Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[alfred russel]

An analysis of some of the reasons the US failed.

That's why experts say the percentage of tests turning up positive results in the U.S. is drastically higher per capita than in Canada. If you test early and often, you identify cases quickly. If you test late, early cases will be missed and the positivity rate will be higher.

For each positive case in Canada, an average of 110 people are being tested. In the U.S., that number currently sits at about one for every 17 tests.

"When I look at the U.S. scenario, it's ... almost like watching a train wreck in slow motion, because a lot of it is quite predictable, mostly because they were really, really behind on getting testing started," said Dr. Lynora Saxinger, an infectious disease physician at the University of Alberta.

"They're expanding their testing now, but the percent positivity of their test is still going up, which is horrifyingly scary."

The rest of the article is mainly about how this was an obvious and predictable result.  It's just that politicians, and the general public deciding they could ignore the health experts.

Zeke Emanuel, who served in the Obama White House and has informally advised President Donald Trump, expressed exasperation that people kept looking for an immediate effect.

Launching into a sermon about the mathematical realities of exponential growth rates, Emanuel said the disastrous consequences of reopening too early would only emerge around early summer.

"Two months, not two weeks," Emanuel said in early May. "That's likely when you'll see the effects of what we're doing today. ... That's when people will recognize, 'Wow, now we've got 1,000 cases today, 3,000 cases tomorrow, 6,000 the next day.'"

He predicted the country would awaken to the disaster around mid-July.

It's happening ahead of schedule.

There is also a bit about how having a single payer system helps government organize the response.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/us-covid-19-surge-canada-1.5628979

I don't get it...apparently Canada has run 2,598,243 tests with 102,954 confirmed cases. How do you get 110 tests per positive test?

If the number is really around 2.6 million, Canada has tested less than the US has.

Canada also has a higher fatality rate per identified case, which either means its health system is doing a poorer job of treating cases or its testing regime of detecting them.

[alfred russel]

The south is melting down, that part has been clear for two weeks now.  I wouldn't necessarily breathe easily in New York or New Jersey, though.  They're doing well, and certainly nothing like Florida, but they're not extinguishing their case counts quickly enough, and the secondary trends are alarming.  The conclusion that I would draw from New York and New Jersey numbers is that it probably isn't as safe to open up as it may feel like, the embers are still glowing red hot.

Agreed on all counts.
Anecdotally I don't have any summer vaca plans yet but many friends and colleagues do.  There are kids going to camp and the schools plan to reopen as well.  The numbers seem OK right now but to what extent is that the product of the tough controls that are now being loosened?

In summary, people don't give a shit anymore. People are just living their lives almost as normal. I've been taking more care than some people I know (i'm at least wearing a mask when indoors but not at home or a gym), but here is where we are:

Thursday: ate dinner on an outdoor patio of a restaurant, went to a gym.
Friday: went to a gym, got pizza at a restaurant (though we ate outside and the place had outdoor seating) everyone else was eating inside), went to a movie with friends.
Saturday (today): went to the Georgia Aquarium to see the baby whale--big crowds and while a mask was mandatory half took it off once passing security and no one cared, later going to a gym and going to a bar tonight with friends (has an outdoor patio)
Sunday: going kayaking with friends, probably back to a gym and eating out somewhere since we are going out of town.

The aquarium was legitimately alarming. Supposedly they are limiting numbers, but of course everyone is crowding the viewing spaces and it felt as crowded as typical. A lot of people didn't have masks.

I don't think there is the political will to go back to lockdown, and people will ignore it anyway. I don't know if this is a southern US thing, if you guys see it but are not posting about it, or if you guys are staying inside and not seeing what is happening. But here there are crowds all over the place.

[alfred russel]

Tool to calculate how fucked up you'll be if you get Covid.

http://evidence.ohdsi.org:3838/Covid19CoverPrediction/

I get:

1.2% to get hospitalized
0.3% of needing intensive care
0.1% of kicking the bucket

I get the same, but it seems like for people in our age group it is too high.

I am 41 with no preexisting conditions, a 0.1% death risk from the actual data from Florida below seems unlikely. I tried this also as a 30 year old with no preexisting conditions, and it also says 0.1% - I think that is just the bottom of the scale and it will show 0.1% as the minimum score.

[Sheilbh]

Interesting piece in the FT about government support for companies.

All countries have different "mixes" of this sort of support, so some are largely grants, others tax cuts, or tax deferrals, others loans. The UK's approach has largely been cancelling certain taxes for this year, plus tax deferrals and government backed loans (at interest rates). The theory behind this approach was - a bit like payments for the self-employed - that it could use infrastructure that it already had from tax payments etc rather than having to do something new. And, from what I've read, it's been fairly successful.

But, given the scale of support companies have needed there are now concerns that basically loans won't be able to be re-paid. So there's a risk that we kept business on life-support through lockdown but they then collapse on the way out. Apparently bankers and the Treasury are looking at alternative approaches and re-structuring the debt, possibly with the government converting debt into equity. The idea of the government having a direct stake in thousands of businesses was unimaginable, say, 6 months ago. But seems to me a sensible way of doing things because it means the government will be able to get its money back at some point but won't kill businesses in the process.

Now if that happens I also wonder if there's a way of using that stake for other reasons. I've wondered for a while if part of the solution to getting to net zero or cutting tax avoidance is for government to acquire stakes in companies and become a stakeholder rather than just an external rule-maker to get around

[viper37]

The scientist dismissed by Florida's governor for "insubordination" has set up her own website to report more accurate data.
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/7572b118dc3c48d885d1c643c195314e/

[crazy canuck]

I don't get it...

Yep

[Eddie Teach]

I don't get it...

Yep

So which figure is correct?

[Grey Fox]

I don't get it...

Yep

So which figure is correct?

Not all confirmed cases, in Quebec, come from a test. Quebec, up to date on June 24, has done 573 476 tests for 48 898 positives. The government reports 55 079 official Covid-19 cases.

[viper37]

The south is melting down, that part has been clear for two weeks now.  I wouldn't necessarily breathe easily in New York or New Jersey, though.  They're doing well, and certainly nothing like Florida, but they're not extinguishing their case counts quickly enough, and the secondary trends are alarming.  The conclusion that I would draw from New York and New Jersey numbers is that it probably isn't as safe to open up as it may feel like, the embers are still glowing red hot.

Agreed on all counts.
Anecdotally I don't have any summer vaca plans yet but many friends and colleagues do.  There are kids going to camp and the schools plan to reopen as well.  The numbers seem OK right now but to what extent is that the product of the tough controls that are now being loosened?

In summary, people don't give a shit anymore.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/03/16/816707182/map-tracking-the-spread-of-the-coronavirus-in-the-u-s

Code Select Expand


New daily cases are rising in 33 places, including:
State     Avg. this week                Per 100K        % change vs. 2 weeks ago
Florida    4,745 new cases/day    22 per 100K    +250%
Texas    4,968 new cases/day    17 per 100K    +181%
Arizona    2,821 new cases/day    39 per 100K    +130%
Georgia    1,569 new cases/day    15 per 100K    +113%

[DGuller]

I don't get it...

Yep

See, this is exactly what I was talking about.  AR questioned your facts with what seems like reliable facts to the contrary, and your only response is ... this.  I don't get where you and your clique get this arrogance from, at no point did it appear to be earned on merit.

[merithyn]

I don't get it...

Yep

See, this is exactly what I was talking about.  AR questioned your facts with what seems like reliable facts to the contrary, and your only response is ... this.  I don't get where you and your clique get this arrogance from, at no point did it appear to be earned on merit.

I'm curious who cc's "clique" is, given he's the only one engaging AR anymore besides you.

[PDH]

When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way! from you first cigarette your last dyin' days.

[DGuller]

I'm curious who cc's "clique" is, given he's the only one engaging AR anymore besides you.

All of the ones who keep repeating several times a week that they're not engaging him are definitely in it.

[The Larch]

[Josquius]

I never cease to be amazed that Sweden of all countries proved to be europes idiot.