COVID-19

[2Birds1Stone]

I apologize if this has already been shared, but I wanted to get your feedback on this https://youtu.be/IsuCa6V7prg

Crazy?
Plausible?
Somewhere in between?

[Alphaville]

I apologize if this has already been shared, but I wanted to get your feedback on this https://youtu.be/IsuCa6V7prg

Crazy?
Plausible?
Somewhere in between?

i clicked on it but was immediately biased against it by the “vaccine wars” publisher, which screams “crazy af” to me and a waste of 26 minutes.

so i closed the window.

since i didn’t see it, i’m afraid i can’t give an objective opinion.

could you summarize in a paragraph?

[IlliniDave]

https://covidactnow.org/ has changed their presentation again and now show the graphs of the R0 timeline for each state.

Still appears there are zero confirmed cases in my Minnesota hideout county, or the two adjacent counties (between the thre it's an impressive geographic footprint) but overall the state is in the red. One of my friends there said they still have their "stay at home" order for a couple more weeks. If Minnesota erupts into civil war this weekend it is because this weekend is the walleye opener, and if they try to use force to enforce "stay at home", could get ugly.

The wilderness is open for day trips, but closed for overnight camping until at least 5/17. Dunno what the science is there, camping is only allowed at designated sites which are typically hundreds of yards if not miles apart, and there are no concessions or amenities that must be staffed. Of course, this coming weekend the highs are supposed to be in 40s and lows in 20s, not conditions I'd want to canoe or camp in. Too cold to run water to the cabin, too.

Alabama is moderate risk and within Alabama my county is moderate risk. Lots of "red" counties in Alabama but they must be relatively rural areas. Some unscientific random sampling implies the primary driver of Alabama being lower risk than Minnesota seems to be the infection growth and positive test rates. Maybe that's because it's already outdoor weather here (albeit very cool for the time of year) but not so much in Minnesota? Even though I believe the shelter-in-place here was allowed to expire on 4/30, I haven't noticed much change in what businesses are open. Still more than a month away from the all-restrictions-lifted peak according to their modeling.

[Bankai]

Chicago prisoner 'uses mask to escape' after swapping identity with another inmate.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-5 ... type=share

These masks must be making bank robberies much safer for the robbers... I wonder when we'll hear about the first one.

[steveo73]

science is based on skepticism and evidence and proof, and part of the problem we have is that people don’t understand these things.
....
risk management (is it a science?) uses scientific principles and is used to prevent bias
...
korea did not fuck around, tested for evidence and limited spread, did not waste time dreaming, and is reopening right now, with something called “everyday distancing.” their economy is projected to grow this year, but they’re still reasonably preparing their medical facilities for a new spike in the fall, according to sound risk management principles.

Heaps of gold here. Risk management is about making the best decision possible based on the scenario that is being addressed with limited information. We have a likelihood of an event occurring and the potential impact of an event occurring.

That is why the best approach to this whole situation so far does not appear to comply to any group think approach. The group think approaches to me appear to be the extreme options. So option 1 is is exponential growth and we are doomed. Our only chance is complete lock downs right now. The other approach is let it rip because we can't do anything about it.

There are so many options between these two viewpoints right now and if we were using risk management decision making we would have been much better prepared for this event anyway.

Science is an interesting one. There is something off with some peoples understanding of science. I think that there is too much certainty when that certainty doesn't exist. I don't believe people understand modern science of probabilities based on insufficient data and complex processes. Our understanding changes rapidly over time. Science needs to be transparent so we can make rational risk management based decisions.

This virus is a classic example. Maybe lock downs were implemented too slowly but maybe too harshly. We don't know. The way to check is to slowly adjust and test but can you do that straight off the bat. I actually think that the idea of strict lock downs and then slowly release those restrictions was probably the right decision at that point in time and the countries that didn't do this stuffed up based on where we were then using a risk based approach to decision making. Now we have more information and you can slowly start releasing restrictions and observing what happens. If you get a big spike in deaths when you start school back well then stop the schools.

Can you imagine if we had a working risk management approach to epidemics (including pandemics) prior to this event occurring. A world governing body had saved up enough money to handle an outbreak and we simply reach a point to state everyone lock down with option 1 (which means whatever appropriate restrictions are in place) for 4 weeks time and then we will reassess. At that point we calmly reassess and make the next rational decision.

[steveo73]

The normal mediating effect of dissent gets shut down because people who have a different view of the situation are called immoral monsters.

I don't like Bigato's classifications because it's not an IQ issue. It's a philosophical outlook issue. People don't understand the science because they take the science with way too much certainty and take the event to it's logical conclusion. I'm not sure about the moral judgements. You may be right.

So the person who has the scientific model in their heads goes exponential growth works like this and therefore we are doomed. Lets implement massive lock downs and do everything possible to minimize the damage. They can't see the impact that this action is having because their model is we are doomed anyway. The problem is that certainty doesn't exist because science doesn't work like that now.

I mentioned very early in this tread that I am not personally worried about the virus itself, I am concerned about the reaction to it.

I'm concerned about how to approach this event and other events now and in the future to try and have the least impact on society. I hope that we really start looking at heaps of things that we do and where there are clear risks we should look to manage those risks appropriately. I mean there are research centers out there that work on enhancing natural viruses. This is why there is shade being thrown at China. It's not outside the realm of possibility this virus came out of a research lab. This has happened previously. I don't think this happened in this instance.

What is the risk of doing some activity and what is the benefit ? It needs to be more granular and then we can have mature discussions.

Heaps needs to change but I'm more hopeful in a lot of ways now. I think this event is really bringing to light a lot of issues.

[Ego]

I mean there are research centers out there that work on enhancing natural viruses. This is why there is shade being thrown at China. It's not outside the realm of possibility this virus came out of a research lab. This has happened previously. I don't think this happened in this instance.

What is the risk of doing some activity and what is the benefit ? It needs to be more granular and then we can have mature discussions.

Gene editing makes a deadlier version of Covid far more probable in the future. The pylogenetic trees have been published showcasing the exact genes responsible for increased virulence. This is not nuclear science where the technological and engineering barriers are very high. It can be engineered in a garage. I'd be willing to bet there are dozens of hobbiests playing with it at this very moment.

[George the original one]

These masks must be making bank robberies much safer for the robbers... I wonder when we'll hear about the first one.

Are bank lobbies even open there? Here all the bank lobbies are closed, not by decree, but by choice of the banks. Drive-up windows and ATMS only at this point.

[Alphaville]

Are bank lobbies even open there? Here all the bank lobbies are closed, not by decree, but by choice of the banks. Drive-up windows and ATMS only at this point.

yup. my credit union is drive-through only. everything else you can do online.

[BeyondtheWrap]

Here the bank lobbies are closed only at some branches, so if you need a teller you might have to go to a location a little further away. Also the hours are reduced.

[Alphaville]

Possible first death coming in my immediate family (they're in ICU). So not only is my business fucked, but the lock down didn't save lives. Gee, who could have seen that coming? What a fucking joke.

we got one dead and about a dozen sick

so you think doing nothing would have increased their chances how? i understand you’re frustrated but kindly explain.

sure, asking [an undisciplined population distrustful of government with a head full of conspiracies] to follow instructions is less than ideal, but it’s supposed to be mitigation, not perfection.

[Alphaville]

My business does enterprise software development for mid-large size companies (1M-100M/yr in revenue). My clients are in law, freight/logistics, banking, and ecommerce. All are seeing new sales drop by about 80% across the board. When their sales drop, their demand for me drops. Many people in various skilled labor professions will also be feeling the heat on this. The economy is interconnected, who could have known?

drop in sales is not going to last indefinitely. the estimates i’m looking are a “90% economy” when we come out of the other side. which is not ideal, but it’s not a “20% economy” either.

eta: here: https://www.economist.com/leaders/2020/ ... -lockdowns

[M]

@Augustus

That is interesting. I ask because I work as a software engineer for a large multi billion dollar international corporation. Our customers are mostly government, banks, and law firms so we have similar clients. So some things seem similar.... Does your company provide contract software development services? Or are you selling the end software? If selling end software, is it an SAAS model? Or one time fee? Again thanks for insight. It is appreciated.

[steveo73]

Gene editing makes a deadlier version of Covid far more probable in the future.

We really need to watch out for this stuff don't we. Human society in my opinion needs to be much better managed. To me it's bio-terrorism. If you are doing it for some potential beneficial reason you'd have to be able to justify it. The idea of hobbyists creating incidents like this scares me.

[Lemon]

@Augustus

Sorry about your family member and I hope they recover.

[Seppia]

I agree this thread is at times becoming borderline unreadable.

FT has a free to read section on covid that tracks what I believe to be the best real indicator of covid deaths: excess deaths VS a “normal” year.

This should weed out any biased reporting. USA numbers seem consistent with the reporting.

https://www.ft.com/content/a26fbf7e-48f ... 5839e06441

[Bankai]

Nice Summary lecture of where we are now by Prof Whitty: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/covid-19

This was good, especially the overview of how different types of drugs can be used to manage the disease. It looks like while waiting for the vaccine, or even if there'll be no vaccine, there are at least a few possible avenues to tackle this with drugs.

[Bankai]

"Segmentation and shielding of the most vulnerable members of the population as elements of an exit strategy from COVID19 lockdown"

In this study we demonstrate that the adoption of a segmenting and shielding (S&S) strategy could increase scope to partially exit COVID-19 lockdown while limiting the risk of an overwhelming second wave of infection. The S&S strategy has an antecedent in the ‘cocooning’ of infants by immunisation of close family members (Forsyth et al., 2015), and forms a pillar of infection, prevention and control (IPC) strategies (RCN, 2017).
We are unaware of it being proposed as a major public health initiative previously.
(...)
More generally, S&S has potential applications for any infectious disease for which there are defined proportions of the population who cannot be treated or who are at risk of severe outcomes.

https://www.wiki.ed.ac.uk/display/Epigr ... 050520.pdf

From the professor who led the research team:

For the non-vulnerable population, coronavirus carries no more risk than a "nasty flu", says Prof Mark Woolhouse, an expert in infectious disease who led the research.

"If it wasn't for the fact that it presents such a high risk of severe disease in vulnerable groups, we would never have taken the steps we have and closed down the country.

"If we can shield the vulnerable really well, there is no reason why we cannot lift many of the restrictions in place for others.

"The lockdown has come at a huge economic, social and health cost."

[7Wannabe5]

Unfortunately, I think one of the reasons an intelligent plan towards segmentation and segregation of vulnerable population will not happen in the U.S. is that the political leadership on both sides is so very old, yet ego driven to consider themselves still vital.

[Stahlmann]

so anyone developed (let's say) $500 IKEA-like air respirator up to this moment?
ideas from Ego's post was "difficult" for me btw.
or what's prepper (undestood as not relaying on government healthcare system) way to surive in case I will catch this shit?
is anyone MD in Europe for secret sending of given drugs? (yes, I know there's no working protocool atm, but I mean smth which will at least give hope of surviving)