COVID-19

[Sabres Fan in NS]

8 minutes ago, nfreeman said:

What does this mean?  Those countries are no longer keeping track of virus deaths?  That seems highly unlikely.

They are not counting anywhere near as many deaths now.

 

[Taro T]

8 minutes ago, SwampD said:

Stopping the spread.

Are we realistically going to "stop the spread" before herd immunity is reached?  If we truly can do that & simply get the virus to go away, great, but how do we get there? Many areas that didn't have a 1st wave made it to June before seeing it, but many of them eventually got it.  Areas that had a 1st wave, fortunately haven't seen a 2nd spike, again ttbomk.  Is that due to herd immunity in those places finally being reached, for some other reason, or is it just a matter of time until we do start seeing 2nd waves?

There was hope the virus would go away come the summer.  That doesn't seem to be the case as in several areas cases have been increasing since early June.  Fortunately, where we are seeing new peaks, we are seeing the median age of the people contracting it trending downward and many of those are asymptomatic.   Will that keep the death rates low or possibly even still declining?  Don't know, but am expecting we won't see a spike in the death rates as we should have already been seeing that for the past 10 days+.  Will still be watching them and hoping that remains the case.

 

[nfreeman]

3 minutes ago, New Scotland (NS) said:

They are not counting anywhere near as many deaths now.

 

So they are still counting but their death rates have declined?  That is also the case here, and I think pretty much the same all over, which of course is a good thing.

In any case, it's a very fluid situation.  We'll have to wait and see.

[Stoner]

3 hours ago, Claude_Verret said:

Yep, that's why I said in my scenario all other things being equal. When they aren't equal, and some variables aren't to the naked eye, then the balance can shift. Some asymptomatic people shed more virus than others.

Again, people should wear masks, but i feel there is this underlying presumption that if everyone just does as told then we'll get this thing under control faster. I don't know if that's necessarily true, and neither does anyone else no matter how many credentials follow their name. But I am certain that people in the media, no matter what way they lean, are much, much further back in the darkness on this pandemic than anyone who has a scientific or medical background. 

To the bolded, isn't that common sense after seeing how NY got things under control?

1 hour ago, nfreeman said:

For the record, Belgium, the UK, Spain, Sweden, France and Italy all have higher death rates than the US does, and Ireland and the Netherlands are both pretty close.

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

Is this a defense of our response (by the government, the health care system, the population in general)? It's kind of like saying, for the record (insert name of five NHL teams) are worse on the PP than we are!

1 hour ago, Taro T said:

We are approaching 130k dead, but we're also seeing deaths reaching low levels we haven't seen since early/mid-March.  Which is encouraging.  

It also seems that the states where positive tests are rising are in the midst of their own 1st wave.  We've fortunately not seen any 2nd waves ttbomk.   Interestingly, we haven't seen deaths spiking yet & hopefully that remains true.  (They obviously lag positives & hospitalizations, but we're 3+ weeks into those spikes and the deaths had been more on a 10 day lag where things were hit very hard in March.)

The data indicates that the more recent infection spikes are in younger people.  Maybe that's why we aren't seeing spiking death rates?  Is it that healthier people are getting it and getting less severe cases?  Is it that treatments are better?  A combo?  Something else?

If we don't get a vaccine soon &/or the virus doesn't peter out on its own; then we'll need "herd immunity" to keep the more vulnerable safe come the fall/ winter.  Big picture, these rising case rates (provided hospitals don't end up overwhelmed & deaths don't rise) might be a blessing in disguise.  Personally, would prefer not seeing people getting this, but if younger healthy people getting it & recovering prevents another bout of what we saw in NYC then, sadly, bring it on.

I'm sure Claude would agree that the idea of immunity and thus herd immunity is very much an open question.

 

[SwampD]

33 minutes ago, Taro T said:

Are we realistically going to "stop the spread" before herd immunity is reached?  If we truly can do that & simply get the virus to go away, great, but how do we get there? Many areas that didn't have a 1st wave made it to June before seeing it, but many of them eventually got it.  Areas that had a 1st wave, fortunately haven't seen a 2nd spike, again ttbomk.  Is that due to herd immunity in those places finally being reached, for some other reason, or is it just a matter of time until we do start seeing 2nd waves?

There was hope the virus would go away come the summer.  That doesn't seem to be the case as in several areas cases have been increasing since early June.  Fortunately, where we are seeing new peaks, we are seeing the median age of the people contracting it trending downward and many of those are asymptomatic.   Will that keep the death rates low or possibly even still declining?  Don't know, but am expecting we won't see a spike in the death rates as we should have already been seeing that for the past 10 days+.  Will still be watching them and hoping that remains the case.

 

Realistically? No. For reasons stated upthread, individualism and anti-intellectualism.

It makes sense that the median age is going down. People know that the older you are the worse it can be, so they are doing more to protect themselves. I do think we’ll see a second wave.

[Claude_Verret]

55 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Never knew that about science. Thank you. 

I'd note there's flaws in your description because science is ever changing but we simply don't do anything because the science isn't settled. Again I take issue with your hypothesis that if ppl had followed the best science advice at the time we still wouldn't have this under control. 

 

That's not my hypothesis. If people had followed everything to the letter things could be much better now, they could be exactly the same, or less likely it could be worse . Seeing a spike in cases while also seeing widespread ignoring of the recommended guidelines is an observation that shows a correlation. Causation cannot be inferred from a simple two variable correlation.  Maybe viral surveillance data will show that over recent weeks viral markers have altered such that spread is easier despite the best public health mitigation efforts. There are a multitude of other variables that can impact this.

[nfreeman]

2 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

To the bolded, isn't that common sense after seeing how NY got things under control?

Is this a defense of our response (by the government, the health care system, the population in general)? It's kind of like saying, for the record (insert name of five NHL teams) are worse on the PP than we are!

The incidence in NY has thankfully decreased, but it's awfully generous to say that NY "got things under control."

In any case, my post wasn't a defense of anything -- only a response to the assertion by one of our more excitable and dramatic posters that the US had the worst situation of any developed country.

[Stoner]

16 minutes ago, Claude_Verret said:

That's not my hypothesis. If people had followed everything to the letter things could be much better now, they could be exactly the same, or less likely it could be worse . Seeing a spike in cases while also seeing widespread ignoring of the recommended guidelines is an observation that shows a correlation. Causation cannot be inferred from a simple two variable correlation.  Maybe viral surveillance data will show that over recent weeks viral markers have altered such that spread is easier despite the best public health mitigation efforts. There are a multitude of other variables that can impact this.

So the decline in cases after Manhattan became a virtual ghost town is also a correlation?

[Stoner]

10 minutes ago, nfreeman said:

The incidence in NY has thankfully decreased, but it's awfully generous to say that NY "got things under control."

In any case, my post wasn't a defense of anything -- only a response to the assertion by one of our more excitable and dramatic posters that the US had the worst situation of any developed country.

Daily cases in the state have dropped from a peak of almost 12,000 a day to 550-ish. Daily deaths topped a thousand, and yesterday 12 died. The positivity rate touched on 50% and has dropped so low it's hard to read the chart. Low single digits.

More room for improvement, but to say NY didn't get things under control from where they were is weird.

[Taro T]

20 minutes ago, SwampD said:

Realistically? No. For reasons stated upthread, individualism and anti-intellectualism.

It makes sense that the median age is going down. People know that the older you are the worse it can be, so they are doing more to protect themselves. I do think we’ll see a second wave.

Yes, it does make sense that the median age is going down.  And that SHOULD correlate with significantly better outcomes.

Honestly don't know if we will see 2nd waves or not, nor when they'd hit.  Would guess that they would start in the late fall with the onset of the traditional flu season, but that's strictly a guess.

Interestingly, if places like NYC/ North Jersey did actually reach herd immunity levels, then we may not see a 2nd wave there.  And if we don't get a 2nd wave there, we MAY not get it elsewhere presuming other hot spots also get to a critical quantity of infected people.  The good thing for these other regions seeing rising positive cases is that our medical community knows a lot more about this today than on March 13 when the country started to close down and likely because of that and our doing better at protecting the elderly we aren't seeing death rates rising.  And again, hoping that trend continues.

[nfreeman]

6 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

Daily cases in the state have dropped from a peak of almost 12,000 a day to 550-ish. Daily deaths topped a thousand, and yesterday 12 died. The positivity rate touched on 50% and has dropped so low it's hard to read the chart. Low single digits.

More room for improvement, but to say NY didn't get things under control from where they were is weird.

Well, saying NY "got things under control" implies that the improvement is due to NY affirmatively taking virus-curbing steps (or reversing previous idiotic steps), as opposed to the virus' effects naturally petering out over time as herd immunity is approached.

[Indabuff]

Huh, G4 virus?  I wonder how much houseboats are going for...

[MattPie]

6 minutes ago, nfreeman said:

Well, saying NY "got things under control" implies that the improvement is due to NY affirmatively taking virus-curbing steps (or reversing previous idiotic steps), as opposed to the virus' effects naturally petering out over time as herd immunity is approached.

 

17 minutes ago, Taro T said:

Yes, it does make sense that the median age is going down.  And that SHOULD correlate with significantly better outcomes.

Honestly don't know if we will see 2nd waves or not, nor when they'd hit.  Would guess that they would start in the late fall with the onset of the traditional flu season, but that's strictly a guess.

Interestingly, if places like NYC/ North Jersey did actually reach herd immunity levels, then we may not see a 2nd wave there.  And if we don't get a 2nd wave there, we MAY not get it elsewhere presuming other hot spots also get to a critical quantity of infected people.  The good thing for these other regions seeing rising positive cases is that our medical community knows a lot more about this today than on March 13 when the country started to close down and likely because of that and our doing better at protecting the elderly we aren't seeing death rates rising.  And again, hoping that trend continues.

FWIW, arguing that "well, it *happened* that after NYS went into lockdown and started mandating mask use the deaths dropped off quickly is just correlation" sounds a lot like someone saying, "well, sure, Jeff Skinner got traded to the Sabres and start scoring tons of goals with Eichel, but we don't know if he would have scored those goals with another center anyway". It's all correlation because we can't run 10-20 runs to see, but at some point you watch what's happening in Texas and Florida and say, "lockdowns and masks seem to work so it's a good idea".

[Eleven]

22 minutes ago, Indabuff said:

Huh, G4 virus?  I wonder how much houseboats are going for...

Beat me to it:  https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/06/swine-flu-strain-human-pandemic-potential-increasingly-found-pigs-china

[Taro T]

4 minutes ago, MattPie said:

 

FWIW, arguing that "well, it *happened* that after NYS went into lockdown and started mandating mask use the deaths dropped off quickly is just correlation" sounds a lot like someone saying, "well, sure, Jeff Skinner got traded to the Sabres and start scoring tons of goals with Eichel, but we don't know if he would have scored those goals with another center anyway". It's all correlation because we can't run 10-20 runs to see, but at some point you watch what's happening in Texas and Florida and say, "lockdowns and masks seem to work so it's a good idea".

In NYS: Lockdown began March 13.  Public mask wearing began April 17.  Sterilization of subway cars began May 6.  Nursing home requirement to take Covid positive individuals took effect March 25 & ended May 5.

When did we turn the corner?

Most of upstate reached phase 1 on May 15 (state officially started looking at stats to be allowed to open May 4).  Much of upstate never saw the 1st wave.  NYC had a horrific 1st wave and it didn't reach phase 1 until June 8.  So, with needing to be in good shape on all the metrics for 2 weeks before opening and the virus having a 10-14 day incubation period, it seems the EO's of May 5th were a (the?) major factor in getting things under control.

Was it the lock down, mask wearing, actually cleaning the subways & not forcing nursing homes to accept infected individuals, the NYC area reaching herd immunity, or the virus running its course that eventually allowed NYC to turn the corner?  Probably a bit of several of these.

Or perhaps something else?

[Claude_Verret]

19 minutes ago, MattPie said:

 

FWIW, arguing that "well, it *happened* that after NYS went into lockdown and started mandating mask use the deaths dropped off quickly is just correlation" sounds a lot like someone saying, "well, sure, Jeff Skinner got traded to the Sabres and start scoring tons of goals with Eichel, but we don't know if he would have scored those goals with another center anyway". It's all correlation because we can't run 10-20 runs to see, but at some point you watch what's happening in Texas and Florida and say, "lockdowns and masks seem to work so it's a good idea".

I think a more apt sports / sabres analogy that would encompass a multitude of other impacting variables unlike simply Eichel vs. other centers would be taking the Sabres 10 game winning streak of a few years ago in a vacuum and extrapolating it to a playoff berth.

Back to covid, no honest person is going to say masks aren't a good thing going forward. Its simply an unknown as to what real world impact they are making right now in light of all the other variables that have potential effects. Even some of the recognized experts downplayed mask importance before they were for them.

 

[Curt]

3 minutes ago, Taro T said:

In NYS: Lockdown began March 13.  Public mask wearing began April 17.  Sterilization of subway cars began May 6.  Nursing home requirement to take Covid positive individuals took effect March 25 & ended May 5.

When did we turn the corner?

Most of upstate reached phase 1 on May 15 (state officially started looking at stats to be allowed to open May 4).  Much of upstate never saw the 1st wave.  NYC had a horrific 1st wave and it didn't reach phase 1 until June 8.  So, with needing to be in good shape on all the metrics for 2 weeks before opening and the virus having a 10-14 day incubation period, it seems the EO's of May 5th were a (the?) major factor in getting things under control.

Was it the lock down, mask wearing, actually cleaning the subways & not forcing nursing homes to accept infected individuals, the NYC area reaching herd immunity, or the virus running its course that eventually allowed NYC to turn the corner?  Probably a bit of several of these.

Or perhaps something else?

Maybe it was magic.  We can’t be sure.

This is getting a bit silly, I think.  Although almost nothing about this virus has been truly scientifically proven, there are a lot of things that we can be pretty sure of.  It’s perfectly reasonable that we act upon those things that we are pretty sure of.  What else are we supposed to do?  Wait a couple years until a sufficient number of studies are completed and scrutinized, then take action?

[Taro T]

2 minutes ago, Curt said:

Maybe it was magic.  We can’t be sure.

This is getting a bit silly, I think.  Although almost nothing about this virus has been truly scientifically proven, there are a lot of things that we can be pretty sure of. It’s perfectly reasonable that we act upon those things that we are pretty sure of.  What else are we supposed to do?  Wait a couple years until a sufficient number of studies are completed and scrutinized, then take action?

Absolutely agree with the bolded, not sure what in the post you were referring to suggested otherwise.

We (& far more importantly, our medical community advising our leaders) had EXTREMELY limited info about the novel virus but there were models that predicted true calamity if no actions were taken back during the winter.

Extreme & unprecedented actions were taken & the direst predictions didn't come true though the situation in our nation's largest city and surrounding region ended up plenty dire.  We're still learning & still trying to figure out how best to get more or less back to normal while keeping the virus at bay.  Realizing that actions (and inactions) can have far reaching & unexpected consequences.

And yes, act on those items we're relatively sure of, but turn on a dime when we find out that we don't actually know what we thought we knew.  And then, lather, rinse, repeat.

[Stoner]

56 minutes ago, nfreeman said:

Well, saying NY "got things under control" implies that the improvement is due to NY affirmatively taking virus-curbing steps (or reversing previous idiotic steps), as opposed to the virus' effects naturally petering out over time as herd immunity is approached.

That's a heckuva jab to inject into this thread!

[Stoner]

NYC is far off from herd immunity (if that will be a real thing), and they got slammed, which means everyone else is REALLY far off from it.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/30/roughly-25percent-of-new-york-city-has-probably-been-infected-with-coronavirus-dr-scott-gottlieb-says.html

[Sabres Fan in NS]

15 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

NYC is far off from herd immunity (if that will be a real thing), and they got slammed, which means everyone else is REALLY far off from it.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/30/roughly-25percent-of-new-york-city-has-probably-been-infected-with-coronavirus-dr-scott-gottlieb-says.html

If you really dig into the science of this thing there is no real chance for herd immunity and a vacine is unlikely to solve the problem.

 

[Taro T]

15 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

NYC is far off from herd immunity (if that will be a real thing), and they got slammed, which means everyone else is REALLY far off from it.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/30/roughly-25percent-of-new-york-city-has-probably-been-infected-with-coronavirus-dr-scott-gottlieb-says.html

The thing is, there have been studies that have indicated it could take as much as 70% of a population to provide herd immunity for this virus down to as little as 20% of the population due to the potential of some members of the community to have a natural immunity &/or resistance to this sort of virus.  

It's also likely far more people were exposed to the virus than were infected with it.

How large a percentage of the population needs to be exposed to reach herd immunity?  That seems to be a multibillion dollar question.

[SwampD]

Not responding to any particular post here.

I love how we have to wait on the data for some correlations, but are so confident about others.

How do we know that there wouldn't have been even more deaths if the hospital space wasn't freed up during the peak by sending patients back to care homes?

Politicking this virus will be our downfall.

[North Buffalo]

3 hours ago, Taro T said:

Are we realistically going to "stop the spread" before herd immunity is reached?  If we truly can do that & simply get the virus to go away, great, but how do we get there? Many areas that didn't have a 1st wave made it to June before seeing it, but many of them eventually got it.  Areas that had a 1st wave, fortunately haven't seen a 2nd spike, again ttbomk.  Is that due to herd immunity in those places finally being reached, for some other reason, or is it just a matter of time until we do start seeing 2nd waves?

There was hope the virus would go away come the summer.  That doesn't seem to be the case as in several areas cases have been increasing since early June.  Fortunately, where we are seeing new peaks, we are seeing the median age of the people contracting it trending downward and many of those are asymptomatic.   Will that keep the death rates low or possibly even still declining?  Don't know, but am expecting we won't see a spike in the death rates as we should have already been seeing that for the past 10 days+.  Will still be watching them and hoping that remains the case.

 

Based on what happened in Chappaqua... I'd say social distancing and mask wearing has helped.  Anecdotal sure but one infected asymptomatic in an area already hit... doesnt imply much herd immunity or maybe that area never reached the herd threshold because of social distancing and mask wearing... 

[Curt]

1 hour ago, Taro T said:

Absolutely agree with the bolded, not sure what in the post you were referring to suggested otherwise.

We (& far more importantly, our medical community advising our leaders) had EXTREMELY limited info about the novel virus but there were models that predicted true calamity if no actions were taken back during the winter.

Extreme & unprecedented actions were taken & the direst predictions didn't come true though the situation in our nation's largest city and surrounding region ended up plenty dire.  We're still learning & still trying to figure out how best to get more or less back to normal while keeping the virus at bay.  Realizing that actions (and inactions) can have far reaching & unexpected consequences.

And yes, act on those items we're relatively sure of, but turn on a dime when we find out that we don't actually know what we thought we knew.  And then, lather, rinse, repeat.

Not entirely addressing you specifically, sorry.

Just the whole back and forth with some saying we should be following medical/scientific guidelines more stringently, and others saying that we don’t REALLY know FOR SURE, that would help at all.

Come on people, I don’t REALLY know  FOR SURE that I’m going to wake up tomorrow morning, but I’m pretty sure of it, and I probably should plan accordingly.