Coronavirus

[SageBrush]

Pence is wearing a mask in public now, and the Gov of KS is set to mandate mask wear from 3 July.

See ? It is not that ALL trumpers are zombies; some just have special education needs, like an extra 6 months to catch up.

 

[wdolson]

View attachment 558055

This may be his worst take yet.
It's also not cool to encourage known C19 positive people to go out and possibly expose more people.

People seem to think if someone is a genius in one area, they are geniuses in all. Elon's expertise is in the area of science that is most predictable. As long as you aren't getting down into Quantum Mechanics, Physics is extremely predictable.

For someone who already knows Physics or another hard science, they have the basic building blocks to learn another science discipline more easily than someone starting from scratch. My sister is a Geologist and taught herself Biology to be able to understand scientific journal articles about HIV/AIDS in the 80s, but part of the learning process is to learn how the new discipline is not like the old one.

I think the lack of precise predictability in Biology drives Elon nuts and he doesn't want to go there. Or he's just too pig headed to learn the differences.

In any case, he's a top notch applied Physicist and engineer/industrialist, but when it comes to medicine he's the guy at the end of the bar who thinks he knows everything but doesn't.

Only if you're not concerned about the long term effects on survivors, which might last for a lifetime, and lead to premature death eventually. Focusing only on death rates is a mistake.

That is something I've been thinking about the last few days. I saw an article that said about 10% of the people who get COVID have long term organ damage as a result. It's possible we could see half of those people have complications and/or die in the next 10 years. That would put a huge long term burden on the health care system and the economy (both from the costs of the healthcare and from the economic impact of those who had critical jobs dropping out of the workforce). Not to mention the emotional impact on the families.

I'll post some of our central FL hospital data when I get them. It is very weird that we are seeing ridiculous new case increase but without increase hospitalization to match. Something definitely feels off.

Some of the drop in hospitalization may be due to the younger population testing positive, but the reduced hospitalizations in one state and not others is odd.

PPE works. From what I understand they have triple layers and double layers of PPE that take 5-10 minutes to put on, especially when doing anything risky. And of course P100 respirators, goggles/face shields, etc. They still get infected though.

I'm not 100% convinced that simple mask wearing & basic hygiene will completely eliminate transmission (though at a macro level there's little doubt in my mind that if everyone wore one and took the other common sense precautions, the pandemic would be over).

It's still very unclear to me how transmissible this virus is, but my assessment of it & concern for my personal health is actually increasing, not decreasing. Hence, I wear a face shield in any indoor environment in addition to an N95/KN95. I want to feel like I did everything I reasonably could.

It is continuing to spread without issues in summertime, so that suggests to me it is definitely more transmissible than flu (which we kind of already knew), and that makes it quite concerning.

I suspect it is partially airborne, and not just droplet borne. (To be clear, I have no idea.) And that makes me very concerned for my personal health.

I haven't seen any updates, but something I saw about 2 months ago pegged COVID as more infectious than the common cold, but well below measles, which is the most infectious human disease.

 

[N5329K]

That is something I've been thinking about the last few days. I saw an article that said about 10% of the people who get COVID have long term organ damage as a result. It's possible we could see half of those people have complications and/or die in the next 10 years. That would put a huge long term burden on the health care system and the economy (both from the costs of the healthcare and from the economic impact of those who had critical jobs dropping out of the workforce). Not to mention the emotional impact on the families.
.

Others are starting to notice longer-term psychological effects as well:
‘They Want to Kill Me’: Many Covid Patients Have Terrifying Delirium

Robin

 

[electracity]

Covid-19 Surge Begins Reaching Older, More Vulnerable Floridians
Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

Who wudda thunk ?

I feel sorry for parents with young adult children living in their home. Most 20 year olds, even if generally responsible, will be willing to practice meaningful social isolation for many months. I see almost everyone I know expanding the group of people of which they have closer contact.

Although I'm in Chicago, and our numbers are still staying down.

 

[bkp_duke]

People seem to think if someone is a genius in one area, they are geniuses in all. Elon's expertise is in the area of science that is most predictable. As long as you aren't getting down into Quantum Mechanics, Physics is extremely predictable.

For someone who already knows Physics or another hard science, they have the basic building blocks to learn another science discipline more easily than someone starting from scratch. My sister is a Geologist and taught herself Biology to be able to understand scientific journal articles about HIV/AIDS in the 80s, but part of the learning process is to learn how the new discipline is not like the old one.

I think the lack of precise predictability in Biology drives Elon nuts and he doesn't want to go there. Or he's just too pig headed to learn the differences.

This is the problem with the "binary" sciences like math, physics, and "binary applied" like the applied engineering disciplines. These individuals ask yes/no questions and expect yes/no answers. Biological sciences are basically . . . analog / shades of grey. It's extremely rare to get a binary answer to a question in the biological sciences, unless that question is extremely focused (i.e. has accounted for all variables except one). It is this multi-factor variability which gives medicine it's "art" aspect (i.e. some people are just better at it than others).

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Both came back negative. However I have read that people who have mild cases frequently have undetectable antibodies by 8 weeks after infection. It is completely unknown if they still have immunity or not.

Sounds like after two negative antibody tests, unless you had contact with someone you know tested PCR positive, it's extremely unlikely you have had it. My understanding is that most cases, even mild ones, develop antibodies (the paper recently posted demonstrates that even most mild cases have antibodies - though there is a correlation with titer & disease severity). It's totally normal for a very small percentage of people to not develop antibodies, though. I'm sure @bkp_duke could be a lot more precise (or correct...lol) about the details here.

but well below measles, which is the most infectious human disease.

Yes, less infectious than measles is a pretty low bar.

 

[bkp_duke]

Sounds like after two negative antibody tests, unless you had contact with someone you know tested PCR positive, it's extremely unlikely you have had it. My understanding is that most cases, even mild ones, develop antibodies (the paper recently posted demonstrates that even most mild cases have antibodies - though there is a correlation with titer & disease severity). It's totally normal for a very small percentage of people to not develop antibodies, though. I'm sure @bkp_duke could be a lot more precise (or correct...lol) about the details here.

This is correct. Even in NY state, the data is showing that only 7% or so of the population are actually immune (15-20% in NYC).

The problem is coronavirus is a respiratory virus, and the symptoms are non-specific. In fact, adenovirus gives very similar, and pretty severe "flu link" symptoms.

It's incredibly common of people to SWEAR that they have had COVID-19, but the data just doesn't support that being true.

 

[electracity]

Others are starting to notice longer-term psychological effects as well:
‘They Want to Kill Me’: Many Covid Patients Have Terrifying Delirium

Robin

So you saying that Musk had Covid early on and that explains his tweeting on the topic?

 

[wdolson]

Others are starting to notice longer-term psychological effects as well:
‘They Want to Kill Me’: Many Covid Patients Have Terrifying Delirium

Robin

The psychological effects on both patients and everyone else is going to be massive. It's been 100 years since we've had a pandemic this dangerous and most of the people alive today grew up in a time when most of the worst infectious diseases were under control. My parents were born in the 1920s and they had classmates who died of infectious diseases. My mother almost died of whooping cough.

This is correct. Even in NY state, the data is showing that only 7% or so of the population are actually immune (15-20% in NYC).

The problem is coronavirus is a respiratory virus, and the symptoms are non-specific. In fact, adenovirus gives very similar, and pretty severe "flu link" symptoms.

It's incredibly common of people to SWEAR that they have had COVID-19, but the data just doesn't support that being true.

It is possible that I had something else, but while loss of smell associated with sinus congestion is a symptom of several other viruses, I have not found anything other than COVID that can result in a loss of the sense of smell with completely clear sinuses. Whatever I had, my sinuses were completely clear throughout. But I did lose my sense of smell for the first few days.

My sense of smell is generally better than most humans, but I found a bottle of Mentholatum had virtually no smell and sticking my nose in a bottle of alcohol yielded just the fainted whiff of alcohol. The next day my SO was trying out a new recipe for chile colorado and she thought it was quite hot, but I found it very bland.

The information I found on adenoviruses does talk about loss of the sense of smell, but in conjunction with head cold symptoms.

There is also this study that found that 40% of asymptomatic COVID patients had undetectable antibodies at 8 weeks and it was 13% for those with mild cases. My doctor told me she has seen evidence that there is a correlation with people going to undetectable antibody levels and blood type A, but she didn't cite the source.

COVID-19 antibodies might not last for long, which could be bad news for a vaccine

The lawyer my SO shares an office building with went to the last Seahawk game of the year in Seattle and everyone on the trip (8 people) came down with a breathing infection within 2 weeks. One of the attorneys who works for him came down with COVID in March and almost died, but my SO's office partner didn't get sick even though he was exposed.

In any case I had a poor quality antibody test about 11 weeks after recovery from whatever it was and the good quality test about 15 weeks after. If antibodies start becoming undetectable at 8 weeks, I may have been outside the window. It's aggravating. I don't know if I did or did not have it. If I did, I have no idea if undetectable antibodies just means that they are there but at an undetectable level, or if they are truly gone.

 

[bkp_duke]

The psychological effects on both patients and everyone else is going to be massive. It's been 100 years since we've had a pandemic this dangerous and most of the people alive today grew up in a time when most of the worst infectious diseases were under control. My parents were born in the 1920s and they had classmates who died of infectious diseases. My mother almost died of whooping cough.



It is possible that I had something else, but while loss of smell associated with sinus congestion is a symptom of several other viruses, I have not found anything other than COVID that can result in a loss of the sense of smell with completely clear sinuses. Whatever I had, my sinuses were completely clear throughout. But I did lose my sense of smell for the first few days.

My sense of smell is generally better than most humans, but I found a bottle of Mentholatum had virtually no smell and sticking my nose in a bottle of alcohol yielded just the fainted whiff of alcohol. The next day my SO was trying out a new recipe for chile colorado and she thought it was quite hot, but I found it very bland.

The information I found on adenoviruses does talk about loss of the sense of smell, but in conjunction with head cold symptoms.

There is also this study that found that 40% of asymptomatic COVID patients had undetectable antibodies at 8 weeks and it was 13% for those with mild cases. My doctor told me she has seen evidence that there is a correlation with people going to undetectable antibody levels and blood type A, but she didn't cite the source.

COVID-19 antibodies might not last for long, which could be bad news for a vaccine

The lawyer my SO shares an office building with went to the last Seahawk game of the year in Seattle and everyone on the trip (8 people) came down with a breathing infection within 2 weeks. One of the attorneys who works for him came down with COVID in March and almost died, but my SO's office partner didn't get sick even though he was exposed.

In any case I had a poor quality antibody test about 11 weeks after recovery from whatever it was and the good quality test about 15 weeks after. If antibodies start becoming undetectable at 8 weeks, I may have been outside the window. It's aggravating. I don't know if I did or did not have it. If I did, I have no idea if undetectable antibodies just means that they are there but at an undetectable level, or if they are truly gone.

By definition - loss of smell is ALWAYS part of sinus congestion (literally the cells that do the "smelling" are covered in mucus).

Let me put it this way - I've now won 5 bets with 5 people who "swore" they all had COVID-19 and were confident enough to bet me, and then go get tested.

These odds are better than Vegas, I'll keep taking this all day, EVERY day. I would have bet you, but you apparently already got tested, and not surprisingly were negative.


Please, feel free to get another antibody test, but before you do, let's make a little wager.

 

[linux-works]

taking some concept advice from TV's Dexter, I see:

How a California gym is using plastic pods for workouts during coronavirus - CNN

better than nothing, but still; what's the shower situation like? going home sweaty like that?

NOT IN MY M3 YOU DON'T. walking home is good exercise, too, I've heard.

 

[davepsilon]

All right, new data out for our hospital network in Central FL. Make those "new hospitalization numbers" very fishy. We will be getting an update daily now so we will see.


June 25 COVID-19 Patient Update

• Total Positive Inpatients: 112
• Rule-out Inpatients Pending: 108
• Ventilated Patients: 2 Positive COVID-19 and 1 Rule-out COVID-19

June 29th COVID-19 Patient Update

• Total Positive Inpatients: 172
• Total Positive in ICUs: 24
• Rule-out Inpatients Pending: 144
• Ventilated Patients: 6 Positive COVID-19 and 1 Rule-out COVID-19

Southern FL stats look like they tilt just slightly more severe. Maybe 1/5 of covid inpatients in ICU and 1/10 of inpatients on a vent. Seems like a general rule of thumb that’s been true for awhile. Big uptrend in hospitalizations over the past month, but not the same exponential level of growth seen in cases. Your stats seem to be in the same ballpark tbh.

Miami-Dade County COVID-19 Trajectory - The Miami-Dade COVID Project

 

[TEG]

taking some concept advice from TV's Dexter, I see:
View attachment 558423
How a California gym is using plastic pods for workouts during coronavirus - CNN

Reminds me of Breaking Bad...

 

[eevee-fan]

taking some concept advice from TV's Dexter, I see:

View attachment 558423

How a California gym is using plastic pods for workouts during coronavirus - CNN

better than nothing, but still; what's the shower situation like? going home sweaty like that?

NOT IN MY M3 YOU DON'T. walking home is good exercise, too, I've heard.

Now where have I seen this before...

 

[linux-works]

"fish, plankton, sea green and protein from the sea. [...] the other food stopped coming, and they started. [...] its all here, ready, fresh as harvest day"

 

[wdolson]

By definition - loss of smell is ALWAYS part of sinus congestion (literally the cells that do the "smelling" are covered in mucus).

Let me put it this way - I've now won 5 bets with 5 people who "swore" they all had COVID-19 and were confident enough to bet me, and then go get tested.

These odds are better than Vegas, I'll keep taking this all day, EVERY day. I would have bet you, but you apparently already got tested, and not surprisingly were negative.


Please, feel free to get another antibody test, but before you do, let's make a little wager.

I said I had no congestion. When I lost my sense of smell. I cannot find information on any other infectious disease that causes temporary loss of the sense of smell with no congestion. There are various neurological conditions that can lead to loss of sense of smell without congestion, but I probably don't have Alzheimers or any of the other conditions.

 

[ReddyLeaf]

taking some concept advice from TV's Dexter, I see:

View attachment 558423

How a California gym is using plastic pods for workouts during coronavirus - CNN

better than nothing, but still; what's the shower situation like? going home sweaty like that?

NOT IN MY M3 YOU DON'T. walking home is good exercise, too, I've heard.

Damn, I could sure use some help in the garden. Stop wasting all that good muscle and come over and help. Extra bonus sweating for days over 100F. /s

 

[Dave EV]

It takes just a few hours to study the difference between a PCR and a serology test to the point of at least sounding intelligent about it.

A curious person by nature is going to go and study everything that's standing out in his immediate environment. Like most of us on this thread not in the medical thread. If instead Yellowstone was doing grumbles right now, you'd see the same set of people on here becoming amateur volcanologists instead and reading up on it for hours a day. It's just in the nature of a curious person.

Elon is such a curious person.

For Elon's not to give this even a few hours to get stuff like this right, he must believes it's such a non-event that it's worth exactly zero of his time. Either that or he is outright evil, and did in fact study that, but now preaching misinformation. I find either hypothesis hard to believe.

Yeah, it's quite baffling to say that 50% of the positive test results are wrong, when it's clear that this might only apply to antibody (serology) tests and not antigen (PCR) tests. In fact, antigen/PCR tests generally have a very high false negative rate, especially in the first 5 days of being infected when symptoms may not be present or mild.

Which is why if you take an antigen test shortly after having been exposed, you're best off quarantining yourself for 14 days. If you really want to get out, you probably still ought to quarantine a week and get tested right before you want to get out and about (not recommended!).

I suspect Elon's pigheadedness here has to do with the Dunning-Kruger effect. I just can't figure out why no-one in his inner circle who actually knows enough to get him over the hump has been able to convince him otherwise. On the other hand, the factory appears to be running safely.

The IFR (infection fatality rate) appears to be in the 0.5-1.0% ballpark overall. But it's crazy just how deadly it is the older you get. There is some good data coming out of San Diego County every week with interesting stats - the last one from June 20th with a couple screenshots below: https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/dam/sdc/hhsa/programs/phs/Epidemiology/COVID-19 Watch.pdf

The rate of cases is pretty constant from 20 years old and up, around 400-500 per 100,000. Interestingly the rate is maybe 50 per 100,000 for 0-9 year-olds and 100 per 100,000 for 10-19 year-olds - clearly children either aren't getting sick or not getting tested.

But the CFR (Case Fatality Rate) is in the noise, well under 1% (probably significantly lower, but I don't have the raw data handy), comparatively if you are less than 30 years old. But if you're 80+? You have a less than 75% chance of surviving.

It seems that young people have figured this out as the demographics of people testing positive has been trending towards people under 40. As others have said, just because you don't die doesn't mean that you don't pick up lasting ill effects from COVID-19. I haven't seen any data related to what percentage of cases end up with asymptomatic, mild, moderate, severe, long-lasting symptoms.

 

[bkp_duke]

I said I had no congestion. When I lost my sense of smell. I cannot find information on any other infectious disease that causes temporary loss of the sense of smell with no congestion. There are various neurological conditions that can lead to loss of sense of smell without congestion, but I probably don't have Alzheimers or any of the other conditions.

You still tested negative. The odds of you testing negative and being negative are still MUCH higher than the odds of you testing negative and being positive. Both because of the actual prevalence of the virus in the population, and because of the sensitivity/specificity of the test (none of the Ab tests are THAT bad).

 

[linux-works]

flatten the curve, flatten the curve.

at this point, I think we're now circling the curve.