Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[frunk]

Looks photoshopped.

[Syt]

Meanwhile, in New Orleans.

[Syt]

[celedhring]

Love the extra effort of getting a matching license plate 

[The Brain]

Volvo.

[Legbiter]

New Zealand's done well.

New Zealand says it has stopped community transmission of Covid-19, effectively eliminating the virus.

With new cases in single figures for several days - one on Sunday - Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the virus was "currently" eliminated.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-52436658

Australia is also looking very good.

[Syt]

[Legbiter]

Yeah, for instance Indonesia has very few reported cases but just Jakarta has seen a massive spike in the death rate compared to previous years.

No new cases here today.

[The Brain]

Yeah, for instance Indonesia has very few reported cases but just Jakarta has seen a massive spike in the death rate compared to previous years.

Living is dangerous.

[Legbiter]

Living is dangerous.

You holding up good Brain?

[Sheilbh]

Yeah the FT have done some reporting on excess mortality in sub-national regions too - which shows Jakarta and Guayas:

[Tamas]

Johnson is back to work and made a speech that I guess was all we could realistically expect: telling its too soon to ease on the lockdown, we are going through the peak and he is not going to ruin all the effort we have made by opening up too quickly. But no details on the when and how or what's the plan in general. I think for a dirtbag government recovering from a fumble, that's all the answer we can expect right now. And as it is always mentioned, at least he is not Trump.

So I found this piece on the Guardian rather tiresome:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/27/boris-johnson-back-to-work-waffling

Worst of all is that just so it can attack the PM it touts idiocies like why are we in a general lockdown if only certain age groups are adversely affected by it. Really.

Still, I liked this comment under the article:

"Our country has just spent five years tearing itself apart over a pointless dispute over whether its future would be grounded in fantasy or reality. The result of that was that a low IQ electorate chose some of the nation's most disreputable and least capable politicians to pursue that fantasy and on no other criteria.

Did anyone really think that an unprecedented international health crisis would be handled with skill and foresight in these circumstances and by these people? I'm actually surprised that it hasn't been far, far worse, and I suppose we must all thank God for the scientists at Imperial College whose research seems to have been published just in time."

[The Brain]

Living is dangerous.

You holding up good Brain?

Brain much good.

[Sheilbh]

It's something I saw someone post on Twitter that I kind of feel - that I don't like the Tories and I don't like Boris Johnson. I think he's morally unfit for office and that he's a lazy, cynical dilettante. But I keep end up defending him because on the other side on Twitter (and the Guardian very often) is just a knee-jerk leap to the most negative conclusion/position on everything because there's sort of a total worldview of criminal, almost evil, Tory fecklessness.

There's just no space for time, for luck, or even good old-fashioned incompetence and bad government - all of which have, I think, played more of a role in the last few months than evil Tories doing evil things.

Also Simon Jenkins is wrong about everything - this happens all the time. It's almost a picturesque part of the British constitution like those heralds:
His column on 6 March - "Why I'm taking the coronavirus hype with a pinch of salt"
His column on 2 April - "Was I wrong about coronavirus? Even the world's best scientists can't tell me"

It's the right of columnists to change their mind, of course. But I feel like there'd actually be some value in him exploring why he came to some conclusions, why he changed his mind etc. But he just plows on.

[Josephus]

Intersting article here. Not really surprising. 99 per cent of Italy's fatalities, all had a previous condition

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-18/99-of-those-who-died-from-virus-had-other-illness-italy-says?