Coronavirus Discussion Thread

E tank

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Sure, but the profoundly sick drop quick. Most of our extremely sick patients went from asymptomatic to maximized therapy in less than 48 hours, many in less than 24.
Right, so this isn't the population that it is showing benefit in.
 

Peak

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Right, so this isn't the population that it is showing benefit in.

Certainly those who are profoundly sick must be part of the studies if decreased mortality is a signficiant finding. The healthy ones don't die.
 

SandpitMedic

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If these two guys turn out to be right, even by accident...
...the reality is, everyone is speculating, there have been pretty serious flaws in some credible epidemiologic models and data .
100% spot on...
This is the thing... no one knows for certain. The fact that no one wants to give these guys any credit and immediately flag them as crack pots who shouldn’t be listened to under any circumstances makes me more likely to side with them and to do my own research.

I’ve heard a lot of comparisons- Sweden to Norway is not one I’ve heard, and instead of giving it any credence, people just blanket them as putting out misinformation.

I realize I’m in the minority. I also realize anyone who isn’t on the apocalypse train is quickly lambasted by the media. Makes my spider senses tingle.
 

SandpitMedic

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How’s the Rona in y’all’s neck of the woods nowadays?

Seems like other than NYC it’s a big old dud outside of nursing homes and the severely immunocompromised.
 

Jim37F

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600 something people tested positive statewide, less than 20 deaths, only like 50 or 60 active cases, the rest are all "released from isolation"
 
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Akulahawk

Akulahawk

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ffemt8978

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Thankfully, very underwhelming.
While I'm grateful it has been mostly underwhelming, I'm worried we've created a 'boy who cried wolf' scenario for the next pandemic.
 

Peak

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While I'm grateful it has been mostly underwhelming, I'm worried we've created a 'boy who cried wolf' scenario for the next pandemic.

I agree. All of the epidemilogical models were based on very limited data and poor methods, and then sold as a guarantee of a disaster. I worry about the public trust in the medical field as a whole.
 
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Akulahawk

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While I'm grateful it has been mostly underwhelming, I'm worried we've created a 'boy who cried wolf' scenario for the next pandemic.
This is a concern of mine as well. This pandemic has been a bit insidious, actually. It appears that this actually got going much earlier than most of the world realized and also spread faster/farther than initially realized. I quite suspect that among certain groups, this is probably a wake-up call. Our world is very interconnected and we can pretty much go from anywhere to anywhere inside 24 hours, if we wanted. From a certain viewpoint (bioweapons), this particular pandemic has been quite instructive. From an epidemiological standpoint, it's also being very instructive as well, in particular, when to focus on containment, when to focus on mitigation, when to focus on vulnerable populations, and when to focus on isolation of key infrastructure/industry/government personnel to ensure that all stays up and running. It also (hopefully) will instruct disaster planners about just how in-depth the planning must go in order to preserve the ability of the healthcare system to continue to function and absorb a high-influx of patients that potentially overwhelm the system.
 

Peak

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It also (hopefully) will instruct disaster planners about just how in-depth the planning must go in order to preserve the ability of the healthcare system to continue to function and absorb a high-influx of patients that potentially overwhelm the system.

I do think it is important to remember that many of the systems that became massively overwhelmed (NYC, Italy, et cetera) have thin resources to start with. Areas with more healthcare resources at baseline (especially critical care capacity) don't seem to be having any trouble with the volumes.
 
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Akulahawk

Akulahawk

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I do think it is important to remember that many of the systems that became massively overwhelmed (NYC, Italy, et cetera) have thin resources to start with. Areas with more healthcare resources at baseline (especially critical care capacity) don't seem to be having any trouble with the volumes.
And that's yet another lesson for future planning. Good point!!
 

Carlos Danger

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While I'm grateful it has been mostly underwhelming, I'm worried we've created a 'boy who cried wolf' scenario for the next pandemic.
We can only hope so.

The boy has been crying wolf for decades already though. Every few years there is something new that we are told presents if not an existential threat, then at least a threat to our security and health and way of life. Yet we're all still here. And in fact by any economic or health measure, life has been getting steadily better for a large majority of us for decades…..until March 2020.

This time it was different, though. The government's overreaction was absolutely unprecedented and mind-boggling. It's only a matter of time before the same self-serving politicians and their incompetent agencies and mindless lap dogs in the media once again tell us that This New Threat is so big that we again need to destroy countless lives in order to hopefully save a handful.

I certainly hope that the next time it happens, the general public is much more skeptical and a lot less willing to roll over and trade their rights and livelihoods for the hope of some safety.
 

mgr22

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Not sure about the boy-crying-wolf analogy. I get the part about regional variation in the number and severity of cases, but isn't COVID-19 a legitimate pandemic? If not, how many people need to get infected or die per day to make it one?

I agree with the comment about incompetent agencies and self-serving politicians, but I think there's been as much under-reaction as over-reaction.
 

Carlos Danger

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Not sure about the boy-crying-wolf analogy. I get the part about regional variation in the number and severity of cases, but isn't COVID-19 a legitimate pandemic? If not, how many people need to get infected or die per day to make it one?

I agree with the comment about incompetent agencies and self-serving politicians, but I think there's been as much under-reaction as over-reaction.
Is it a legitimate pandemic? Clearly.

Does it justify destroying countless businesses and livelihoods and essentially putting tens of millions of healthy people at very low risk on house arrest indefinitely? Not a chance.

Following the logic that mass closure of the economy and house arrest was necessary, then when do those interventions end? When we have a vaccine? When unemployment reaches 60%? When the dollar completely collapses? What is the metic we're looking at?
 

SandpitMedic

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Is it a legitimate pandemic? Clearly.

Does it justify destroying countless businesses and livelihoods and essentially putting tens of millions of healthy people at very low risk on house arrest indefinitely? Not a chance.

Following the logic that mass closure of the economy and house arrest was necessary, then when do those interventions end? When we have a vaccine? When unemployment reaches 60%? When the dollar completely collapses? What is the metic we're looking at?
This is along the lines of what I have been saying since it began.

I had one brief moment of “wow this thing may just ravage us all,” and then promptly realized I’d been bamboozled by those who would use this as an excuse to further their agenda.

The virus wasn’t really the problem for the majority of people. The response is and was the problem. Sad.
 

mgr22

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Is it a legitimate pandemic? Clearly.

Does it justify destroying countless businesses and livelihoods and essentially putting tens of millions of healthy people at very low risk on house arrest indefinitely? Not a chance.

Following the logic that mass closure of the economy and house arrest was necessary, then when do those interventions end? When we have a vaccine? When unemployment reaches 60%? When the dollar completely collapses? What is the metic we're looking at?

Good questions. I don't have the answers. Someone should.
 

Kevinf

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It did highlight the areas that we would have issues should a "true" plague-tier pandemic come knocking. People traveling down to spring break then spreading over most of the eastern half of the country during a lock-down bodes poorly for any future containment efforts. We need to be ready to account for that.

It helped to gauge what the true community baseline needs for medical response are, but also helped to show that the riff-raff complaints help keep staffing and response at levels that would be useful during a widespread disaster.

It highlighted supply chain problems of medical equipment, along with issues with government run programs such as unemployment compensation and other social support programs that had major hitches during deployment.

This was a war-game of an unprecedented scale, and I'm hoping we can learn from it.
 
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