
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Remember this one?:

    “We have tremendous numbers of ventilators, but there’s never been an instance like this where no matter what you have, it’s not enough,” Trump said on March 18. “It sounds like a lot, but this is a very unforeseen thing. Nobody ever thought of these numbers.” A day later, he doubled down, noting that “nobody in their wildest dreams would have ever thought that we’d need tens of thousands of ventilators.”


    Quote Originally Posted by linked article
    Except, of course, somebody did think that. A lot of somebodies, actually, and for a very long time. Almost every federal agency you can imagine has, in fact, warned about shortages — and some have offered specific and sobering estimates of need — for the better part of two decades.
    Link to article

    While the website's reputation is not known to me the linked articles make a case that previous administrations have not heeded regular advice regarding large scale epidemics going as far back as 2003. What makes it scary now is the claim that these reports do not exist, topped by an impossible assurance that large co-operations will produce ventilators fast to make up the shortfall. The usual 'aggressively blame everyone and everything that doesn't agree with me' routine coming from the president isn't helping matters one bit as it sends the wrong message to his administration.

    If you want to get an idea how triage will be applied when demand for ventilators far outstrips supply then have a look at this official guideline from November 2015. I leave the math to the readers when (not if) that will happen.

    Page 50 should scare everyone:

    Ventilated patients are reevaluated at 48 and 120 hours and either continue with the ventilator therapy or are reassigned to a different color category, based on their SOFA scores and any exclusion criteria. Patients may lose access to ventilators if their SOFA score increases within the designated time interval, which indicates that their health is deteriorating and their mortality risk is increasing.
    Last edited by Gigantus; March 25, 2020 at 09:36 AM.










  15. #55

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by mishkin View Post
    Until the following week people did not start to fear (hardly anyone wearing a mask on the street) and the government did not decree the state of alarm until the 16th. I still don't know why you focused on a demonstration and not on other massive events, such as football games, but all right.
    No one wrote a 10 page article on how the Spanish marched on Women's day. So, no. No one really focused on it. Its simply a good and simple out of ordinary example to use. Why does it bother you so much?
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  16. #56
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by PointOfViewGun View Post
    No one wrote a 10 page article on how the Spanish marched on Women's day. So, no. No one really focused on it. Its simply a good and simple out of ordinary example to use. Why does it bother you so much?
    I believe Mishkin was responding to you making a thing of it. You can't just turn that around when people pile onto you.

    I think people are looking for blame. And people will look to blame things that line up with their personal biases. I'm going to assume you focused on the march because you're not a fan of feminism, or women's marches. It made a convenient scapegoat, rather than the more nebulous and difficult to pinpoint "everybody to some extent is to blame" which was probably the reality.

    I don't follow anybody's posts around here any more. So I maybe wrong. Or I could be right. But maybe not.
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  17. #57
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by gigantus
    If you want to get an idea how triage will be applied when demand for ventilators far outstrips supply then have a look at this official guideline from November 2015. I leave the math to the readers when (not if) that will happen.
    Im surprised that the industry execs and government officials seems to be working with the mild pandemic numbers, when the virus characteristics and other predictive modeling are suggesting something far worse.

    For example, Elon Musk delivered 1,200 ventilators, and suggested he could manufacture more. (He actually purchased them from the Chinese). This is but a fraction of the number that will be needed.

    Surge hospitalization estimates suggest that in NY state alone there could be a shortage of ventilators numbering in the 10s of thousands. Now multiple that by the large metro areas in the US and you begin to get a sense of the scale of the tragedy that could unfold.

    Also consider what is going to happen in the underdeveloped countries of the world with large populations who dont have access to the resources that they would need to meet such a demand. I.E. Nigeria, Mexico, Philippines, Vietnam, etc.

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  18. #58

    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by antaeus View Post
    I believe Mishkin was responding to you making a thing of it. You can't just turn that around when people pile onto you.

    I think people are looking for blame. And people will look to blame things that line up with their personal biases. I'm going to assume you focused on the march because you're not a fan of feminism, or women's marches. It made a convenient scapegoat, rather than the more nebulous and difficult to pinpoint "everybody to some extent is to blame" which was probably the reality.

    I don't follow anybody's posts around here any more. So I maybe wrong. Or I could be right. But maybe not.
    Its quite insulting to even imply that. I mentioned the march because Ludicus posted a picture of it. It was also not me making the Women's March a thing. Till mishkin pointed at it it was merely an example of a large gathering to show how the Spanish didn't really care much about the virus threat. No one used as a scapegoat too. Nobody argued that the march was the only reason. Why people got triggered by this is beyond me.
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  19. #59
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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    NY state alone there could be a shortage of ventilators numbering in the 10s of thousands
    What good are '10s of thousands' ventilators (lets say hypothetically there wasn't a shortage), when you don't have the staff that know how to use a ventilator/are trained in how to administer invasive-ventilation!? (believe me this is quite a rare/specialised skill).
    Last edited by Stario; March 25, 2020 at 10:43 AM.

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    Default Re: COVID-19: A bloody battle or a long war?

    Quote Originally Posted by Stario View Post
    What good are '10s of thousands' ventilators (lets say hypothetically there wasn't a shortage), when you don't have the staff that know how to use a ventilator/are trained in how to administer invasive-ventilation!? (believe me this is quite a rare/specialised skill).
    The 'normal' ratio is 5 patients per qualified carer, even if doubled it's unlikely that enough qualified staff will be available. Which means crash courses and an acceptance of fatalities due to human error. If it would come to that stage then it will be preferable over fatalities caused by no respiration at all.
    The fact will remain that the number of 'operational' ventilators will be limited and most likely dropping over time when the trained stuff will be reduced by necessary quarantine.










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