Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[Zanza]

I like the way the FT shows the numbers as rolling averages of the last seven days. Shows the trends very well.

Looks like Italy and Spain are really plateauing, US and UK still accelerate, France as well, but less steeply. Germany might plateau at a much lower daily level. As visible with the star our lockdown was a bit earlier than elsewhere, especially Italy. Maybe that will be the difference later? But France and Spain locked down early as well  so maybe that's not the one factor after all.

[Syt]

BBC's public service announcement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3BUrtNeh3k

"It's a fucking lockdown!"

[garbon]

Yeah. There's been some bizarre tweet from a NYT reporter in London (they always have a very odd take on Britain) saying they've never seen London so busy and it was like there was a festival. From my experience and everyone who replied to that tweet it was very quiet today. People were out (as they should be) but it was everywhere I've seen, far quieter than normal and people were socially distancing.

Like Brockwell Park with its 3000 visitors yesterday?

[Syt]

Can one of the math people here advise on what kind of scaling this is on the Y axis?

[Tamas]

There's a study that highlights correlation between mortality rates in a country and how big portion of the population has received the anti-tuberculosis BCG vaccination. As in, the bigger portion the less mortalities.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.24.20042937v1


I have only read a Hungarian article summarising it. The expert they asked said this is certainly possible but we won't have enough data until the pandemic is in its downward slope before we can prove it either way. But one reason why countries who do have BCG mandatory keep it as such is that since it's a weakened strain of the original bacteria, it results in a general strengthening of the immune system (don't ask me to translate the details ).

Their prime example is Japan where BCG has been mandatory since 1947. Most Western countries have stopped doing it as mandatory since the 80s, and in the US it never has been mandatory.

Probably just a statistical coincidence but would be a comforting thought as people in Hungary have had this vaccine as wel..

[Josquius]

That definitely sounds like a random correlation to me. Like global warming and pirates.
More likely explanations for Asia doing better are their culture of mask usage and past experience with this sort of thing.

[garbon]

Most Western countries have stopped doing it as mandatory since the 80s, and in the US it never has been mandatory.

Which would make sense given the prevalence of tuberculosis in Easter Europe vs Western Europe vs the US.

[garbon]

Yeah. There's been some bizarre tweet from a NYT reporter in London (they always have a very odd take on Britain) saying they've never seen London so busy and it was like there was a festival. From my experience and everyone who replied to that tweet it was very quiet today. People were out (as they should be) but it was everywhere I've seen, far quieter than normal and people were socially distancing.

Like Brockwell Park with its 3000 visitors yesterday?

In fact, the British gov't seems to be taking the same tack.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/apr/05/uk-coronavirus-covid-19-live-news-hancock-starmer?page=with:block-5e899a058f08c35a1d11a35d#block-5e899a058f08c35a1d11a35d

Hancock: you've got to follow the rules or we'll ban all exercise outside
Matt Hancock, the health secretary, has said the government could ban exercise outdoors if people flout lockdown rules.

After saying earlier that sunbathing is against lockdown rules, he told Andrew Marr that if people flout them "we might have to take further action".

"I understand how difficult these measures are, of course I do. But the truth is the more people go out from home, the more the virus spreads," he said.

"We've said because of the positive benefits to your physical and your mental health that it's ok to exercise on your own or with members of your own household.

"But if the result of that is that too many people go out and flout the other rules because they say 'well if I can exercise, then it's fine for me to do other things', then I'm afraid we will have to take action.

"My message is really clear, if you don't want us to have to take the step to ban exercise of all forms outside of your own home then you've got to follow the rules."

[Iormlund]

Can one of the math people here advise on what kind of scaling this is on the Y axis?

Jesus Christ. If you want to pretend there's no exponential growth just use a logarithmic scale, Fox.

[celedhring]

+674 dead, smallest increase in 2 weeks. I mean, I'm sure there's some lag in reporting due to the weekend that I expect to show up tomorrow or tuesday, but that's still a really encouraging trend.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah. There's been some bizarre tweet from a NYT reporter in London (they always have a very odd take on Britain) saying they've never seen London so busy and it was like there was a festival. From my experience and everyone who replied to that tweet it was very quiet today. People were out (as they should be) but it was everywhere I've seen, far quieter than normal and people were socially distancing.

Like Brockwell Park with its 3000 visitors yesterday?

I'm so annoyed about that. It's a massive 50 hectare park. Even if all those 3,000 people were in at the same time, for the same length of time they could have used the park socially distantly. 3,000 people in 50 hectares over the course of a day doesn't sound too bad to me.

But it's been shut down which is fine for the Dulwich/Herne Hill side (lots of gardens) that have lots or alternative parks. Probably less helpful tor people in Brixton and Brixton Hill who don't have many other parks near them - maybe go up to Kennington Park or Clapham Common?

Edit: Incidentally a photo of Brockwell Park yesterday - it doesn't seem like it needs shutting down:


Nunhead Cemetary's also been closed down. We need a solution - there's families with young kids in flats who won't have a nearby outdoor space and it's going to make the pavements more crowded/contgested as that's where people will go for exercise.

Edit: Also the pro/anti-sunbather discourse is the new Brexit divide. It is getting intense out there.

[garbon]

If your views hold the day, we'll be on full lock down soon enough.

[Gups]

Friends of mine who live next to Brockwell Park reckon that picture is doctored. It was heaving yesterday apparently

[Josquius]

No sign of the heatwave here.
I feel cheated.

[Tamas]

If your views hold the day, we'll be on full lock down soon enough.

Hancock said that much, indeed.

I am sorry Sheilbh but 600 people per day are dying with a thousand hospital admissions per day and we are still trying to get the measuring stick out in the park to make sure we don't over-inconvenience people for a couple of weeks?