Novel Coronavirus COVID-19

[SumGuy]

10 minutes ago, gaius said:

In order of blame I would put the public health officials first, by a wide margin, followed by the politicians in second place. Simply because most politicians aren't experts in this stuff and expect the officials advising them to know what they're talking about, which they clearly don't in this case.

Guess it depends on the country...in some the public health officials were saying from the beginning how bad it is and advising on the measures that now are being taken, but the politicians didn't just ignore them, they muzzled them by controlling who they allowed to speak, what was allowed on web pages, and the politicians who wanted to silence the message they didn't like were aided and abetted by their sycophants.  Now those same politicians wan to re-write history and deny they ever down played or denied the danger...despite their being plenty of video clips of them doing just that...merely a month ago.   Scarily it even seems to work...who needs a Ministry of Truth to "correct" the historical record when people will self delude.

It's like the political equivalent of DARVO (the go to play book of abusers).  Deny there is a problem, attack the messenger, and even if there is a problem minimize, then reverse the victimization..I guess in this case no blame the medical experts which you minimized when they warned you.   Since at least end of February, and sooner if one paid attention, the medical and epidemiological community, the experts, the true public health officials have been telling people it would get bad, that this is serious.  Not the heads of public health agencies, are often political appointees that toe the political party line and actively suppress the science and facts that don't agree with their political agenda...which is to make the party look great.

In short, the doctors and epidemiology experts are not to blame one bit, if you didn't hear their warning then you were listening to the wrong purveyors of information, and believed too much the wrong politicians.  The politicians were told, they knew, the ones that denied just ignored the inconvenient truth...and in some cases told us it was all OK, then went and sold 2/3 of their stock holdings before the market crashed.   

[SumGuy]

10 minutes ago, Tamfana said:

To a limited extent, yes.  People who have screwed up on something that harms others shouldn't be (1) believed any more or (2) in charge any more.  

Agreed.  

Edited April 2, 2020 by SumGuy

[gaius]

It's likely when this is all over there will be certain countries who were very minimally impacted. While the US, and others, are likely to have tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dead and an economy that has higher unemployment than during the worst part of the great depression.

So if you're ok with Russia, a country much poorer and with way less resources, sending us medical supplies because they managed this effectively and we were like the three stooges then yes, you don't need to assign blame. But if you would rather we do better next time then the people who messed up need to be held to task for it.

[gaius]

8 minutes ago, SumGuy said:

In short, the doctors and epidemiology experts are not to blame one bit, if you didn't hear their warning then you were listening to the wrong purveyors of information, and believed too much the wrong politicians.  The politicians were told, they knew, the ones that denied just ignored the inconvenient truth...and in some cases told us it was all OK, then went and sold 2/3 of their stock holdings before the market crashed.   

I read all kinds of news sites, liberal and conservative, and I've read many op-eds from different doctors/health officials, and without exception I never heard a single doctor advocate for travel restrictions. All I heard was doctors categorizing any kind of mass quarantine and travel restrictions as ineffective in fighting a pandemic. Even after China stomped out their spread by doing exactly that.

I know a lot of people feel very uncomfortable being critical of highly educated professionals but in this case they were an enormous part of the failure. The driving force almost.

[basil67]

8 minutes ago, gaius said:

It's likely when this is all over there will be certain countries who were very minimally impacted. While the US, and others, are likely to have tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dead and an economy that has higher unemployment than during the worst part of the great depression

I'm not sure where you're going with this.  Do you want to slow spread of the virus as much as possible or keep people employed?   We can't do both.   Soooo many jobs here in Australia have been lost because non essential services have been forced to close or closed voluntarily, but our infection curve appears to be plateauing.   Is this good or bad in your view?  

[gaius]

32 minutes ago, Tamfana said:

Gosh, I'd say the opposite.  Public health professionals have been clear and accurate thus far.  

They've been the worst and even they know it. Or else they wouldn't now be trying to pretend China hid information to try and excuse why they didn't act sooner.

[basil67]

6 minutes ago, gaius said:

I read all kinds of news sites, liberal and conservative, and I've read many op-eds from different doctors/health officials, and without exception I never heard a single doctor advocate for travel restrictions. All I heard was doctors categorizing any kind of mass quarantine and travel restrictions as ineffective in fighting a pandemic.

So how do you account for NZ bringing travel restrictions in quite some weeks back and AU hot on their heels?    If you want to come here, you have to have residency and be prepared to be put in a hotel room under police guard for 14 days.

This all happened after many medicos being scathing of our government for not taking their advice.

[basil67]

6 minutes ago, gaius said:

They've been the worst and even they know it. Or else they wouldn't now be trying to pretend China hid information to try and excuse why they didn't act sooner.

You think China didn't hide information?   They aren't exactly known for being forthcoming with the rest of the world.  

[Redhead14]

38 minutes ago, Tamfana said:

Gosh, I'd say the opposite.  Public health professionals have been clear and accurate thus far.  

They have not been clear and accurate on what we should be doing or not doing or about how the virus is transmitted.  The information has changed many times.  For instance, they were claiming that it was transmitted by people coughing and sending droplets into the air and landing on surfaces, etc., now it's transmitted simply by talking and breathing with/around each other.  That's a bigger issue.  Originally, eh, we don't need masks, now we need masks.  They should know exactly what's needed -- China and Italy gave blueprints more or less . . .

[littleblackheart]

1 hour ago, SumGuy said:

Fair enough, what was the age and health distribution?  I imagine that the average age on a cruise is up.  18% is still pretty frightening to me, almost 1 in 5 who have could not now and be spreading it.

From the study:

Quote

A total of 634 people tested positive among 3,063 tests as at 20 February 2020. Of 634 cases, a total of 313 cases were female and six were aged 0–19 years, 152 were aged 20–59 years and 476 were 60 years and older . Cases were from a total of 28 countries, with most being nationals of six countries, namely Japan (n = 270 cases), the United States (n = 88 cases), China (n = 58 cases; including 30 from Hong Kong), the Philippines (n = 54 cases), Canada (n = 51 cases) and Australia (n = 49 cases).

Another study done on Japanese citizens evacuated from Wuhan gave an estimate of 33.3%. So my friend was not far off after all (yes, I did ask her for the reference!)

The reference: 'Estimation of the asymptomatic ratio of novel coronavirus infections (COVID-19)' Hiroshi Nishiura, Tetsuro Kobayashi, Takeshi Miyama, Ayako Suzuki, Sungmok Jung, Katsuma Hayashi, Ryo Kinos***a, Yichi Yang, Baoyin Yuan, Andrei R. Akhmetzhanov, Natalie M Linton, published in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases (2020)

There's also another lab study in Iceland that reports an asymptomatic rate of 50% (CNN edition 01/04/2020 - 'Iceland lab's testing suggests 50% of coronavirus cases have no symptoms')

So the overall trend suggests a fairly high rate of asymptomatic ratio.

Edited April 2, 2020 by littleblackheart

[gaius]

Just now, basil67 said:

So how do you account for NZ bringing travel restrictions in quite some weeks back and AU hot on their heels?    If you want to come here, you have to have residency and be prepared to be put in a hotel room under police guard for 14 days.

This all happened after many medicos being scathing of our government for not taking their advice.

Then you have better public health officials than we do. Ours were advocating the exact opposite of that. Just to clarify, I'm mostly ragging on the public health officials in the US. Some parts of Europe qualify as well. But NZ and Australia have done admirable jobs so far.

Which is why you'll probably come out way better at the end of this than we will.

[basil67]

4 minutes ago, Redhead14 said:

They have not been clear and accurate on what we should be doing or not doing or about how the virus is transmitted.  The information has changed many times.  For instance, they were claiming that it was transmitted by people coughing and sending droplets into the air and landing on surfaces, etc., now it's transmitted simply by talking and breathing with/around each other.  

One of the reasons medicos are more worried about COVID 19 than regular influenza is because, unlike the flu, they don't know much about this.   It's unfair to criticise people who are in the situation of learning on the go. 

Edited April 2, 2020 by basil67

[Tamfana]

Just now, gaius said:

They've been the worst and even they know it. Or else they wouldn't now be trying to pretend China hid information to try and excuse why they didn't act sooner. 

But the politicians and political appointees are the decision-makers for when to act and which action to take.  

Go to the CDC website and you will find a January 17 conference call transcript.  

Or is this a part of that Foxian/Republican default setting to blame "experts" and "elites" and "know it alls?"  Cuz it's incontrovertible that politicians, the political appointees and RW media personalities that screwed up.  And continue to.  

[Azincourt]

24 minutes ago, gaius said:

It's likely when this is all over there will be certain countries who were very minimally impacted. While the US, and others, are likely to have tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dead and an economy that has higher unemployment than during the worst part of the great depression.

So if you're ok with Russia, a country much poorer and with way less resources, sending us medical supplies because they managed this effectively and we were like the three stooges then yes, you don't need to assign blame. But if you would rather we do better next time then the people who messed up need to be held to task for it.

You honestly believe Donald Trump will ever be held responsible to anything?

That's impossible, man. He's been getting away with everything since the moment he was born, and he will be completely responsability-free until the day that he dies.

[Tamfana]

4 minutes ago, Redhead14 said:

They have not been clear and accurate on what we should be doing or not doing or about how the virus is transmitted.  The information has changed many times.  For instance, they were claiming that it was transmitted by people coughing and sending droplets into the air and landing on surfaces, etc., now it's transmitted simply by talking and breathing with/around each other.  That's a bigger issue.  Originally, eh, we don't need masks, now we need masks.  They should know exactly what's needed -- China and Italy gave blueprints more or less . . .

It hasn't changed.  The part I highlighted for instance isn't a "change."  I just think that lots of people don't understand. 

[littleblackheart]

5 minutes ago, basil67 said:

One of the reasons medicos are more worried about COVID 19 than regular influenza is because, unlike the flu, they don't know much about this.  They are learning as they go.  It's unfair to criticise them for having to learn on the go. 

They have also always been quite clear about the need for PPE and testing. They are absolutely not responsible for the band-aid type of responses from some gvts that were more worried about financial impact than human impact.

Edited April 2, 2020 by littleblackheart

[Tamfana]

1 minute ago, littleblackheart said:

They have also always been quite clear about the need for PPE and testing. They are absolutely not responsible for the band-aid type of responses from some gvts were more worried about financial impact than human impact.

Right, and the thing that just kills me about that is that they aren't separable, unrelated issues.  

[gaius]

1 minute ago, Tamfana said:

But the politicians and political appointees are the decision-makers for when to act and which action to take.  

Go to the CDC website and you will find a January 17 conference call transcript.  

Or is this a part of that Foxian/Republican default setting to blame "experts" and "elites" and "know it alls?"  Cuz it's incontrovertible that politicians, the political appointees and RW media personalities that screwed up.  And continue to.  

If you have some information you want to present please summarize it here, I'm not spending my night sorting through CDC call transcripts. Especially since I've already read a whole bunch of opinion pieces from different health officials being highly critical of many of the tactics you need to stop an outbreak with. Which I linked and summarized earlier in the thread.

Defending "experts" just to defend experts isn't any more intelligent than people who attack just to attack by the way.

[basil67]

2 minutes ago, gaius said:

Then you have better public health officials than we do. Ours were advocating the exact opposite of that. Just to clarify, I'm mostly ragging on the public health officials in the US. Some parts of Europe qualify as well. But NZ and Australia have done admirable jobs so far.

Which is why you'll probably come out way better at the end of this than we will.

Is it at all possible that Trump is ignoring their advice?  Do you know what is said behind closed doors?   And what of the other medicos in your country?  If your government medicos are inept as you suggest, why hasn't Trump sacked them and started listening to other leading doctors?

[Tamfana]

Nope I have no information that I wish to present.  People can learn whatever they wish, as far as I'm concerned.    

[gaius]

Just now, basil67 said:

Is it at all possible that Trump is ignoring their advice?  Do you know what is said behind closed doors?   And what of the other medicos in your country?  If your government medicos are inept as you suggest, why hasn't Trump sacked them and started listening to other leading doctors?

One of the leading doctors in the US, Anthony Fauci, recently claimed in an interview that he and the Coronavirus task force was unanimous in it's disapproval of Trump's idea to impose some sort of quarantine on New York. He even went so far to say he had to talk long and hard with Trump to coax him out of it.

So yes, Trump is responsible for not ignoring him, but to pretend the health officials in this country haven't been a huge part of the problem is just ludicrous.

 

[elaine567]

Few are criticising medics on the ground but the lack of PPE and test kits in the UK is scandalous.
WE had ample warning that we would need PPE and test kits.
NHS workers have died here... not to mention the risk patients and the general public have been put under
The Govt. were miles behind the curve and that is not good enough.
Now we are on a trajectory that mimics Italy...
Sad.

[Azincourt]

12 minutes ago, elaine567 said:

Few are criticising medics on the ground but the lack of PPE and test kits in the UK is scandalous.
WE had ample warning that we would need PPE and test kits.
NHS workers have died here... not to mention the risk patients and the general public have been put under
The Govt. were miles behind the curve and that is not good enough.
Now we are on a trajectory that mimics Italy...
Sad.

I think the entire world is on a trajectory that mimics Italy.  This isn't going to go away in 15 days from now. I'd be surprised if we're rid of the virus before the year ends. Jesus Christ, I ain't stepping on the beach's sand any time soon from the way this is going.

[mark clemson]

1 hour ago, Redhead14 said:

They have not been clear and accurate on what we should be doing or not doing or about how the virus is transmitted.  The information has changed many times.  For instance, they were claiming that it was transmitted by people coughing and sending droplets into the air and landing on surfaces, etc., now it's transmitted simply by talking and breathing with/around each other.  That's a bigger issue.  Originally, eh, we don't need masks, now we need masks.  They should know exactly what's needed -- China and Italy gave blueprints more or less . . .

They go by data, but they can't actually run experiments (with a lethal virus) to confirm it. Even now, they are not yet certain is spread by aerosolized particles (the talking to other people and simply breathing exhaled air business). Aerosolized particles float around in the air for about 3 hours, so in theory, everyone, e.g. in a small store should be getting it from one person spending signficant time there. It's very contagious, but it doesn't appear to be THAT contagious.

There is ambiguity/differences in the apparent transmission mechanism and symptom-less carrier % data. For example, the suggestion about probable aerosolized particle transmission (rather than just larger liquid droplets) was due to an incident in a Washington state church. But maybe those folks shared some cookies too, who knows. Personally, at this point, I'm wearing a mask e.g. when I go grocery shopping, but that's just me.

Florida, Georgia, and Lousiana screwed themselves IMO. It's only in "liberal" areas/blue states, it won't affect us "real" Christians, we can party at the beach and throw Mardi Gras, social distancing is too much "hassle", let's throw some barbeque parties...

Unrealistic beliefs and denial. They could have learned a lot after the NYC screw ups but they didn't. Duh.There's a whole subculture in the US now fixated on denying science whenever it suits their pre-existing beliefs and/or convenience. Too bad it bites everyone in the *ss not just them. I suspect this won't be the last time, either.

Disclaimer to medical "chat" above: I'm a layperson.

[Tamfana]

JARED KUSHNER: "The notion of the federal stockpile was it's supposed to be our stockpile. It's not supposed to be states stockpiles that they then use."

"ours" 

DC's?  It'a not a state.  Just kidding.  

But this is the thinking of the guy in charge of COVID-19 response in the United States, federal level.  Sorry people in other countries.