Coronavirus in the US

Parent Cafe
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https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/23/us/politics/coronavirus-trump-fauci.html

** Trump Has Given Unusual Leeway to Fauci, but Aides Say He’s Losing His Patience**

The president has become increasingly concerned as Dr. Anthony S. Fauci has grown bolder in correcting his falsehoods about the spread of the coronavirus.

President Trump has praised Dr. Anthony S. Fauci as a “major television star.” He has tried to demonstrate that the administration is giving him free rein to speak. And he has deferred to Dr. Fauci’s opinion several times at the coronavirus task force’s televised briefings.

But Dr. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984, has grown bolder in correcting the president’s falsehoods and overly rosy statements about the spread of the coronavirus in the past two weeks — and become a hero to the president’s critics because of it. And now Mr. Trump’s patience has started to wear thin.

So has the patience of some White House advisers, who see Dr. Fauci as taking shots at the president in some of his interviews with print reporters while offering extensive praise for Mr. Trump in television interviews with conservative hosts.

Mr. Trump knows that Dr. Fauci, who has advised every president since Ronald Reagan, is seen as credible with a large swath of the public and with journalists, and so he has given the doctor more leeway to contradict him than he has other officials, according to multiple advisers to the president.

When Mr. Trump knows that he has more to gain than to lose by keeping an adviser, he has resisted impulses to fight back against apparent criticism, sometimes for monthslong interludes. One example was when he wanted to fire the White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, in 2017 and early 2018. Another was Jeff Sessions, the former attorney general. Mr. Trump eventually fired both when he felt the danger in doing so had passed.

Mr. Trump cannot fire Dr. Fauci as he could the others who have drawn his ire, but he could dismiss the doctor from the task force.

So far, the president appears to be making the same calculation with Dr. Fauci, who was not on the briefing room podium on Monday evening. When asked why, Mr. Trump said he had just been with Dr. Fauci for “a long time” at a task force meeting. Officials, asked about Dr. Fauci’s absence, repeated that they were rotating officials who appear at the briefings

“He’s a good man,” Mr. Trump said. Dr. Fauci was scheduled to be on Fox News with Sean Hannity a short time later.

Still, the president has resisted portraying the virus as the kind of threat described by Dr. Fauci and other public health experts. In his effort to create a positive vision of a future where the virus is less of a danger, critics have accused Mr. Trump of giving false hope.

Dr. Fauci and Mr. Trump have publicly disagreed on how long it will take for a coronavirus vaccine to become available and whether an anti-malaria drug, chloroquine, could help those with an acute form of the virus. Dr. Fauci has made clear that he does not think the drug necessarily holds the potential that Mr. Trump says it does.

In an interview with Science Magazine, Dr. Fauci responded to a question about how he had managed to not get fired by saying that, to Mr. Trump’s “credit, even though we disagree on some things, he listens. He goes his own way. He has his own style. But on substantive issues, he does listen to what I say.”

But Dr. Fauci also said there was a limit to what he could do when Mr. Trump made false statements, as he often does during the briefings.

“I can’t jump in front of the microphone and push him down,” Dr. Fauci said. “OK, he said it. Let’s try and get it corrected for the next time.”

In an interview with CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday, Dr. Fauci played down the idea that there was a divide between him and the president. “There isn’t fundamentally a difference there,” he said.

“The president, has heard, as we all have heard, what are what I call anecdotal reports that certain drugs work. So what he was trying to do and express was the hope that if they might work, let’s try and push their usage,” Dr. Fauci said. “I, on the other side, have said I’m not disagreeing with the fact anecdotally they might work, but my job is to prove definitively from a scientific standpoint that they do work. So I was taking a purely medical, scientific standpoint, and the president was trying to bring hope to the people.”

A White House spokesman and Dr. Fauci did not respond to requests for comment.

Dr. Fauci came to his current role as the AIDS epidemic was exploding and President Reagan was paying it little attention. He and C. Everett Koop, the surgeon general, were widely credited with spurring the Reagan administration to action against AIDS, a fact that underscores Dr. Fauci’s ability to negotiate difficult politics.

He has recognized Mr. Trump’s need for praise; in the president’s presence and with audiences that are friendly to him, Dr. Fauci has been complimentary. He told the radio host Mark Levin on Fox News of the administration’s response to the virus: “I can’t imagine that under any circumstances that anybody could be doing more.”

And Dr. Fauci is savvy not just about the inner workings of the government but about the news media that covers it.

When Vice President Mike Pence took over as the lead of the coronavirus task force, his advisers wanted to put a 24-hour pause on interviews that administration officials were giving as they assessed where the administration was after a chaotic few weeks. They were initially fine with Dr. Fauci’s appearances, meeting with him before interviews to get a sense of what he planned to say.

But in the past two weeks, as Dr. Fauci’s interviews have increased in frequency, White House officials have become more concerned that he is criticizing the president.

Officials asked him about the viral moment in the White House briefing room, when he put his hand to his face and appeared to suppress a chuckle after Mr. Trump referred to the State Department as the “Deep State Department.” Dr. Fauci had a benign explanation: He had a scratchy throat and a lozenge he had in his mouth had gotten stuck in his throat, which he tried to mask from reporters.

Some officials have not questioned that Dr. Fauci is giving interviews, but they have wondered how he has so much time for so many requests from the news media.

Dr. Fauci, for his part, has been dismissive of some questions about whether he was at odds with the president, treating it as a news media obsession.

“I think there’s this issue of trying to separate the two of us,” he said on CBS.

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Facebook had stockpiled 720,000 masks.

Apple had stockpiled an unknown quantity of masks.

PG&E had 1,000,000 masks.

All donated. That’s nice but was it hoarding? Donated before DOJ announced it would prosecute hoarders.

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Did they say when they got them?

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.

You bet I already went through that document with a fine tooth comb. Yeah, it is not as simple as it looks. The HR and legal departments are going to be BUSY.

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Bill Ackman Makes $2.5 Billion ‘Recovery Bet’ Amid Coronavirus Tumble

Bloomberg

Scott Deveau
BloombergMarch 23, 2020

Ad: 17s
(Bloomberg) – Activist investor Bill Ackman said he has made a “recovery bet” on the economy, investing $2.5 billion in equities, including upping his positions in several of his portfolio companies and reinvesting in others like Starbucks Corp.
The billionaire investor said he has taken off all the hedges that he put in place for his Pershing Square Capital Management, through shorts in the credit market. Those hedges were put in place to offset the effects of the coronavirus, he said.
Ackman said his hedge fund has used the proceeds to reinvest over the past 10 to 12 days in several of his portfolio companies, including Lowe’s Cos., Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. and Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc.
“That’s about the most bullish thing we’ve done,” he said in a Bloomberg TV interview. “We are all long. No shorts, you know, betting on the country.”
Ackman has called for a federally mandated nationwide shutdown over the next 30 days rather than letting individual states implement their own measures for tackling the coronavirus pandemic. He reiterated that call Monday and urged for increased testing for the virus across the country.
“I built a lot of confidence over the last week that the president and his team are heading in the right direction,” Ackman said, adding that he had no “inside knowledge” of what the federal government will do next.
Chipotle, Zoom
One portfolio business he wasn’t able to increase his position in was Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc., which he said was trading at “crazy” prices. He said Chipotle is one of the businesses that stands to gain from the current crisis as people turn to delivery apps amid self-quarantine orders across the country.
“Some companies are actually going to be long-term beneficiaries. It’s not just Zoom,” he said, referring to the video conferencing company whose shares have soared 130% this year. “Chipotle, we think, is going to be a very long-term beneficiary of what’s taken place here.”
He said the sell-off on companies such as Hilton have been overdone. Pershing Square is looking at the cash flow of companies, like Hilton, which don’t carry a lot of debt, and discounting their earnings over the next 12 to 18 months. He said that shaves about 5% off their value, not 50%.
Boeing, Buffett
“If you can buy Hilton at $60 when it was trading at almost $120, it’s going to be a bargain,” he said.
Others, like Boeing Co., will need support to get through the current turbulence, either through government aid or the private sector, from someone such as Buffett, according to Ackman.
“If Buffett will do it, I don’t think the Treasury secretary should,” he said.
(Updates with Ackman’s comments in seventh paragraph)
For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com
Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.
©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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Yes. Those companies got the masks for the wildfires.

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The masks weren’t hoarded. Most people in the US just learned about N95 masks with this virus, but we in California learned about them when the wildfire seasons started getting bad. A year and a half ago the air was so bad in Silicon Valley that we couldn’t go outside for over a week. At the worst, I thought I’d ride my bike to the store, a mile away, but turned back after a block; it was bad. Lots of people around here have N95 masks.

There’s nothing strange about tech companies in Silicon Valley having a large stash of N95 masks.

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Alaska limits public gatherings, requires all arriving travelers to self-quarantine
CNN

Alaska announced a series of new measures today to curb the spread of the coronavirus, including an order for people to maintain a six-foot “social distance” in public.

Businesses that can’t abide by that guideline are required to close by 5 p.m. Tuesday.

"The purpose of this mandate is to limit all close contacts,” said Adam Crum of the Department of Health and Social Services in a news conference.
Nonessential public gatherings of more than 10 people are also banned until further notice.

The state is also requiring all travelers entering Alaska from another state or country to self-quarantine for 14 days upon arrival. The rule goes into effect Wednesday, and violators could be prosecuted, according to Crum.

Singapore sees its biggest single-day surge in new cases
From CNN’s Akanksha Sharma in Hong Kong

Singapore confirmed 54 new cases of the coronavirus on Monday – the country’s biggest one-day surge since the outbreak began.

Of the 54 new cases, 48 are imported from overseas, with travel histories to Europe, North America and Southeast Asia.

This raises the national total to 509 cases, according to Singapore’s Ministry of Health.

Of these 509, two patients have died, 152 have been discharged from hospital, and 355 remain hospitalized, including 15 in critical condition.

[ Shows the contrast with how many Asian countries hospitalize all confirmed cases as WHO has suggested. ]

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New York’s infection “attack rate” is five times higher than the rest of the US, health expert warns
CNN

New York, the hardest-hit state in the US, now has 21,689 coronavirus cases and 157 deaths.

New York City alone has 13,119 cases. At least 2,213 of those patients are hospitalized and 525 are in the intensive care unit.

Earlier today, health expert Dr. Deborah Birx said at a news briefing with President Donald Trump that the greater New York City area has an “attack rate close to one in a thousand” – five times higher than what other areas are experiencing.

Some 28% of tests in New York are positive, she said – compared to less than 8% in the rest of the country.

“(New Yorkers are) the group that needs to absolutely social distance and self isolate at this time. Clearly the virus had been circling there for a number of weeks to have this level of penetrance into the community,” she said.

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Interesting chart of the most cases per capita by county. All the top 10 are NYC metro counties, except for New Orleans which is #6. We don’t seem to be getting love from POTUS either. Strange for a red state to be ignored by him.

To see the chart of most affected counties, click the link and scroll down a bit. (strange that Staten Island has more cases per capita than the other NYC boroughs).

https://www.nola.com/news/coronavirus/article_c0509efc-6d4f-11ea-ae50-236ff5752610.html

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“Requires a little nuanced thinking but:

More people’s livelihoods and and well-being are tied to the stock market (which is dependent on the health of the US economy”

Sorry, but it doesn’t require “nuanced thinking” to recognize the advocation for genocide.

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Vietnam’s seafood exporters have seen up to 50% of their export contracts cancelled or delayed due to the coronavirus outbreak, the country’s seafood exporters association said on Tuesday.

Seafood and other aquatic products, such as farmed fish, are among Vietnam’s top exports to China and Europe, both of which have been hit hard by the virus.

Farmed fish exports to China were halted in January due to travel curbs, and this month clients in other parts of the world started to cancel and delay orders, the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Processors said in a statement.

Vietnam’s aquatic product exports in the first two months of this year fell 10% from a year earlier to $989 million, according to government customs data. Its seafood exports fell 2.8% last year to $8.54 billion and accounted for 3.2% of total export earnings.

Guardian

SF Mayor says city has procured 1 million N-95 masks

San Francisco Mayor London Breed on Monday announced the the city had procured 1 million N-95 personal protective masks for front line workers from the California Office of Emergency Services.

“We’re also preparing to increase the capacity of our health care system by hiring more nurses, while ensuring that we have the equipment needed to keep them safe as they do their important work,” Breed said in a statement. “I want to thank the Governor and the state for their support during this challenging time.” In addition to the masks, Breed said that the city had hired 82 qualified nurses over the weekend as part of its effort to rapidly expand the capacity of the city’s health care network. San Francisco expects to hire an additional 140 nurses in coming weeks, the San Francisco Office of the Mayor said in a statement. CNBC

Board games, yoga mats and yeast: What people are buying as they heed coronavirus stay-at-home orders

Sarah Whitten, CNBC

As the coronavirus continues to spread in the U.S., people are purchasing items based on three needs: to protect, to entertain and to connect.
Sales of board games such as Sorry, Connect 4 and Clue have jumped in the last month.

Consumers are also spending money on preventive supplies and food.

In the weeks since the U.S. confirmed its first case of COVID-19, consumer habits have been shifting.

Medical masks, hand sanitizer, gloves and toilet paper have flown off shelves in the U.S., as more people began to look to protect themselves and prepare for long stints isolated in their homes. But, those aren’t the only items that consumers are spending money on in stores and online.

In addition to medical supplies, such as cold medicine, thermometers and tissues, and items for the pantry, such as canned goods and bottled water, people have begun shelling out money for entertainment. Board games, puzzles and video games have become popular items.

According to Kit Yarrow, a consumer psychologist, people are currently purchasing items based on three needs: to protect, to entertain and to connect.

“First of all there are our practical needs,” she said. “We are home more, so we need more food and we need more provisions.”

Canned goods, bottles of water, frozen food, rice and pasta have been cleaned off shelves in recent weeks and grocery stores have had to work quickly to replenish their supply.

Yarrow said that the hoarding of food items makes sense psychologically. As humans feel threatened or anxious, our first instinct is to gain some sort of control over the situation.

“People are resorting to the only action they feel like they can, which is stockpiling,” she said.

And it’s not just for ourselves. Yarrow said that some people who have to care for children, their own parents or animals are being driven by a sense of guilt to hoard more items.

“It’s guilt avoidance,” she said. ”‘I better get more than I need because the consequences if I don’t are too horrible to imagine.’”

No one wants to run out of food or cleaning supplies while trying to take care of others, she said.

In addition to food supplies, people have been purchasing gloves, soap, diapers, water filters and jugs, bidets and painter’s tape, according to data analysis by Thinknum of Amazon sales from late January through the second week of March.

“I think people are anxious and people feel that this an unsafe world right now,” Yarrow said.

It’s why they have begun stockpiling items that protect against the virus, as well as items that would protect them against other people; there has been a rise in purchases of security cameras and guns.

“Unsurprisingly, nondiscretionary or essential categories such as food, household products, personal care and health products saw the biggest jump,” Deborah Weinswig, CEO and founder, Coresight Research, wrote in a research note Friday about the impact of the coronavirus on consumers.

“More than one-third of all respondents reported buying more food and/or more household products,” she said of Coresight’s survey of more than 1,000 people March 17-18.

Once folks feel like they are physically safe — have enough food and protection — there is a shift to buying items that are more geared toward emotional well-being.

One of the top sellers on Amazon in the last month has been board games and jigsaw puzzles, according to Thinknum. In particular, Sorry, Jenga, Connect 4 and Clue, which all happen to be Hasbro-owned games.

Hasbro CEO Brian Golder told CNBC on Monday that the company is experiencing strong demand during the coronavirus pandemic.

“Overall we are seeing great demand in our products,” Goldner said on “Squawk Box.” “In fact, our supply chains are back up and running in China,” he added.

Goldner said demand for Hasbro’s games, such as Monopoly and Operation, and Play-Doh have been particularly strong. He said the company is also planning new products in response to the widespread stay-at-home directives being issued across the country.

Shares of Hasbro closed up more than 12% on Monday but are down about 50% since January. The stock has a market value of about $7.1 billion.

Yarrow said in addition to traditional entertainment such as family games, video games, TV and movies, people have also been gravitating toward crafting and baking to keep themselves busy.

“People have to find stuff to do,” she said. “Some of it is game consoles and stuff like that, but a lot of it is people going back to home crafts. Stuff to keep themselves amused, but in a solitary way.”

She said yeast has been surprisingly popular and selling out at stores because people have been making more bread at home. Other crafts include embroidery and knitting.

Others have opted to order yoga mats and resistance bands, among other health and fitness items, Thinknum found. Since gyms are closed, people are having to get more creative about their exercise routines.

Yarrow also said that more people have been purchasing condoms.

Consumers are also gravitating more toward technology that allows them to connect with people that they aren’t able to physically interact with. She pointed to companies such as Zoom, which have seen a surge not only in consumer interest but also in investor interest.

Shares of Zoom, a video platform designed for conference calls, have skyrocketed more than 125% since January and were up nearly 20% on Monday.

“We are learning new ways of connecting with each other through technology,” Yarrow said.

“There is nothing more fundamentally important in our life than connecting with other people and here in this time when we are so anxious and need each other more than ever and we aren’t supposed to be together,” she said. “It’s the human imperative. We are going to find ways to be together.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/23/what-people-are-buying-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak-and-why.html

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US Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin and senate democratic leader Chuck Schumer have told Reuters they are optimistic about finalising the country’s coronavirus stimulus deal on Tuesday, as negotiators noted that there had been progress, but some issues were still under review. (Guardian)

Fed surprises market with program to support corporate bonds amid coronavirus pandemic

The Federal Reserve pulled out another series of bazookas today, including a flurry of programs to buy more Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities. But one move that surprised many was the decision to buy corporate bonds and corporate bond exchange-traded funds.

“This is unprecedented action by the Fed,” Johnny Fine, head of Investment Grade Bonds at Goldman Sachs told CNBC’s Wilfred Frost.

Under a program called the Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility, the Federal Reserve will be able to purchase corporate bonds, not just Treasuries. That alone is big news, but this program also allows for the purchase of ETFs that track the U.S. investment-grade corporate bond market. (CNBC)

Volunteers from tech companies like Amazon, Apple and Google build coronavirus-tracking site in six days

In the last week, a group of thirty volunteers from tech companies like Apple, Amazon and Alphabet put together a website called “covidnearyou” that aims to track the coronavirus as it spreads.

The idea started when Prem Ramaswami, the head of product at Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs, and his wife, started feeling sick more than a week ago. When he tried to get a test for the coronavirus, his doctor told him that would not be possible. According to Ramaswami, he was denied access to the test because he hadn’t been in touch with anyone who had tested positive.

Ramaswami, who previously worked on health projects at Google, wondered how he could help others in the same boat. (CNBC)

https://covidnearyou.org

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Consumers could spend $20 billion less for gasoline this April as prices collapse in futures market

Gasoline prices in the wholesale and futures markets crashed as more states issued stay-at-home orders, severely dampening demand for fuel.

Some spot cash prices around the U.S. were down 40% or more Monday, and futures prices for gasoline in New York Harbor lost 24% for gasoline due for delivery in April. As a result, the prices drivers pay at the pump could fall by as much as 20% in a matter of weeks and in some areas, could reach a low below $1 a gallon ultimately in select markets.

“The reason is clear. No one is driving,” said Daniel Yergin, vice chairman at IHS Markit.

[ Plus very low oil prices due to economic downturn/lack of industrial production, etc. related to Covid-19. ]

Facebook is offering employees up to a month of paid leave to care for sick family members
Facebook has introduced new paid time off programs that will allow employees to take up to a month away from work to care for sick relatives in light of the coronavirus outbreak, a spokeswoman for the company told CNBC.

“Facebook understands we are in uncharted territory with the COVID-19 pandemic,” the spokeswoman said in a statement. “We want to support our people with navigating their needs during this time. Therefore, we have launched a number of initiatives for our employees and their families.”

Among these initiatives is a paid emergency care leave program that offers 30 working days of leave to employees who need to care for a sick family member, or if they need to travel to another country or state to care for a family member.

US health officials say 147 nursing homes have at least one resident with coronavirus

There are 147 nursing homes across 27 states that have at least one resident with the coronavirus, exposing seniors who are “more susceptible to dangerous complications from the virus,” Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma said in releasing the new data.

CMS and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention examined the high rate of COVID-19 fatalities at the Life Care Center nursing home in Kirkland, Washington, the epicenter of the outbreak in the state. At least 35 residents or staff of Life Care have died from the virus, CMS said.

While that figure is a small fraction of the 15,000 nursing homes across the U.S., it posses a serious threat to the senior population since people over 65 years old are already at higher risk to serious illness and death from the coronavirus, according to the CDC.

CNBC

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‘Genocide’ has a specific meaning and I can’t imagine how it applies to what I wrote.

Might be I’m not getting your point because I’m one of the group you seem concerned about, and… while I appreciate the thought, I don’t agree with it.

I’d rather ride it out, take my chances as to the virus - get it later, rather than sooner, in the hope that by then there’ll be an agreed upon treatment and the crush will be off. Washing hands, six feet, etc.

As an aside… I think the president might have used the adage: the cure may be worse than the disease, today. That he didn’t expound on it, and say that we’re risking ending up with the worst of both worlds - the disease and a detrimental cure, was a mistake on his part.

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Wuhan, China will lift lockdown on 8 April

In China, Wuhan, the city at the center of the coronavirus pandemic, will lift its lockdown measures on 8 April, 2020, Bloomberg reports.

More now on the cases in Australia, which jumped on Tuesday almost entirely as a result of passengers who disembarked a cruise ship in Sydney several days ago, prompting widespread criticism of the official response to the pandemic.

The ship, Carnival Corp’s Ruby Princess, became the country’s largest source of coronavirus infections as one of its passengers also became the eighth fatality nationally.

In a chain of events described by New South Wales state Police Minister David Elliott as a “monumental stuff-up”, about 2,700 passengers were allowed to leave the ship when it docked in Sydney on 19 March.

By Tuesday, around 130 of those passengers had tested positive and officials were frantically hunting down other travellers to test them and track their movements.

Australia stepped closer to a full lockdown on Tuesday, with authorities warning of harsher penalties for anybody violating self-isolation orders as they began to worry that hospitals were starting to feel the strain.

With 1,984 cases, Australia has registered significantly lower rates of coronavirus compared to elsewhere in the world, but the infection rate has quickened in recent days and NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said it was now at a “critical stage.”

While schools officially remained open in most of the country, parents were strongly advised to keep their children home, as all other non-essential services, including cinemas, pubs and houses of worship, were closed for the first full day.

Authorities had initially classified the ship as low risk because it was returning from an 11-day round trip to New Zealand, despite around a dozen passengers showing signs of ill health. About 60% of the passengers were Australian, and 20% were from the United States, ship records showed.

{People don’t learn. Also, note to self - avoid cruise ships with the word Princess in their name. Scratch that. Just avoid cruise ships period. ]

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Coverage of the TX Lt. Governor’s remarks

Older people would rather die than let Covid-19 harm US economy – Texas official
Lieutenant governor Dan Patrick tells Fox News: ‘Do we have to shut down the entire country for this? I think we can get back to work’

Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick said he was willing to give up his life to preserve the US economy from the effect of efforts to tackle the coronavirus.

As Donald Trump pushed to re-open the US economy in weeks, rather than months, the lieutenant governor of Texas went on Fox News to argue that he would rather die than see public health measures damage the US economy, and that he believed “lots of grandparents” across the country would agree with him.

“My message: let’s get back to work, let’s get back to living, let’s be smart about it, and those of us who are 70-plus, we’ll take care of ourselves,” Lt Gov Dan Patrick, a 69-year-old Republican, told Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Monday night.

“Don’t sacrifice the country,” Patrick said. “Don’t do that.”

Patrick said he feared that public health restrictions to prevent coronavirus could end American life as he knows it, and that he is willing to risk death to protect the economy for his grandchildren.

“You know, Tucker, no one reached out to me and said, ‘As a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?’” Patrick said. “And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in.”

“That doesn’t make me noble or brave or anything like that,” he added. “I just think there are lots of grandparents out there in this country like me.”

At the White House’s coronavirus briefing Monday night, the administration’s coronavirus response coordinator, Dr Deborah Birx, said that emerging data from Europe suggested that 99% of the coronavirus deaths were people over age 50, and that many had pre-existing conditions. That “doesn’t change the need to protect the elderly”, Birx said.

Trump, who has raised concerns about the damage that coronavirus prevention measures are doing to the US economy, said he was eager to return for the country to return to normal as soon as possible, and suggested that an economic crisis might result in more deaths, through suicide, than a global pandemic.

He did not answer questions from journalists about whether he would abide by the advice of public health experts if they told him next week that the government needed to keep restrictive measures in place over the longer term to prevent the spread of the virus.

Patrick, a Texas Republican, praised the president’s focus on the economy on Monday and said that it had “lifted” his heart.

“I don’t want the whole country to be sacrificed,” Patrick said. “I’ve talked to hundreds of people … and everyone says pretty much the same thing: We can’t lose our whole country. We’re having an economic collapse.”

“We’re going to be in a total collapse, recession, depression, collapse in our society if this goes on for another several months,” Patrick said. “As the president said, the mortality rate is so low. Do we have to shut down the entire country for this? I think we can get back to work.”

Patrick said that, as someone who turns 70 next week, he was in the high-risk group, but that he was willing to give up his life for his six grandchildren.

“Look, I’m going to do everything I can do to live,” Patrick said. “But if you said, are you willing to take a chance … If I get sick, I’ll go and try to get better, but if I don’t, I don’t.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/24/older-people-would-rather-die-than-let-covid-19-lockdown-harm-us-economy-texas-official-dan-patrick

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Hubei and Wuhan travel restrictions to be lifted two weeks apart

More on the travel restrictions being lifted in Wuhan and Hubei province now, from Reuters:

The Health Commission for China’s Hubei province said on Tuesday it will remove all travel restrictions in and out of the province on 25 March, with the exception of the city of Wuhan, the provincial capital and the epicentre of the country’s coronavirus outbreak.

Travel restrictions for leaving Wuhan will be lifted on 8 April, and people will be able to leave on the basis of using a health code, the commission said. The city has been under lockdown since 23 January. (Guardian)

Japan’s Prime Minister will speak with the Olympics chief tonight
From CNN’s Yoko Wakatsuki in Tokyo

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is going to hold a phone call with International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach at 8 p.m. Tokyo time, Abe’s office said, as calls for both the IOC and Japanese government to postpone the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo grow louder.

Abe and his ministers had previously resisted calls to either cancel or delay the Games, which are scheduled to start on July 24. But as other major sports leagues and events worldwide canceled and postponed tournaments and games, pressure has mounted for the IOC to do the same for the quadrennial competition.

Abe told lawmakers Monday that postponing the Games is a possibility, the first time he has publicly taken such a position.

Japan and the IOC have faced calls to postpone the Games in recent days from several athletes and countries.

The IOC said a final decision on postponement will be made within four weeks, due to the vast complexities of rescheduling a massive global sporting event like the Olympics.

Venezuela says it asked the US to help allow a repatriation flight for stranded citizens
From CNN’s Jackie Castillo in Atlanta and Stefano Pozzebon in Bogota

The Venezuelan government said today it had asked for US cooperation to allow a flight to repatriate Venezuelan citizens stuck in the US.

In a statement, Venezuelan foreign minister Jorge Arreaza said the repatriation flight would be carried out by the country’s flag carrier, Conviasa.

Conviasa is among several Venezuelan state companies currently under sanctions by the US.

The US and more than 50 other countries do not recognize the government of embattled Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

The United States has not yet publicly reacted to the Venezuelan request.

China is reopening parts of the Great Wall for tourists
From journalist Eric Cheung in Hong Kong, CNN

One of the most visited sections of China’s Great Wall will be reopened for tourists Tuesday as the number of novel coronavirus cases in the country continues to drop.

However, only a portion of the Badaling Great Wall is being reopened, according to a post by local officials on the microblogging platform Weibo. Other sites, like a museum, will remain closed.

Visitors must reserve tickets online before visiting; present a QR code that confirms they are healthy; wear a face mask during their visit; and maintain a distance of at least 1 meter (3.3 feet) from others.

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Why is Italy’s coronavirus fatality rate so high?
Italy toll due to demographics and way deaths are reported, but experts say other nations could soon be in its position.

The numbers have been dizzying. Four hundred thirty-three. Six hundred twenty-seven. Seven hundred ninety-three.

For weeks now, the daily briefings by Italy’s civil protection agency have been providing grim updates on the number of people killed by the new coronavirus, deepening a sense of gloom in a country that has become the deadliest centre of the pandemic.

Despite a series of near-draconian measures gradually rolled out to halt the spread of the virus, including a nationwide lockdown and the shutdown of all non-essential businesses, Italy has been unable to “flatten the curve” .

The country’s latest tally reported a total of 6,078 deaths from 63,928 infections, with a world-leading fatality rate of more than 9 percent.

In contrast, in China, where the outbreak originated, the mortality rate stands at 3.8 percent. In Germany, which has reported more than 24,000 cases and just 94 deaths, it is at 0.3 percent.

But there may be several reasons for Italy’s alarming mortality rate.

“The numbers we have are not representative of the entire infected population,” said Massimo Galli, head of the infectious disease unit at Sacco Hospital in Milan, the main city in the worst-hit region of Lombardy where 68 percent of the total national fatalities have been reported.

Galli explained that as the emergency situation rapidly deteriorated over the past month, Italy focused its testing only on people showing severe symptoms in areas with high epidemic intensity - the result, experts say, is that the currently available numbers produce a statistical artefact, a distortion. “This causes an increase in the fatality rate because it is based on the most severe cases and not on the totality of those infected,” Galli said.

The coronavirus may take up to 14 days before an infection flares into symptoms such as fever and dry cough, and during that incubation period asymptomatic patients may potentially transmit it. Experts believe it is this so-called “stealth transmission” that has driven the rapid spread of the outbreak, infecting communities that remain unaware until they develop symptoms and get tested.

As of March 15, Italy had carried out about 125,000 tests. In contrast, South Korea - which has implemented a strategy of widespread testing - has conducted some 340,000 tests, including for those showing mild or no symptoms at all. It has recorded almost 9,000 infections to date, with a mortality rate of 0.6 percent.

Italy’s ‘social contact matrix’
In Italy, 85.6 percent of those who have died were over 70, according to the National Institute of Health’s (ISS) latest report.

With 23 percent of Italians over 65 years old, the Mediterannean country has the second-oldest population in the world after Japan - and observers believe age distribution could also have played a role in raising the fatality rate.

Another possible factor is Italy’s healthcare system itself, which provides universal coverage and is largely free of charge.

“We have many elderly people with numerous illnesses who were able to live longer thanks to extensive care, but these people were more fragile than others,” Galli said, adding that many patients at Sacco Hospital - one of Italy’s largest medical centres - who died due to coronavirus were already suffering from other serious diseases.

According to the ISS’s latest report tracing the profile of COVID-19 victims, 48 percent of the deceased had an average of three pre-existing illnesses.

While indirectly, experts also pointed to Italy’s “social contact matrix” as another possible reason behind the wider spread of the coronavirus among older people.

“Elderly Italian people, while most of them live by themselves, are not isolated and their life is characterised by a much more intense interaction with their children and younger population compared to other countries,” said Linda Laura Sabbadini, central director of the Italian National Institute of Statistics.

“When such an external shock [such as the coronavirus outbreak] takes place, it’s important that these interactions decrease, hence isolating elderly people should have immediately been a priority.”

‘Forever unprepared’
However, such explanations arising from the peculiarities of the Italian experience - ranging from strong familial ties in a geriatric society to issues surrounding testing practices - should not make other nations complacent, experts warned.

“Other countries should watch closely,” said Pierluigi Lopalco, epidemiologist and professor of hygiene at the University of Pisa.

“What we are watching in Italy is the same movie we have already seen in China, where Italy is Hubei and Lombardy is Wuhan,” he said, referring respectively to the Chinese province that was sealed off by the authorities, and its capital where the new coronavirus was first detected late last year.

“I am afraid we will be re-watching the same film again in other countries in the coming weeks,” warned Lopalco, who is part of a taskforce leading the epidemiological response in Puglia, in southern Italy.

Citing the epidemic curve of other countries, Lopalco suggested that their difference with Italy is simply timing: they are just at an earlier stage.

“After China, Italy is the first country where the epidemic erupted; hence, we are dealing with the effects of an advanced-stage epidemic.”

While many countries are gradually adopting stricter measures to implement social distancing, they have so far resisted taking the same drastic steps as Italy due to significant worries about the economic effects…

Italian doctors at the centre of the country’s battle with the pandemic have warned that the reluctance to act quickly and decisively could have important consequences.

“If I were the head of any country’s health ministry I would be terrified, and I would move extremely fast to adopt strict measures to contain it,” Galli said, stressing that “in these situations, we all are forever unprepared: it is impossible to be fully ready to handle such events”.

‘Hoping a new wave doesn’t come’
As Italy has been holding its breath to see the epidemic flattening its curve, the strained healthcare system has been quickly approaching total saturation.

In Lombardy, some doctors on the coronavirus front lines are working without adequate protective equipment, according to reports, exposing themselves to great risk. Already, 14 of them have lost their lives and a total of 3,700 nurses and doctors have become infected while on duty, according to ISS.

…authorities in Italy’s hardest-hit region are running against time to isolate people and find beds for patients. In central Milan, the four-star Michelangelo hotel is being transformed into a quarantine facility for some 300 people, while an exhibition pavilion is being turned into an intensity care ward for a similar number of patients. Both are scheduled to be in operation by the end of this week.

According to Galli, it will be weeks before a consistent slowdown is recorded in northern Italy because the region is still coping with the infections contracted before the implementation of the sweeping isolation measures.

“We are like a man submerged into the sea with the tip of his nose still being able to reach the surface. He is still breathing, but also hoping that a new wave doesn’t come.”

However, the latest update by the country’s civil protection agency was grounds for some cautious optimism. The number of new infections on Sunday stood at 3,957, compared with 4,821 the day before, while deaths fell to 651 from a record 793 on Saturday - a rare moment of respite. And on Monday, the slight improvement continued, with new fatalities dropping to 602 even as infections rose to 4,160.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/03/italy-coronavirus-fatality-rate-high-200323114405536.html

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An interesting observation made by a nurse who worked at the Life Care Center:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/23/health/coronavirus-nurses-inside-washington-care-home/index.html