I know people keep saying that in general people do care about the health of others, but I have to disagree. If that were true, wouldn’t folks do something as simple as wear a mask when it is “strongly suggested”?
Unfortunately, these deaths are just numbers on charts and graphs to do many, especially because the victims tend to be elderly and/or compromised.
I do agree with reopening, but I see such terrible behavior it is disheartening.
There’s no category that “all” people of any particular group fit in. There are only overall categories that correspond to trends.
No one can even correctly say that “all” workers or “all” business owners or “all” Republicans/Democrats/old/young/whatever want any particular thing. I’ve yet to see any poll come up with 100% to a question. Humans just fit into a group or hear an anecdote and extrapolate incorrectly assuming that person speaks for everyone.
It’s worthwhile also looking at the hospitalization risk by age. Most people who die of the virus are old, but hospitalizations are not nearly so heavily weighted toward the old.
In New York City, more than 2 of all 1000 adults under 45 have been hospitalized for covid. That 1000 in the denominator includes the large majority of young New Yorkers who couldn’t have gotten sick from covid because they have not been infected with it.
Probably about 1% of 18-44s in NYC who were infected with covid were hospitalized for it. In a jurisdiction where the hospitals weren’t overwhelmed, that percent would be higher; New York sent a lot of very sick people home without admitting them.
Being sick enough to be hospitalized for covid is alarming. We don’t know what lasting effects there may be from serious covid disease, but there are good reasons to believe some people might end up with permanent lung problems.
I’m not sure this has been discussed in this thread, but it makes alot of sense. Here in New England, starting at the end of February everyone [proverbial] was so careful with the touching and the hand washing and yet, the spread in March and April was ASTRONOMICAL. A friend of mine works in an OB office in a hospital and they were all meticulous with the gloves and touching (no face touching, no contact)(unfortunately, no masks were available), yet in April one of the workers tested positive for CV, then 3 others - 2 were asymptomatic. No chance it was from touching anything! They had however spend 8 hour days in the same office with no masks - in close contact. Anecdotal, but there are many stories like this.
So no more obsessive wiping of food packages or mail for me, and more focus on social distancing and outdoor activities.
Wow. I haven’t logged in here in a few weeks. People seem to have left the “thank you for posting information” group and have retreated to their corners.
Some pages back someone asked if we know people who have tested positive. Here is my response to that question:
We know one couple, a physician and her husband, who were on a cruise in early March, and tested positive when they returned home. They had mild cases, quarantined at home, and the spouse has since donated plasma. They have recovered and returned to work.
My husband is an active duty Army physician. His department of a major medical center (DC suburbs) had a cascading series of positive cases all in one weekend in mid March. An intern returned from a vacation in a European hotspot and was sent home to quarantine. A resident got sick while on call, tested positive and he was quarantined at home for two weeks until he was cleared. Every staff person he had been in contact with that weekend had to quarantine pending test results. One staff member who is in a relationship with the resident, and who developed the same symptoms, tested negative. That staff person stayed home for two weeks anyway. That same weekend an OB patient came to the ER with GI complaints. She was sent to labor and delivery (late in her pregnancy), where she vomited. A Rapid Covid test revealed that she was positive. Everyone she had been in contact with was sent home to quarantine pending test results. At one point my husband’s OB department had ~20 persons at home sick or awaiting test results. This was also the weekend when a Covid testing tent was set up outside the hospital, and things were a bit chaotic.
At that point the department moved to a three team approach - one team with direct patient contact, one team resting at home, one team doing telemedicine… the teams rotated for the past six weeks. Everyone is back to a modified regular schedule as of this week.
Personally, my husband is a stage 4 Cancer survivor, (I have shared this here) who is two years and five months post surgery/ chemo with NED. He is still active duty Army and still seeing patients and delivering babies.
This has added some anxiety to our lives.
Our daughter in law is pregnant with our first grandchild. So far, so good. Both she and our son had a weird viral illness in late February. He is a teacher and had had a flu shot. Whatever this was knocked him down for two full weeks. He felt sick enough to see his doctor. He had a negative flu test. A large number of his fellow teachers and staff at his DC public school had the same illness. At the time there were no tests for Covid available. We are assuming they had Covid-19.
Our area of the country is taking masks and social distancing advice seriously.
We have recently expanded our tiny bubble of me hubby and 22 year old daughter who is at our house working from home, to include our son, daughter in law and her family. We have shared a few outside gatherings. I have also met a few friends outside to chat with appropriate distancing. Our daughter has spent time outside with her boyfriend.
I think we all need to be calm and careful as the country opens. Try to do socializing outside and with appropriate distancing. Wear masks (I have a wardrobe of them now) when you must be close or must be inside businesses. Try to limit your time inside businesses. Wash your hands frequently. Use Purell (or equivalent) when you can’t wash your hands . Don’t touch your face when out in public.
We worry about my husband’s elderly parents, who are living advertisements for people who will probably die if they contract this virus. They live in Wisconsin, which has opened. They are following the “rules”’(Or lack thereof) in the state. So they have worn masks, but this week they went to their crowded local cafe, and had friends from Milwaukee visit.
Sigh.
So I’m leaving my building tonight, wearing my mask as instructed by our local health officials, and as I step into the elevator, there is a women already in there without a mask. I almost decided to wait for another elevator but decide to stay in. As we start to go down to the parking structure the elevator stops at the next floor. Two women with masks walk in. They know the women without the mask and say “hi, where’s your mask?” And the mask less women says “oh it’s right here in my bag but I’m very healthy and not worried about getting the virus”.
I didn’t say anything but what I wanted to say was “hey idiot, the mask is to protect us as much as it is to protect you!” But I didn’t and couldn’t wait for her to get out of the elevator.
Unfortunately, I think there is so much misinformation out there that it will be impossible to really educate the public properly about the real risks and precautions we should be taking.
All we can do is educate and protect ourselves the best we can and do a little praying…
In Austin today, I waited 15 minutes in line at the Trader Joe’s, standing under shade canopies 6 feet apart from fellow Austinites. All wore masks except for one woman - so approximately 98 percent compliance. Everyone was polite, and we all tried to distance ourselves. This is in an upper-income neighborhood, and I am not sure what the scene is in other parts of town.
That would be an interesting thing to have. Unfortunately we don’t have enough information to make one. We do know that different subgroups in the same area have radically different chances of being infected, though.
I haven’t seen anything to make me believe that your chance of being infected is dependent on your underlying conditions if any.
This is what I’ve been hypothesizing. Do you remember where this article was?
From the CDC website:
“The virus does not spread easily in other ways (other than person to person)
COVID-19 is a new disease and we are still learning about how it spreads. It may be possible for COVID-19 to spread in other ways, but these are not thought to be the main ways the virus spreads.
From touching surfaces or objects. It may be possible that a person can get COVID-19 by touching a surface or object that has the virus on it and then touching their own mouth, nose, or possibly their eyes. ***This is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads, but we are still learning more about this virus” (emphasis added)
When I’m wearing a mask (which is everywhere except my house) I hear an alarm like you hear on your phone for an Amber alert and it says Danger Emergency Danger and I can’t imagine doing anything that is not absolutely necessary. No haircuts. No restaurants. No sewing class. No gym. No Home Depot. How do people turnn off the alarm and go there anyway?
I posted it in post #3343 above.
My understanding is that those of us who are older and may have one or more health conditions aren’t more likely to contract C19, just more likely to get VERY ill if we do.
I was at Costco today. As required, everyone was wearing a mask and socially distancing. They had barriers up for all the cashiers.
There were a handful of people who worse their mask below their nose (perhaps due to medical reasons), but everyone was otherwise very polite and everything we wanted was in stock, though they did have a limit of 3 items of poultry, beef or pork per person. They did have lots of rice, cereal, fresh and frozen items—the store looked pretty well stocked. I didn’t notice if they had a placard at the front of the store of items they were out of.
For the cold produce section, there was a socially distanced line and people waited until the worker told them they could enter so that area didn’t get too crowded. Cashiers were mostly opened, so people didn’t wait long to check out.
The food court had the fewest people i can recall ever seeing and no tables or condiments visible.
Our state is being very methodical about opening up and trying to keep our ultra low infection rate. I believe restaurants will have limited dining in early June.
I’m glad our state has always allowed outdoor exercise and we’ve had lovely weather. I think it’s helped folks minimize unnecessary contact.
On the subject of being re-infected soon after recovery from COVID:
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/coronavirus-covid19-reinfection-immune-response
Covid19 is horrific. We can all agree on that.
For reference point the U.S. 2017-18 Influenza killed about 80,000 people. Right now Covid19 has killed about 90,000.
It is widely believed the summer season, like Influenza will be quiet.
We will see what next season brings.
A couple of things:
- Has anyone heard from @doschicos recently? I think she was very interested in this topic and I feel like I haven't seen her post in quite a relatively long time.
- On the topic of going without internet or essential services - on Sunday morning, there was some kind of Zoom issue. Not even a workday, and I understand there were lots of ripples! (Even in our house, Sunday school issues.) It makes me think about what we're starting to rely upon more than ever during this time.
- Without too many identifying details, I was really bummed that I had what I think is a good, safe idea related to social distancing for something planned by my workplace, and the administration shot it down without any discussion or thoughts about how alternatives are going to lead to much more student virus exposure. I'm concerned that there could be a pointy-haired-boss effect where people trying to make decisions aren't using analysis or critical thought as much as following some subset of guidelines.
I’m sorry that’s so vague. But it’s analogous to the nurse who did DS’s COVID test - she did all the strep test, exam, handling him, etc. without PPE and then put on PPE to swab him and then took off PPE to do the rest of the visit. So she had read somewhere “how to” but did not use any critical thinking about why or how or what to modify if other things also happened in the appointment.
"I will be a little more cautious in the future about believing the self-interested prognostications of experts. I assume that many will similarly be cautious. "
@OneMoreToGo2021 - what is the self interest of an expert in this case?
“If possible”. SMH.
“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention quietly released more detailed guidance for schools, businesses, transit systems and other industries hoping to reopen safely amid the coronavirus pandemic after fear that the White House had shelved the guidelines.
The 60-page document, which a C.D.C. spokesman said was uploaded over the weekend, but which received little notice, adds great detail to six charts that the C.D.C. had released last week. It provides specific instructions for schools and day camps, restaurants and bars, child care programs, employers with workers deemed “high-risk,” and mass transit administrators who are hoping to resume service.“
“The document released this week also tones down the C.D.C.’s guidance in several instances. Guidance that schools should “ensure social distancing” became “promote social distancing” in the final version, and the phrase “if possible” was added in several sentences.”
The schools will do the best they can, but will not be able to “ensure” children follow the rules all the time. That is just reality. Parents of school age children should have realistic expectations if they send their kids back to school.
Since there was discussion yesterday about attending church I’m posting this for anyone who is interested.
“A church in Houston has canceled mass indefinitely after one of its priests died and five others subsequently tested positive for the coronavirus.”
“At Houston’s Holy Cross Chapel, two of the priests who later tested positive had “been active in celebrating public Masses at Holy Ghost since May 2nd,” when the church reopened, Zuniga said.
Both the parish and archdiocese have encouraged members who have attended Mass since the reopening to monitor their health symptoms and be tested for Covid-19.”
https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/19/us/texas-church-covid19-priest-trnd/index.html