A couple comments ago you said C19 deaths in Italy are 5% of the normal pneumonia rate. You have no credibility. You sound like @Dog backing up Trump saying he always knew it was a pandemic.
US ranked #1 to best deal with a disease outbreak
- Thread starter The Joker
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In ITALY, where the infection has had a FEW WEEKS to get hold, it’s turned out to be a nasty killer. How long has the current couple of flu bugs been circulating in the north hemisphere. Since July/August?
You say you’re r a math guy, it ain’t showing.
By better focused I was more thinking of how we determine who needs to be working, how we can isolate those that are working, and how this is all actively managed. Whist rapidly identifying carriers and isolating them.
But to your points;
- I was implying that the chinese response, while minimising deaths from covid 19 might have also increased deaths from other sources. ie the opposite of Mike's "they died of pneumonia, but they are counted as a covid 19 death". I'm curious if there were a bunch of people who the chinese are saying "even though they had covid 19, they died of TB / lead poisioning / starvation, therefore we don't count them as a covid 19 death". If this is the case it supports your point - we should be doing more, earlier.
- Four days ago Australia had tested 80 000 people for an infection count of 450 odd. That to me says we are testing 200 people for each person who is actually infected, so we should be doing an OK job of identifying infections. There are still very few people who have been infected from an unknown source. So keep chasing and testing exposed, rather than waiting for symptoms to manifest.
So testing is where I think we should be being more aggressive - doing everything we can to test the people possibly exposed, and isolating the virus that way. Of course, if you are right about the test not being reliable and definitive, this may not work. I haven't seen reason to be as pessimistic about the efficacy of our testing process as you are - I thought there were more false positives than negatives.
If we can keep infront of exposure tracking and isolating infections, we can keep more of the people being productive. Ultimately almost everyone is part of the supply chain for food and medical care, if you go back enough steps.
A few super infectors can wreck this of course. I'd suggest at this point anyone knowingly exposing others to the virus should be treated as committing manslaughter. If you think you have it and infect anyone, simple expedential maths implies that you are causing the death of other people. Too harsh?
Steam Flyer
Sophisticated Yet Humble
I agree in principle but this is rather a slippery slope. I don't know what the existing body of law covers, I know that some people have been charged with assault by deliberately attempting to infect others (with spit or with their blood). If we start doing this kind of thing, it will not get dropped after the pandemic is over and could become a draconian pile-on charge.
Good point about "who are essential workers" BTW thanks
- DSK
Steam Flyer
Sophisticated Yet Humble
I picture Wofsey as like a hyperactive 9-year-old boy, thinks he's really smart 'cuz Mom always says how smart I yam, and doesn't realize that there actually is such a thing as knowing what the fuck you're doing. Thinks you can google anything and be an instant world expert.
Anybody who, at this point, thinks "it's just like the flu only not as bad" or some bullshit, is both stupid and inhuman. Or they are just repeating Russian disinformation because they think it's cool
- DSK
mikewof
mikewof
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They were. But there is something called "change."
You seem to equate "credibility" with the "ability to accurately predict the future." In other words, you seem to think that certain human beings contain the power of magic and clairvoyance.
mikewof
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Funny, you try to insult me and then display your own ignorance.
The numbers say that it's not "bullshit" at all. But that's what "numbers" do, they reduce emotional arguments to something binary. It removes politics from the discussion and creates something with transaction.
mikewof
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Medicine is like any other science in a way, it's partly an art, subject to human decisions. Doing what you write in bold up there could be the result of some fairly involved analysis, rather than knee-jerk decision designed to deceive the West.
To the second bit, works in theory, but in real life, is it possible? How could anyone possibly know if someone is deliberately infecting others? This virus has been clearly shown to be opportunistic. The people who have that pre-existing condition have just as much of an obligation to sequester themselves, as those with asymptomatic infections have to quarantine themselves. I'm not at all in favor of any idea that demonizes the young asymptomatic while removing responsibility from the older susceptibles. And further, without being tested, an asymptomatic person can only assume that they aren't in fact infected.
If anyone actually acts on your idea, then any asymptomatic person who infects someone else can be convicted of manslaughter, because the testing isn't always accurate.
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Woofers a couple weeks ago “corona viruses don’t kill” clearly wrong
today “Italy’s death rate from cocoa less than 5% normal pneumonia death” clearly wrong
now? Some jumbo jumbo of “eh, those folks woulda died from the flu anyway”
fucking idiot
mikewof
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Yeah, just do the math. This isn't that complicated. Just take the year's pneumonia or flu infection, divide by 12 to get the monthly average, multiply by 1.5 for a colder month and by 0.5 for the warmer months. Then multiply that by the number of weeks, compared to the same number of weeks with the other infection.
Duh.
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The flu is in what, 60% of the population? Covid is in a fraction of 1%? Get a brain, Moran
mikewof
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Corona viruses usually don't kill, most of them exist in the human body with no harm. The ones that do tend to make people sick have about the same mortality rate as rhinoviruses and about half the mortality rate of seasonal flu.
As for the 5%, did I write that about Italy or U.S. or global?
To your insults, let's see where this ends up. So far, on the global scale, the number of deaths from COVID-19 stand at about 0.75% of the global deaths from seasonal flu and pneumonia. You may disagree with that, but the math doesn't carry the same emotion you do.
mikewof
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Where did you get that 60% number? Is it just something you made up?
And to the 1%, how do you know what is the infection rate unless that location did a random test recently?
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Left Shift
Super Anarchist
When the rim of the hole you are digging is just in reach of your outstretched fingertips, the standard advice is to stop digging and try to climb out.
mikewof
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What does that have to do with math?
Flu bugs and COVID-19 and CoViB-7 are established to be opportunistic infections. You can't linearize that as you have done, that's why it's called the flu "season." Because the infections can show little to no effect when the environmental stresses are low, and then roar into action when they are high. Coronaviruses and Rhinoviruses are generally the same, it's why we are less likely to "catch cold" in August, than February. Cold causes cracking in nasal, sinus and respiration membranes that allow viruses entry.
mikewof
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Sean
Super Anarchist
We need to prevent covid-19 from becoming as common as flu and pneumonia. Do that math. (with a realistic mortality rate)
ShortForBob
Super Anarchist
A bit of cheerful and reassuring news
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-22/doubt-over-contracting-coronavirus-covid-19-twice/12075878
Can I get coronavirus twice? This Nobel prize winner is sceptical
We are very likely to develop immunity to COVID-19, making re-infection unlikely and raising the chances of vaccines being highly effective, according to the Australian scientist who discovered an important way the immune system fights viruses.
Key points:
In 1996, Peter Doherty won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discovering how the immune system identifies cells that have been infected by a virus.
He said reports of people contracting COVID-19 twice were unlikely to be true.
"I would be sceptical. But you can't say with absolute certainty," he told the ABC.
"I would think even if it was a reinfection, that your prior infection would give you very rapid immunity and you would recover very quickly."
Professor Doherty said it was more likely the test results suggesting the patients were clear of the virus were wrong.
That could happen if the virus was not infecting the part of the body where the swab was taken from but instead infecting deeper in the lungs, Professor Doherty said.
"I suspect they've been infected all along. It's just that this area that's been sampled hasn't been detecting it," he said.
"My guess would be we'd have pretty solid long-term immunity, quite frankly."
He said with some flu strains, people who had been infected had strong immunity 50 years later, but not much work had been done on coronaviruses until SARS — another coronavirus — was identified in 2003.
The coronavirus causing COVID-19 was not a particularly rapidly-mutating one, he said, giving more hope that immunity — or a vaccine — would provide long-term protection.
He said estimates a vaccine would be available within 12 to 18 months were very realistic.
"I think the 18 months is probably on the long side," he said.
"It may well be that China may bash ahead a lot quicker, then come up with an effective vaccine.
"I hope we'll have something in 12 months.
"I would say it's very likely we will develop a vaccine for COVID-19 and it will be a good vaccine."
Quieting the immune system in severe cases
Professor Doherty said there was also hope for treatment of severe cases of COVID-19, by quieting part of the immune system's response to the virus.
"Some of the symptoms that we see in a virus infection are not due to the virus causing damage, they're the response we make to it," he said.
In some of the most severe cases, it appeared the immune system was going into overdrive and an inflammatory response to the virus was killing people, he said.
He said existing drugs used for inflammatory conditions like rheumatoid arthritis had some promise in treating that, by blocking the inflammatory molecules produced by the immune system.
"I believe there are some promising results out of China, where they are blocking some of those molecules," he said.
Professor Doherty warned people to take this virus very seriously.
"Do not think that this is just another influenza. It's killing at least 10 times as many people as influenza," he said.
"And it's particularly lethal for those in their 70s and 80s. It is dangerous and older people need to isolate themselves."
And he had one other piece of advice.
"If you're a smoker, do try to stop," he said.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-22/doubt-over-contracting-coronavirus-covid-19-twice/12075878
Can I get coronavirus twice? This Nobel prize winner is sceptical
We are very likely to develop immunity to COVID-19, making re-infection unlikely and raising the chances of vaccines being highly effective, according to the Australian scientist who discovered an important way the immune system fights viruses.
Key points:
- Professor Doherty does not think contracting COVID-19 twice is very likely
- He says if a patient did catch it twice, the prior infection would give them rapid immunity
- He believes a vaccine will be available within 12 to 18 months
In 1996, Peter Doherty won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discovering how the immune system identifies cells that have been infected by a virus.
He said reports of people contracting COVID-19 twice were unlikely to be true.
"I would be sceptical. But you can't say with absolute certainty," he told the ABC.
"I would think even if it was a reinfection, that your prior infection would give you very rapid immunity and you would recover very quickly."
Professor Doherty said it was more likely the test results suggesting the patients were clear of the virus were wrong.
That could happen if the virus was not infecting the part of the body where the swab was taken from but instead infecting deeper in the lungs, Professor Doherty said.
"I suspect they've been infected all along. It's just that this area that's been sampled hasn't been detecting it," he said.
"My guess would be we'd have pretty solid long-term immunity, quite frankly."
He said with some flu strains, people who had been infected had strong immunity 50 years later, but not much work had been done on coronaviruses until SARS — another coronavirus — was identified in 2003.
The coronavirus causing COVID-19 was not a particularly rapidly-mutating one, he said, giving more hope that immunity — or a vaccine — would provide long-term protection.
He said estimates a vaccine would be available within 12 to 18 months were very realistic.
"I think the 18 months is probably on the long side," he said.
"It may well be that China may bash ahead a lot quicker, then come up with an effective vaccine.
"I hope we'll have something in 12 months.
"I would say it's very likely we will develop a vaccine for COVID-19 and it will be a good vaccine."
Quieting the immune system in severe cases
Professor Doherty said there was also hope for treatment of severe cases of COVID-19, by quieting part of the immune system's response to the virus.
"Some of the symptoms that we see in a virus infection are not due to the virus causing damage, they're the response we make to it," he said.
In some of the most severe cases, it appeared the immune system was going into overdrive and an inflammatory response to the virus was killing people, he said.
He said existing drugs used for inflammatory conditions like rheumatoid arthritis had some promise in treating that, by blocking the inflammatory molecules produced by the immune system.
"I believe there are some promising results out of China, where they are blocking some of those molecules," he said.
Professor Doherty warned people to take this virus very seriously.
"Do not think that this is just another influenza. It's killing at least 10 times as many people as influenza," he said.
"And it's particularly lethal for those in their 70s and 80s. It is dangerous and older people need to isolate themselves."
And he had one other piece of advice.
"If you're a smoker, do try to stop," he said.
