Deleted.
Not sure what the school Florida’s governor attended has to do with anything. There are superstars and nitwits at every school.
Updating the numbers.
WA DOH reports:
Number of individuals tested: 33,933
Positive: 2,221 (6.5%)
Deaths: 110 (not unexpected; yesterday’s number was very low)
https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/4/e006577
cloth masks for HCPs
" cloth masks should not be recommended for HCWs, particularly in high-risk situations,"
I have really not found an area where the HCPs are using homemade masks in clinical areas, maybe more for worried well and the IMO better than nothing for shopping maybe. Where are they actually going?
Dr. Fauci is in good shape for 79 years old.
Thank you for thinking of healthcare workers as real, scared, exhausted people. The ones I know are dedicated and brave, but not unbreakable.
I think we should stop talking about what happens after the next three weeks. I would like our leaders to be laser-focused on how we are going to get through this first peak of cases. Many of the people pouring into our hospitals today got infected two weeks ago. (The second week is when most people who are not going to do well start having trouble breathing.)
If everyone could just stay home for now, maybe we won’t extend the peak into a wide mountain. If we stay put longer, things will calm down sooner, and maybe our healthcare workers will be able to take a day off. They will need support while they try to come to grips with how many people they had to turn away from ER’s and place on morphine drips rather than respirators.
How long do we need to stay at home? We don’t know. Instead of speculating, educate, prepare, lead.
I know of several places that are actively seeking them out in my area.
"As Trump touts an unproven treatment, supplies vanish for patients who need those drugs.
The U.S. has all but exhausted its supplies of two anti-malarial drugs that are being used by some doctors in the U.S. and China to treat the coronavirus, but which lack definitive evidence as effective treatment or approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
Hopes that the decades-old drugs could be effective against the coronavirus were also boosted by President Trump, who told a White House press briefing last week that the compounds were “a game-changer’’ and have shown “very, very encouraging results.‘’ He made similar remarks Friday and tweeted the recommendation again on Saturday morning, saying he hoped the medicines will "be put in use IMMEDIATELY.”
The sudden shortages of the two drugs could come at a serious cost for lupus and rheumatoid arthritis patients who depend on them to alleviate symptoms of inflammation, including preventing organ damage in lupus patients.
Much of the frenzy has been fueled by three recently published studies, on small groups of patients from China, Japan and France, that indicated possible benefits of the drugs. But those were NOT randomized clinical trials tested against a placebo, which is considered the gold standard for proof of efficacy.
Trump on Friday continued expressing optimism about the use of the drugs from the White House lectern, even as Anthony S. Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, stood beside him trying to tamp down the hype. Fauci called the evidence thus far “anecdotal.’
Later in the exchange, Trump said he has high hopes for at least one of the drugs: “It may work, it may not work. I feel good about it. That’s all it is. Just a feeling. You know, I’m a smart guy. I feel good about it."
Can NO ONE mute this man???
Every time he opens his mouth he threatens the health of people in this country!!!
Especially regarding ANYTHING that has to do with scientific findings!!!
Trump is suffering from an acute case of the Dunning- Kruger Effect.
San Diego closes all parks, beaches and trails to prevent the spread of coronavirus
From CNN’s Alexandra Meeks
In response to numerous reports of gatherings at parks and beaches over the weekend, San Diego will move forward with the closure of all parks, beaches, boardwalks, city lakes and trails, Mayor Kevin Faulconer announced at a news conference Monday.
“It’s time to protect each other,” he said. “Physical distance is the key to beating this virus and that is why we’re acting today. It is simply irresponsible to congregate and it is unfair to the rest of San Diego.”
Faulconer went on to say that San Diego police officers will be permitted to enforce the new rules with fines.
A cruise ship with 42 sick people is headed for Florida
From CNN’s Stephanie Gallman
Holland America’s Zaandam ship headed toward Florida is carrying 42 people — 13 guests and 29 crew — reporting flu-like symptoms.
“Since it is flu season, and COVID-19 testing is not available on board, it is difficult to determine the cause of these elevated cases at this time,” according to a statement from the cruise line’s website.
The guests have been asked by the cruise line to remain in their staterooms until they have more information and as the ship sails north with the intention to arrive in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on March 30.
Zaandam departed Buenos Aires, Argentina, on March 7, prior to Holland America’s decision to suspend its global cruise operations for 30 days. The trip was scheduled to end in San Antonio, Chile, on March 21.
According to the statement, no one has been off the ship since March 14 after a stop in Puenta Arena, Chile, where guests were initially told they could disembark for flights, but then were not allowed.
There are a total of 1,243 guests and 586 crew on board the ship.
[ Why the heck is anyone still on a cruise ship right now?!? Long way from Chile to Florida. ]
Back to the White House now, where Dr Fauci, the head of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is absent.
My colleague David Smith is in the White House briefing room, and just asked President Trump, “Where is Dr. Fauci?”
Anthony Fauci, the head of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has become a trusted public figure during the coronavirus crisis, sometimes speaking alongside the president. He did not appear at today’s briefing.
“I was just with him,” Trump said, explaining that Fauci was “at a task force meeting.”
David Smith asked Trump if Fauci agreed with him about the need to re-start the economy.
“He doesn’t not agree,” Trump said. “He understands there’s a tremendous cost to our country.”
Guardian
It’s not surprising there’s a high rate of infection in the densely populated tri-state area with a lot of people taking public transportation, but little testing until very recently. The lack of true isolation of confirmed cases with mild symptoms also contributed to the problem. Self-isolation in a small NYC apartment isn’t going to work well.
I’m pretty sure the cat’s out of the bag in NYC. No one is going to lockdown that city. This isn’t China, it’s just not realistically going to happen.
Density certainly has its downsides.
It’s more “locked down” than anyone would have ever imagined.
Word down here in Palm Beach County is that an infected man from Westchester, NY, flew down on JetBlue to Palm Beach, where he has a second home. People here know his name. He took a corona test prior to the flight, and promptly hightailed it out of Dodge, receiving his positive results mid-flight on March 11.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/12/us/coronavirus-jetblue-new-york-florida.html
In other news, Palm Beach County (population 1.5 million) just saw its first death attributed to coronavirus, an 88-year old man.
Yeah, he’s a special case…
US Army Fort Jackson confirms two positive coronavirus cases
From Raja Razek and Allison Rampley
A Fort Jackson, South Carolina, officer and a soldier have both tested positive for Covid-19, according to a statement Monday.
Both service members are in isolation and receiving the necessary medical care, and the Fort Jackson Public Health Team is working to identify anyone else who may have been exposed to the virus, according to the statement from Fort Jackson Commander Brig. Gen. Milford H. Beagle Jr.
Following the announcement of the two cases, Fort Jackson tweeted to visitors, urging them “to plan ahead and to expect delays at Gates 1, 2, and 4” as “the Department of the Army Security Guards are conducting a general health & welfare assessment, including a temperature check, of everyone entering Fort Jackson.”
The mortality rate will be ‘a very big factor’ in Trump’s decision to ease restrictions
Asked if he was concerned that if he eased government restrictions to prevent coronavirus “too early”, the virus might continue to spread unabated, Trump said that he was looking to the mortality rate for coronavirus, and he found it encouraging.
At the beginning, “nobody knew anything about this particular virus”, and Trump said he heard numbers that the mortality rate for the virus might be as high as 5%, compared with “.001 or 2 or 3” percent for the normal flu.
Now, Trump said, he was hearing potential mortality rate numbers that were lower.
“The mortality rate, to me that is a very big factor,” Trump said.
“We’re under 1% now,” Trump said. “It’s still terrible. The whole concept of death is terrible, but there’s a tremendous difference between something under 1% and 4 or 5 or even 3%.”
Trump citing “under 1%” as the mortality rate for coronavirus is roughly in line with some expert estimates looking at data from other countries. (Guardian)
CDC says coronavirus survived in Princess Cruise ship cabins for up to 17 days after passengers left
The coronavirus can survive on surfaces for up to 17 days, a study published Monday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.
The study examines two public health responses to COVID-19 outbreaks on the Carnival-owned Diamond Princess ship in Japan and the Grand Princess ship in California.
The virus “was identified on a variety of surfaces in cabins of both symptomatic and asymptomatic infected passengers up to 17 days after cabins were vacated…” the researchers wrote.
The coronavirus survived for up to 17 days aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship, living far longer on surfaces than previous research has shown, according to new data published Monday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The study examined the Japanese and U.S. government efforts to contain the COVID-19 outbreaks on the Carnival-owned Diamond Princess ship in Japan and the Grand Princess ship in California. Passengers and crew on both ships were quarantined on board after previous guests, who didn’t have any symptoms while aboard each of the ships, tested positive for COVID-19 after landing ashore.
The virus “was identified on a variety of surfaces in cabins of both symptomatic and asymptomatic infected passengers up to 17 days after cabins were vacated on the Diamond Princess but before disinfection procedures had been conducted,” the researchers wrote, adding that the finding doesn’t necessarily mean the virus spread by surface.
“COVID-19 on cruise ships poses a risk for rapid spread of disease, causing outbreaks in a vulnerable population, and aggressive efforts are required to contain spread,” the CDC wrote, reiterating its guidance to vulnerable populations to avoid cruises during the pandemic.
Researchers from the National Institutes of Health, CDC, UCLA and Princeton University previously found that COVID-19 can last up to three days on plastic and stainless steel. That study also found that the amount of the virus left on those surfaces decreased over time.
The new study set out to determine how “transmission occurred across multiple voyages of several ships.” They noted that as of March 17, there were at least 25 cruise ship voyages with confirmed COVID-19 cases that were detected either during or after the cruise ended.
Almost half, 46.5% of the infections were asymptomatic when they were tested, partially explaining the “high attack rate” of the virus among passengers and crew.
The Diamond Princess and its 3,700 passengers and crew were quarantined at a Japanese port on Feb. 4 after a previous passenger was diagnosed with COVID-19 after he returned to Hong Kong. The ship quickly became what was at the time the largest cluster of confirmed COVID-19 cases outside of China with more than 800 passengers and crew eventually becoming infected.
Nine people died after disembarking the ship. The Japanese government and other nations eventually evacuated their citizens.
The researchers found that 712 of people on the Princess Diamond, or 19.2% were infected by COVID-19.
The other ship included in the study, the Grand Princess, was forced to moor off the coast of California after two patients who had disembarked in California tested positive. A total of 78 cases were eventually tied back to the ship across two separate voyages. After several days, California officials brought the ship to the Port of Oakland, where passengers disembarked and were transported to federal quarantine facilities.
The Diamond Princess and Grand Princess accounted for more than 800 total COVID-19 cases, including 10 deaths.
Fact-checking Trump’s claim about suicide deaths from a bad economy
In a marked low point of Donald Trump’s Monday press conference, the president argued that public health measures to slow spread of the coronavirus might have their own death toll, because the public health guidelines hurt the economy, and economic crisis leads to suicide.
The president implied that quickly ending restrictive health measures, in order to open the economy back up again, might avert an outbreak of suicide in the United States.
The president said: “People get tremendous anxiety and depression. And you have suicides over things like this when you have terrible economies. You have death, probably, I mean definitely would be in greater numbers than the numbers that we’re talking about with regard to the virus.”
What does the data show?
It is reasonable to suggest that a pandemic-linked recession can increase the risk of a rise in suicides.
According to research published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, North America and Europe experienced 10,000 more suicides during the 2008 recession. The outbreak of Sars in Hong Kong in 2002 and 2003 also led to a “significant increase” in suicides in those aged over 65, according to 2010 research.
But experts also caution that there is no single cause of suicide.
While the figures for the mortality rate of coronavirus continues to evolve, recent research from Wuhan, China, the city where the outbreak began, indicates the mortality rate there was around 1.4%. Experts at Harvard University have projected an infection rate in the US of between 20 - 60%, meaning that while it is impossible to reliably estimate the American coronavirus death toll a reasonable scenario could result in hundreds of thousands of lives lost.
On first look, given the potentially devastating death toll directly associated with coronavirus, it appears unlikely to be matched by an increased rate in suicide, making the presidents claim almost certainly inaccurate. (Guardian)
The psychological conditioning is beginning for reopening the economy and easing quasi-lockdown conditions, which should occur by the end of next week I would imagine.
The damage to asset values and the economy generally is becoming too tough to bear for the real decisionmakers in the United States.
No doubt there will be plenty of aid and support to those most vulnerable to the virus who choose to self-isolate.