Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[Zanza]

Other countries with low fatality rates take note. Germany, you've recently gone from sub 0.5% to .74% Expect that to at least double.

Germany has lots more dead than the official numbers show due to the way they gather the data. France as well.

How so? This claim that Germany does not count 'right' is already several weeks old (from Italian nationalists), but has not been substantiated yet as far as I know.

[Admiral Yi]

The next wave of stupid in this whole thing is the permitting process to be an "essential business".

My brother's employer makes outdoor pillows for patios. One of the companies they sell through is lowe's, and lowe's is working with its suppliers to get them designated essential, which was successful for my brother's company. The basis was that pillows are important to keeping home life comfortable during a quarantine. They were very worried about a shutdown and were developing contingency plans to begin making hospital gowns.

The current status isn't perfect and there may still be a temporary shut down: the maker of the legal notices they put on the pillows is in Birmingham and Birmingham has shut them down as non essential. They are trying to figure out if they can get the legal notices some other way, or if they can get the maker of the legal notices classified as "essential" because they support an "essential" business.

Why is this a wave of stupid rather than a serious question being addressed throough the bureaucratic process?

[Iormlund]

We're probably all underreporting deaths for one reason or another. I don't think we'll get good estimations until we make population-wide studies to get final rate of infection and compare deaths this year to previous years.

[alfred russel]

The next wave of stupid in this whole thing is the permitting process to be an "essential business".

My brother's employer makes outdoor pillows for patios. One of the companies they sell through is lowe's, and lowe's is working with its suppliers to get them designated essential, which was successful for my brother's company. The basis was that pillows are important to keeping home life comfortable during a quarantine. They were very worried about a shutdown and were developing contingency plans to begin making hospital gowns.

The current status isn't perfect and there may still be a temporary shut down: the maker of the legal notices they put on the pillows is in Birmingham and Birmingham has shut them down as non essential. They are trying to figure out if they can get the legal notices some other way, or if they can get the maker of the legal notices classified as "essential" because they support an "essential" business.

Why is this a wave of stupid rather than a serious question being addressed throough the bureaucratic process?

Outdoor patio pillows are not "essential" to stop covid 19, but in the event they were, they could be produced without legal notices stapled to them. Surely those aren't "essential". I probably need to read up on the history of how humanity came over previous epidemics, but I doubt it involved outdoor patio pillows, with or without legal notices.

I'm suspicious of a bit of corruption or at least political favoritism in the process.

[Sheilbh]

God we're such a nation of busybodies/snitches.

Police are apparently inundated with calls from people who suspect their neighbour is going for a second run or for a non-essential trip and want them arrested

Police are now asking people to exercise caution in reporting on each other. There's so many people out there who want a soft police state - like NIMBYism/long-running disputes over planning applications for an extension with the coercive power of the state behind it.

Although my favourite example is a man who called the police because his wife doesn't think her job is essential, and he does and she's working from home. So he wanted them to force her to leave the house and go to work

[fromtia]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylMyWZK_K7A

Pretty good break down of how the stimulus check will be distributed in the US.

Also a pretty good debunk of that rumor floating around that the stimulus will be taken back out of future tax rebates.

Good video, thanks Yi. I was sure to have FL withhold taxes from the UI that I applied for of course.

[fromtia]

I've seen many theories... genetic differences between Asian and Europeans, the fact that we and Italians have closer relationships with our parents and grandparents, our culture of physical contact, the fact that East Asians got educated with SARS... I suppose once the dust settles we'll be able to get better answers.

It is really hard to parse out a clear picture of what the underlying causes are for what's happening. Hall of mirrors to be sure, at least for now. More will be revealed.

I give you this for levity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBKPtWN1Mj8

[Maladict]

Btw Maladict, you should know that the Netherlands have featured heavily in our coronavirus-related news cycle today. 

Why?

Yeah, why?

edit: blocking the EU emergency aid fund of course. So much for unity 

Sorry, computer issues.

One was blocking the EU emergency aid fund, yes, but not just because of it (the Netherlands were not alone, AFAIK at least also Germany and Austria blocked it too) but because of the way in which it was done which, at least int he way in which I've seen it reported appeared to be quite snotty and rehashing the morality play of good frugal countries of the North vs. bad lazy southerners that appeared during the previous crisis. Let's just say that your finance minister should not look at Mediterranean holidays in the future. I mean, the Portuguese PM actualy came out and called his remarks repugnant and disgusting.

The other thing was a report/interview with some doctor of Leiden's university medical center, in which he basically blamed Spain and Italy's ICU saturation on the "cultural position" that the elderly have in our societies, saying that there's no point in bringing the elderly into hospitals (as is apparently being done in Spain and Italy) and basically implying that it's better to leave them die at home or in care facilities.

Let's just say that your national reputation might have been better right after the 2010 WC final. 

I know, it's shameful. Take comfort in the fact that the government's preoccupation with the economy means that a lot of us will die as well.

[Iormlund]

We're probably all underreporting deaths for one reason or another. I don't think we'll get good estimations until we make population-wide studies to get final rate of infection and compare deaths this year to previous years.

[Fate]

Here's an example of the excess mortality in a smaller town near Bergamo which has one of the highest death rates:



Blue is baseline mortality. Green is a death in a patient with a positive COVID-19 test. Red is the number of total deaths or "all cause mortality." They're not reporting red in these daily death totals. They're reporting green.

[Tamas]

God we're such a nation of busybodies/snitches.

Police are apparently inundated with calls from people who suspect their neighbour is going for a second run or for a non-essential trip and want them arrested

Police are now asking people to exercise caution in reporting on each other. There's so many people out there who want a soft police state - like NIMBYism/long-running disputes over planning applications for an extension with the coercive power of the state behind it.

Although my favourite example is a man who called the police because his wife doesn't think her job is essential, and he does and she's working from home. So he wanted them to force her to leave the house and go to work

That seems general human nature. I remember reading in the Court of the Red Tsar, when Stalin and co. instituted a quota of internal enemies to be arrested for each region, the regions' issue wasn't to meet the quota, but to deal with the massive amount of reports of people made of their neighbours etc. A lot of us humans are just nasty savage apes once you scrape off the veneer of civilisation we paint on ourselves for safety.

[crazy canuck]

We're probably all underreporting deaths for one reason or another. I don't think we'll get good estimations until we make population-wide studies to get final rate of infection and compare deaths this year to previous years.

Why would a COVID related death not be reported in countries where health care is free and hospital beds are available?  I can understand why there would be under reporting in countries where one or both of those things are not true.

[Fate]

We're probably all underreporting deaths for one reason or another. I don't think we'll get good estimations until we make population-wide studies to get final rate of infection and compare deaths this year to previous years.

Why would a COVID related death not be reported in countries where health care is free and hospital beds are available?  I can understand why there would be under reporting in countries where one or both of those things are not true.

Many people die alone at home or in a nursing home and don't get a test. Look at excess mortality over this same period versus the previous and subsequent year and you'll get a better sense of the truth death total. We can't realy do it accurately in the midst of the outbreak.

[celedhring]

Health care system being overwhelmed by Covid-19 patients will also increase mortality from other causes, surely.

[Iormlund]

We're probably all underreporting deaths for one reason or another. I don't think we'll get good estimations until we make population-wide studies to get final rate of infection and compare deaths this year to previous years.

Why would a COVID related death not be reported in countries where health care is free and hospital beds are available?  I can understand why there would be under reporting in countries where one or both of those things are not true.

Lack of testing resources, I imagine. When you find half a dozen dead in a nursing home, as Fate says, those not really your priority for testing. Frontline workers are.

Also, a lot of otherwise preventable deaths may be taking place due to healthcare system collapse because of lack of resources, fatigue, reluctance to go to the hospital, etc.