Originally Posted by Bwana:
Once again, don't come in this thread with some kind of political agenda, or you will be shown the door. If you want to go that route, there is a thread about this in DC.
Originally Posted by Dartgod:
People, there is a lot of good information in this thread, let's try to keep the petty bickering to a minimum.
We all have varying opinions about the impact of this, the numbers, etc. We will all never agree with each other. But we can all keep it civil.
Thanks!
Click here for the original OP:
Spoiler!
Apparently the CoronaVirus can survive on a inanimate objects, such as door knobs, for 9 days.
California coronavirus case could be first spread within U.S. community, CDC says
By SOUMYA KARLAMANGLA, JACLYN COSGROVE
FEB. 26, 2020 8:04 PM
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is investigating what could be the first case of novel coronavirus in the United States involving a patient in California who neither recently traveled out of the country nor was in contact with someone who did.
“At this time, the patient’s exposure is unknown. It’s possible this could be an instance of community spread of COVID-19, which would be the first time this has happened in the United States,” the CDC said in a statement. “Community spread means spread of an illness for which the source of infection is unknown. It’s also possible, however, that the patient may have been exposed to a returned traveler who was infected.”
The individual is a resident of Solano County and is receiving medical care in Sacramento County, according to the state Department of Public Health.
The CDC said the “case was detected through the U.S. public health system — picked up by astute clinicians.”
Officials at UC Davis Medical Center expanded on what the federal agency might have meant by that in an email sent Wednesday, as reported by the Davis Enterprise newspaper.
The patient arrived at UC Davis Medical Center from another hospital Feb. 19 and “had already been intubated, was on a ventilator, and given droplet protection orders because of an undiagnosed and suspected viral condition,” according to an email sent by UC Davis officials that was obtained by the Davis Enterprise.
The staff at UC Davis requested COVID-19 testing by the CDC, but because the patient didn’t fit the CDC’s existing criteria for the virus, a test wasn’t immediately administered, according to the email. The CDC then ordered the test Sunday, and results were announced Wednesday. Hospital administrators reportedly said in the email that despite these issues, there has been minimal exposure at the hospital because of safety protocols they have in place.
A UC Davis Health spokesperson declined Wednesday evening to share the email with The Times.
Since Feb. 2, more than 8,400 returning travelers from China have entered California, according to the state health department. They have been advised to self-quarantine for 14 days and limit interactions with others as much as possible, officials said.
“This is a new virus, and while we are still learning about it, there is a lot we already know,” Dr. Sonia Angell, director of the California Department of Public Health, said in a statement. “We have been anticipating the potential for such a case in the U.S., and given our close familial, social and business relationships with China, it is not unexpected that the first case in the U.S. would be in California.”
It is not clear how the person became infected, but public health workers could not identify any contacts with people who had traveled to China or other areas where the virus is widespread. That raises concern that the virus is spreading in the United States, creating a challenge for public health officials, experts say.
“It’s the first signal that we could be having silent transmission in the community,” said Lawrence Gostin, director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Center on National and Global Health Law. “It probably means there are many more cases out there, and it probably means this individual has infected others, and now it’s a race to try to find out who that person has infected.”
On Tuesday, the CDC offered its most serious warning to date that the United States should expect and prepare for the coronavirus to become a more widespread health issue.
“Ultimately, we expect we will see coronavirus spread in this country,” said Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. “It’s not so much a question of if, but a question of when.”
According to the CDC’s latest count Wednesday morning, 59 U.S. residents have tested positive for the new strain of coronavirus — 42 of whom are repatriated citizens from a Diamond Princess cruise. That number has grown by two since Messonnier’s last count Tuesday, although the CDC was not immediately available to offer details on the additional cases.
More than 82,000 cases of coronavirus have been reported globally, and more than 2,700 people have died, with the majority in mainland China, the epicenter of the outbreak.
But public health leaders have repeatedly reminded residents that the health risk from the novel coronavirus to the general public remains low.
“While COVID-19 has a high transmission rate, it has a low mortality rate,” the state Department of Public Health said in a statement Wednesday. “From the international data we have, of those who have tested positive for COVID-19, approximately 80% do not exhibit symptoms that would require hospitalization. There have been no confirmed deaths related to COVID-19 in the United States to date.”
CDC officials have also warned that although the virus is likely to spread in U.S. communities, the flu still poses a greater risk.
Gostin said the news of potential silent transmission does not eliminate the possibility of containing the virus in the U.S. and preventing an outbreak.
“There are few enough cases that we should at least try,” he said. “Most of us are not optimistic that that will be successful, but we’re still in the position to try.”
My Dad (age 79) just got called by the VA and scheduled to get the jab - woo hoo. He said it's the first time his veteran status has ever helped him in anything that he can recall. Although he does use the VA medical system for certain things, so that's probably not 100% true. [Reply]
Originally Posted by suzzer99:
My Dad (age 79) just got called by the VA and scheduled to get the jab - woo hoo. He said it's the first time his veteran status has ever helped him in anything that he can recall. Although he does use the VA medical system for certain things, so that's probably not 100% true.
Make sure he doesn't get the child vaccine by accident. [Reply]
Found out this morning that 1B is being implemented in Missouri and we may be getting the vaccine here at work sooner than later. (food production plant).
Not confirmed but it appears due to low participation rates among 1A (50% or less), mainly healthcare workers and first responders, they are getting to 1B sooner than expected. [Reply]
Peer Reviewed Study Shows COVID Lockdowns Have No Benefits Compared to Voluntary Measures
Stanford researchers found “no clear, significant beneficial effect of [more restrictive measures] on case growth in any country.”
A new peer reviewed study by Stanford researchers has found that mandatory lockdowns do not provide more benefits to stopping the spread of COVID-19 than voluntary measures such as social distancing.
The study compared countries that had imposed mandatory lockdowns, such as England, France, Germany, Iran, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and the U.S., to those that had relied on the public to follow voluntary measures, such as Sweden and South Korea.
The researchers subtracted “the sum of non-pharmaceutical intervention (NPI) effects and epidemic dynamics in countries that did not enact more restrictive non-pharmaceutical interventions (mrNPIs) from the sum of NPI effects and epidemic dynamics in countries that did.”
After analyzing the data, the researchers found “no clear, significant beneficial effect of [more restrictive measures] on case growth in any country.”
The authors added that they “do not question the role of all public health interventions,” but insisted that stay at home orders and business closures had no additional impacting on lowering the spread of the virus.
The study adds to the weight of evidence that clearly indicates lockdowns are totally pointless and only create further misery and death.
According to Professor Philip Thomas of Bristol University, the UK lockdown will end up costing 500,000 lives due to the health impact of the economic recession it will cause.
Untold numbers of people will also die from having their urgent treatments delayed as well as avoiding hospitals.
According to research published by Imperial College London and Johns Hopkins University, around 1.4 million people globally will also die from untreated TB infections.
Last September, Germany’s Minister of Economic Cooperation and Development, Gerd Muller, warned that lockdown measures throughout the globe will end up killing more people than the coronavirus itself.
Originally Posted by suzzer99:
My Dad (age 79) just got called by the VA and scheduled to get the jab - woo hoo. He said it's the first time his veteran status has ever helped him in anything that he can recall. Although he does use the VA medical system for certain things, so that's probably not 100% true.
Remind him of the super sweet deals Applebee’s offers to us vets [Reply]
Originally Posted by petegz28:
Peer Reviewed Study Shows COVID Lockdowns Have No Benefits Compared to Voluntary Measures
...
The study adds to the weight of evidence that clearly indicates lockdowns are totally pointless and only create further misery and death.
I don't know why people put crap like this in an article if they're actually trying to pass it on as news or even a little analytical.... it just screams having a complex to the point where this person probably spends a lot of time desperately trying to feed their confirmation bias.
And that's not to even question the validity of the study, but FFS, just let it stand on its own merit instead of launching into a soapbox rant about lockdown butthurt. It goes from something I might think more than 2 seconds about to picturing this guy announcing this with a megaphone on a street corner.
I've been thinking about vaccine impact, and I'm guessing it'll be an S-shaped curve. The first 10 percent of vaccines won't have much impact (but still a little) because the virus will still have a lot of pathways to spread. Then we'll start hitting a point relatively quickly where suddenly the infection rates start plummeting as the virus unsuccessfully bounces off of more and more people, limiting its pathways. Then as the vaccination rates get high (80+) the impact will get small again as connections between non-vaxxed people let it survive. Of course it won't go to zero until pretty much everyone is vaxxed up.
We would still be in the top part of the curve now, improving but not yet significant.
Originally Posted by Marcellus:
Found out this morning that 1B is being implemented in Missouri and we may be getting the vaccine here at work sooner than later. (food production plant).
Not confirmed but it appears due to low participation rates among 1A (50% or less), mainly healthcare workers and first responders, they are getting to 1B sooner than expected.
Can confirm that they are opening up more people to get it. I work for a vaccinator so we just got the email this morning about opening this up. We have already vaccinated 3000+ people. [Reply]
Originally Posted by dirk digler:
Can confirm that they are opening up more people to get it. I work for a vaccinator so we just got the email this morning about opening this up. We have already vaccinated 3000+ people.
Do you think there’s any danger of not having enough for everyone to get the second shot? [Reply]
