Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[viper37]

Ontario to announce enforced shutdown of non-essential businesses as of midnight tomorrow

But they're super vague about what is and isn't essential

they will announce tomorrow. Looks like media will be essential, so I'm still working-because you know we all need The Canadian Jewish News

Société des alcools du Québec - essential.Société québécoise du cannabis - essential.

Too bad the provincial borders will be closed, Malthus could have travelled a bit to find something 

It's for Quebec, but it will give you an idea of what to expect:
https://www.quebec.ca/en/health/health-issues/a-z/2019-coronavirus/essential-services-commercial-activities-covid19/

[mongers]

New South Wales and especially Sydney have inflicted a wound on themselves, the state allowed over 2,500 passengers on a cruise ship to disembark and disperse, despite 3 people on board having tested positive.

The Southern city has now seen a spike to over 800 cases, as the region begins to enter the Autumn.

[viper37]

https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/fnpasx/nani_covidorifto/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

make sure to turn your sound on.

I shouldn't laugh. I shouldn't la... 

[HisMajestyBOB]

https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/fnpasx/nani_covidorifto/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

make sure to turn your sound on.

[Razgovory]

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick: 'I'm all in' on risking my health to lift social distancing guidelines for economic boost

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/23/politics/coronavirus-texas-social-distancing-guidelines/index.html

What the fuck?  Has the GOP gone from a Cult of Personality to a death cult?  This is weirding me out.

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said Monday night that he's "not living in fear" of the novel coronavirus pandemic and is "all in" on lifting social distancing guidelines recommended by public health experts in order to help the economy.

Patrick, who said he turns 70 next week, would be among the high-risk population that is most affected by the coronavirus. But he said people like him have to weigh the hazards to their personal health that the virus poses with the challenges to health of the American economy brought on by social distancing guidelines.
"No one reached out to me and said, 'As a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?' And if that is the exchange, I'm all in," Patrick told Fox News.
He added, "My messages is that let's get back to work, let's get back to living. Let's be smart about it and those of us who are 70+, we'll take care of ourselves. But don't sacrifice the country."
The suggestion directly contradicts recommendations put forth by government agencies and public health experts. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been urging "social distancing" -- defined as "remaining out of places where people meet or gather" and "avoiding local public transportation" -- even if you don't have any symptoms of the virus as a way to slow the spread of the disease. The CDC has recommended that no gatherings of 50 or more people take place for eight weeks and adults 65 and over stay home, if possible.
The CDC reports that 8 in 10 coronavirus deaths reported in the US are among adults 65 years old and older.
State health officials on Monday reported more than 100 coronavirus-related deaths in a single day for the first time since the outbreak, according to a tally from CNN Health, surpassing 500 total deaths nationwide.
Still, Patrick's comments echo a growing desire among some Republicans -- including President Donald Trump -- to ease guidelines that have shuttered businesses and kept workers at home.
"Our country wasn't built to be shut down. This is not a country that was built for this. It was not built to be shut down," the President said during a Monday evening briefing at the White House, even as he acknowledged the effects of coronavirus are likely to worsen.
Reacting to Trump's comments, Patrick said he talks to business people "all the time" and that his "heart is lifted tonight by what I heard the President say because we can do more than one thing at a time."

[crazy canuck]

 

USA 🇺🇸 USA 🇺🇸

[Admiral Yi]

https://thedispatch.com/p/the-police-power-of-the-states-to

Much, much more than you wanted to know about state power to close businesses.

[Valmy]

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick: 'I'm all in' on risking my health to lift social distancing guidelines for economic boost

Yeah he is one of our many nuts. Before being Lt. Governor he was a right wing radio host, so very qualified!

Disappointed but not surprised to hear him say this.

[Syt]

Seems in line with GOP inclinations to let the weak in society perish and the strong survive. I'll give it a few days before they say everyone who got Covid19 and died had it coming and didn't deserve handouts. 

[viper37]

Officials tracing 9 days worth of contact for Ontario's latest covid-19 patient

Damn. 

[viper37]

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick: 'I'm all in' on risking my health to lift social distancing guidelines for economic boost

Yeah he is one of our many nuts. Before being Lt. Governor he was a right wing radio host, so very qualified!

Disappointed but not surprised to hear him say this.

I wonder what is the economic cost of having many people in the hospital, in intensive care and many dying...  Funerals ain't cheap, hospitals ain't cheap, even if you are insured, these insurance companies will raise their premiums next year, making it unaffordable for many.

[Oexmelin]

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick: 'I'm all in' on risking my health to lift social distancing guidelines for economic boost

Yeah he is one of our many nuts. Before being Lt. Governor he was a right wing radio host, so very qualified!

Disappointed but not surprised to hear him say this.

He will not be the only one to obey the leader when he proclaims mission accomplished next week.

[Syt]

Decent article about how the virus was allowed to spread in Ischgl/Tyrol and carried to nordic countries from there: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/24/europe/austria-ski-resort-ischgl-coronavirus-intl/index.html

Not contained: the pressure from the powerful tourism/ski lift lobby in Tyrol on politicians to keep the skiing areas open. Two days before the Tyrol quarantine one of their federal parliament members went on record that a quarantine was absurd as there were hardly any cases in the state.

[Syt]

Financial markets paused their slide Thursday, but no one should think this rolling economic calamity is over. If this government-ordered shutdown continues for much more than another week or two, the human cost of job losses and bankruptcies will exceed what most Americans imagine. This won't be popular to read in some quarters, but federal and state officials need to start adjusting their anti-virus strategy now to avoid an economic recession that will dwarf the harm from 2008-2009.

The vast social-distancing project of the last 10 days or so has been necessary and has done much good. Warnings about large gatherings of more than 10 people and limiting access to nursing homes will save lives. The public has received a crucial education in hygiene and disease prevention, and even young people may get the message. With any luck, this behavior change will reduce the coronavirus spread enough that our hospitals won't be overwhelmed with patients. Anthony Fauci, Scott Gottlieb and other disease experts are buying crucial time for government and private industry to marshal resources against the virus.

***

Yet the costs of this national shutdown are growing by the hour, and we don't mean federal spending. We mean a tsunami of economic destruction that will cause tens of millions to lose their jobs as commerce and production simply cease. Many large companies can withstand a few weeks without revenue but that isn't true of millions of small and mid-sized firms.

Even cash-rich businesses operate on a thin margin and can bleed through reserves in a month. First they will lay off employees and then out of necessity they will shut down. Another month like this week and the layoffs will be measured in millions of people.

The deadweight loss in production will be profound and take years to rebuild. In a normal recession the U.S. loses about 5% of national output over the course of a year or so. In this case we may lose that much, or twice as much, in a month.

Our friend Ed Hyman, the Wall Street economist, on Thursday adjusted his estimate for the second quarter to an annual rate loss in GDP of minus-20%. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's assertion on Fox Business Thursday that the economy will power through all this is happy talk if this continues for much longer.

If GDP seems abstract, consider the human cost. Think about the entrepreneur who has invested his life in his Memphis ribs joint only to see his customers vanish in a week. Or the retail chain of 30 stores that employs hundreds but sees no sales and must shut its doors.

Or the recent graduate with $20,000 in student-loan debt—taken on with the encouragement of politicians—who finds herself laid off from her first job. Perhaps she can return home and live with her parents, but what if they're laid off too? How do you measure the human cost of these crushed dreams, lives upended, or mental-health damage that result from the orders of federal and state governments?

Some in the media who don't understand American business say that China managed a comparable shock to its economy and is now beginning to emerge on the other side. Why can't the U.S. do it too? This ignores that the Chinese state owns an enormous stake in that economy and chose to absorb the losses. In the U.S. those losses will be borne by private owners and workers who rely on a functioning private economy. They have no state balance sheet to fall back on.

The politicians in Washington are telling Americans, as they always do, that they are riding to the rescue by writing checks to individuals and offering loans to business. But there is no amount of money that can make up for losses of the magnitude we are facing if this extends for several more weeks. After the first $1 trillion this month, will we have to spend another $1 trillion in April, and another in June?

By the time Treasury's small-business lending program runs through the bureaucratic hoops—complete with ordering owners that they can't lay off anyone as a price for getting the loan—millions of businesses will be bankrupt and tens of millions will be jobless.

***

Perhaps we will be lucky, and the human and capitalist genius for innovation will produce a vaccine faster than expected—or at least treatments that reduce Covid-19 symptoms. But barring that, our leaders and our society will very soon need to shift their virus-fighting strategy to something that is sustainable.

Dr. Fauci has explained this severe lockdown policy as lasting 14 days in its initial term. The national guidance would then be reconsidered depending on the spread of the disease. That should be the moment, if not sooner, to offer new guidance on what might be called phase two of the coronavirus pandemic campaign.

That will surely include strict measures to isolate and protect the most vulnerable—our elderly and those with underlying medical problems. This should not become a debate over how many lives to sacrifice against how many lost jobs we can tolerate. Substantial social distancing and other measures will have to continue for some time in some form, depending on how our knowledge of the virus and its effects evolves.

But no society can safeguard public health for long at the cost of its overall economic health. Even America's resources to fight a viral plague aren't limitless—and they will become more limited by the day as individuals lose jobs, businesses close, and American prosperity gives way to poverty. America urgently needs a pandemic strategy that is more economically and socially sustainable than the current national lockdown.

[Richard Hakluyt]

With perfect information (as if  ) we could theoretically work out the intersection point between direct deaths from the virus and deaths caused by economic slowdown.

Some have calculated that austerity in the UK has led to 120,000 excess deaths for example https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-did-austerity-kill-120000-people .

I don't think that analysis should be left to journalists or politicians though. We should continue to take our advice from experts; perhaps, annoyingly for some, that will include economists.