COVID-19

[CS]

@jp
The dark humor coming out is pretty awesome. I've been collecting pictures from another forum I'm on. I'd shared them here but I have no place to host pictures (and have no interest in fixing that lack, atm).

[George the original one]

596 new cases [in Washington state]. Reporting format changed and I was about to quit reporting when I noticed a button for tabular format <whew>. I notice case counts sometimes going down for a county; I believe these are presumptive cases that did not confirm in testing rather than removal due to illness ending.

State of Washington did that rebuild of their web reporting, but it hasn't been updated since Saturday night, so I'll have to give up on reporting their details for now. The Johns Hopkins map (https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html) continues to get fresh case numbers if you're interested. Spokane County is very much a hot spot, probably, in my opinion, because of the locals independence streak, and you can compare to Clark County (just north of Portland, Oregon, similar population size), which has had cases for much longer.

I'll keep checking Washington's official page and start reporting when they get it working again.

[George the original one]

EUROPEAN COUNTRIES THAT HAVE FLATTENED THE CURVE

Italy - First case Jan 31, lockdown began March 9
Luxembourg - First case February 29, lockdown began March 15
Austria - First case February 25, lockdown began March 16
Switzerland - First case February 25, schools & stores closed March 16, gatherings >5 people banned March 20

Notice how early they enacted lockdowns and how long they have been in action. The earlier in the trajectory that the lockdowns began, the less time it takes to flatten the curve. So far they are going sideways on the COVID-19 trajectory rather than a sharp drop.

https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?countr ... country=US

[George the original one]

Request for Vaccine Clinical Trial

Researchers say the genetic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 is providing a roadmap of what is needed to develop a vaccine against the virus. The goal of the vaccine is to mobilize the immune system to target the "spike" which the virus uses to attach to and infect a person's healthy cells, causing the COVID-19 disease.

Assuming the researchers do not encounter any unexpected hurdles, they expect to hear fro the FDA within 30 days. If they get approval, it will take about six weeks to producer the vaccine.

If approved, in-person clinical trial vaccinations could begin in 60 days.

https://katu.com/news/local/providence- ... ical-trial

[George the original one]

Oregon Health Authority as of 8:00a Mon, Mar 30
- 606 Positives
- 12277 Negatives
- 16 Deaths

Cases by County
- 9 Benton (Corvallis) - Note two are actually in Washington state, though they're residents of Benton County.
- 40 Clackamas (Oregon City)
- 3 Clatsop (Astoria)
- 1 Columbia (St. Helens)
- 25 Deschutes (Bend)
- 8 Douglas (Roseburg)
- 1 Grant (Canyon City)
- 2 Hood River (Hood River)
- 20 Jackson (Medford)
- 10 Josephine (Grants Pass)
- 4 Klamath (Klamath Falls)
- 12 Lane (Eugene)
- 1 Lincoln (Newport)
- 36 Linn (Albany)
- 123 Marion (Salem)
- 1 Morrow (Heppner)
- 100 Multnomah (Portland)
- 15 Polk (Dallas)
- 3 Tillamook (Tillamook)
- 4 Umatilla (Pendleton)
- 1 Union (La Grande)
- 5 Wasco (The Dalles)
- 168 Washington (Hillsboro)
- 14 Yamhill (McMinnville)

Cases by Age Group
- 13 19 or younger
- 58 20-29
- 82 30-39
- 117 40-49
- 115 50-59
- 108 60- 69
- 64 70-79
- 48 80 and over
- 1 Not available

Hospitalized by Age Group
- 0 19 or younger
- 6 20-29
- 6 30-39
- 25 40-49
- 19 50-59
- 37 60- 69
- 28 70-79
- 19 80 and over
- 0 Not available

Hospitalized
- 140 Yes
- 361 No
- 105 Not provided

Sex
- 335 Female
- 266 Male
- 6 Not available

Hospital Capacity
- 291 Available adult ICU beds
- 2059 Available adult non-ICU beds
- 203 Available pediatric beds
- 67 Available pediatric ICU beds
- 765 Available ventilators
- 132 COVID-19 admissions
- 39 COVID-19 patients on ventilators

84 new cases. Added Malheur and Wallowa counties, which leaves 10 counties without cases. Slight reformatting of hospital capacity.

Oregon Health Authority as of 8:00a Tue, Mar 31
- 690 Positives
- 13136 Negatives
- 18 Deaths

Cases by County
- 12 Benton (Corvallis) - Note two are actually in Washington state, though they're residents of Benton County.
- 50 Clackamas (Oregon City)
- 3 Clatsop (Astoria)
- 1 Columbia (St. Helens)
- 24 Deschutes (Bend)
- 9 Douglas (Roseburg)
- 1 Grant (Canyon City)
- 3 Hood River (Hood River)
- 21 Jackson (Medford)
- 10 Josephine (Grants Pass)
- 5 Klamath (Klamath Falls)
- 16 Lane (Eugene)
- 2 Lincoln (Newport)
- 37 Linn (Albany)
- 1 Malheur (Vale)
- 141 Marion (Salem)
- 1 Morrow (Heppner)
- 116 Multnomah (Portland)
- 18 Polk (Dallas)
- 3 Tillamook (Tillamook)
- 5 Umatilla (Pendleton)
- 1 Union (La Grande)
- 1 Wallowa (Enterprise)
- 7 Wasco (The Dalles)
- 186 Washington (Hillsboro)
- 16 Yamhill (McMinnville)

Cases by Age Group
- 13 19 or younger
- 72 20-29
- 96 30-39
- 130 40-49
- 135 50-59
- 120 60- 69
- 70 70-79
- 52 80 and over
- 2 Not available

Hospitalized by Age Group
- 0 19 or younger
- 7 20-29
- 6 30-39
- 26 40-49
- 23 50-59
- 40 60- 69
- 29 70-79
- 123 80 and over
- 0 Not available

Hospitalized
- 154 Yes
- 418 No
- 118 Not provided

Sex
- 378 Female
- 303 Male
- 9 Not available

Hospital Capacity
- 280 Available adult ICU beds
- 2113 Available adult non-ICU beds
- 85 Available pediatric NICU/PICU beds
- 203 Available pediatric beds
- 749 Available ventilators
- 213 COVID-19 admissions
- 40 COVID-19 patients on ventilators

[George the original one]

USA crossed an arbitrary line in the sand today: Half of USA states have more than 1,000 cases and no states have less than 100 cases.

1 state has not closed bars & restaurants.
3 states have not closed schools.
15 states have not closed non-essential businesses.
24 states have not issued "stay-at-home" orders.

15 states have mandatory quarantine for visitors. Of those, 8 do not have "stay-at-home" orders.

[Ego]

More evidence that hydroxychloroquine works, this time a randomized trial.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101 ... 20040758v1

Efficacy of hydroxychloroquine in patients with COVID-19: results of a randomized clinical trial

Key findings: For the 62 COVID-19 patients, 46.8% (29 of 62) were male and 53.2% (33 of 62) were female, the mean age was 44.7 (15.3) years. No difference in the age and sex distribution between the control group and the HCQ group. But for TTCR, the body temperature recovery time and the cough remission time were significantly shortened in the HCQ treatment group. Besides, a larger proportion of patients with improved pneumonia in the HCQ treatment group (80.6%, 25 of 32) compared with the control group (54.8%, 17 of 32). Notably, all 4 patients progressed to severe illness that occurred in the control group. However, there were 2 patients with mild adverse reactions in the HCQ treatment group.

[steveo73]

EUROPEAN COUNTRIES THAT HAVE FLATTENED THE CURVE

Italy - First case Jan 31, lockdown began March 9
Luxembourg - First case February 29, lockdown began March 15
Austria - First case February 25, lockdown began March 16
Switzerland - First case February 25, schools & stores closed March 16, gatherings >5 people banned March 20

Notice how early they enacted lockdowns and how long they have been in action. The earlier in the trajectory that the lockdowns began, the less time it takes to flatten the curve. So far they are going sideways on the COVID-19 trajectory rather than a sharp drop.

https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?countr ... country=US

It works if people aren't dickheads. In Australia some couple went to Aspen for a fancy ski holiday and then returned to Australia with COVID-19 and proceeded to go shopping an play golf. Now people are being locked up when they return from overseas.

This is something we can beat if people can just be socially responsible.

[thrifty++]

61 new confirmed or probable cases in NZ bringing the total actual or probable cases to 708.

82 people have recovered.

Still only 1 person has died.

2 people still in intensive care but considered stable.

So that's bringing the mortality rate down to 0.14% and the combined mortality and serious case stat down to 0.42%.

1843 tests per day were being conducted in the past week, with daily capacity at about 3700 tests. A significant ramp up in testing is about to commence.

I really hope that these figures bear some testament to a lower mortality rate around the world.

I notice that Iceland still only has 2 deaths. And New Caledonia seems to have only 16 cases and no deaths. Island states have a bit more luck in being able to manage this more easily. Obviously not the UK though being the international transport hub for the world.

[Bankai]

@Ego: this looks good!

Worth remembering that it's not a peer-reviewed study, the sample size is quite small and the median age of patients not representative.

Hopefully, there'll soon be more data on the effect of HCQ on patients with more severe sickness and older demographics as the median age of deaths to COVID-19 is some 3.5 decades older than the median age used in this study. Still, it looks like a potential breakthrough.

[JL13]

Can someone explain to me what the timeframe is supposed to be here? We're looking at 30 days of social distancing to get over the hump and flatten the curve, over which time we're going to have supposedly 100,000 -200,000 deaths in the USA. At a 1% mortality rate, that's 10m - 20m infected in the USA. How does the infection rate drop off after that? Don't we need 40%-70% of the population to be infected for herd immunity? 20m doesn't come close to that.

What is the exit scenario of these lockdowns?

[CS]

What is the exit scenario of these lockdowns?

I want to laugh and cry at that. That whole question is based on the assumption any of these leaders have an idea of what the heck they are doing.

Maybe start from a different premise, based on the leader's though process starting from this point -> "oh, shiny thing over there"

[JL13]

I meant more specifically, what is the basis for these models only showing the curve through May? At each level of social interaction, holding everything else constant, the herd immunity level changes, right?. So if these models are showing 20m total infected leading to the death rate decaying in 30 days, that means that herd immunity is happening at what, 6%??? That means if we start to lift up on social distancing then we get another ramp up. How many ramp ups do we they have planned until we're finally back to normal life?

[BeyondtheWrap]

@JL13 I was assuming that prediction of 100,000-200,000 deaths was if we stay in lockdown for a full year. Which at least is what we would have to do if we’re waiting to get a vaccine before opening up.

[BeyondtheWrap]

I’m thinking NYC might reach herd immunity very soon. Part of me is hoping so, at least.

NYC currently has a little over 40,000 positive cases. Which means the whole city would be infected in between 7 and 8 doubling periods, so possibly by the end of April? And maybe wait a few more weeks for everyone to recover and the city will have herd immunity? Wishful thinking on my part, but also scary for a lot of people. How long is the doubling period for shelter-in-place? Seems to be slowing down.

But the number of positive cases is of course undercounted. Should we estimate the true number from the deaths? On 3/31 NYC was up to 1096 deaths, so (assuming a 1% death rate) that would suggest that about 100,000 people had been infected as of 3/18 (12 days ago) or 3/13 (17 days ago)? So by now possibly close to a million are infected (basically all the essential workers?) so the curve will be forced to flatten soon (which explains why they are expecting the peak in early April).

Could also estimate the true infected number using the hospitalizations. As of 3/31 NYC had 10,929 hospitalizations, so that would suggest about 55,000-70,000 had been infected 10 days ago on 3/21.

Hmm, these estimates don’t really seem to agree. Are we still thinking 15%-20% are hospitalized 10 days on average after infection and 1% die 17 days after infection?

[George the original one]

What is the exit scenario of these lockdowns?

Honestly, in my opinion, there isn't one. Not before summer, not without a miracle.

Morgan Stanley is pessimistic (and I agree) and provides the following points:

1. U.S. cases are growing the fastest
2. U.S. mortality is not slowing despite social distancing
3. New cases are growing faster than testing capacity
4. New ‘hot spots’ are exhibiting growth above other regions
5. U.S. social-distancing measures remain less strict than those of other countries

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/5-rea ... 2020-03-30

Basically no country has enough experience to know how much to loosen restrictions and the USA can't even get its act together regarding a lockdown. South Korea is maintaining a sideways trajectory, but they never went into a lockdown and are using a totally different control strategy than other countries. China isn't afraid to use more lockdown if needed, though they're also probably more willing to tolerate higher deaths.

As I mentioned above, Luxembourg, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy appear to be reaping the benefits of their lockdowns & social distancing and are now on sideways trajectories.

[George the original one]

This is something we can beat if people can just be socially responsible.

Uhmmm...

[George the original one]

Hmm, these estimates don’t really seem to agree.

In an exponential climb with a doubling rate of 3-7 days, being off by a factor of 2 is pretty much irrelevant. That's why you see so little difference in the COVID-19 trajectories from https://aatishb.com/covidtrends

[steveo73]

Uhmmm...

People in general are doing the right thing. It's just groups of people that just don't get it. What do you do though.

It's interesting how we can make such a difference if we choose too and how some people just don't seem to care or get it.

I said earlier and it's a valid point that this community here is probably generally more introverted and care less about social interactions so it's easier for us. My mum for instance is a worker and she loves to socialize. This is very hard for her. For myself, my wife and my 2 sons the social distancing part is pretty good.

I miss jiu-jitsu but that is about it.

[Ego]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/0 ... omponents/

UK received coronavirus test kits from another unnamed country. The test kits themselves were contaminated with the coronavirus.