My cleaning lady came back about a month ago and I was never so happy to see her in my life! It was about the mopping and vacuuming and dusting more than anything else. I provided her with a mask and we socially distanced while she was here. I am more concerned about getting her sick , than if she got us sick. I have always had someone clean, but then again, i have worked full time my entire life except for 2 small maternity leaves. its embarrassing, but i suck at cleaning.
now how about this. China might have had cases as far back as last fall.
My house cleaner came back about 2 weeks ago. She was hospitalized with CV-19 in mid march, about a week after the last time she cleaned my home. (No one in my family has been sick) She called me several weeks back to let me know she was 100% recovered and ready to return to work. I waited until our state opened up (stores, salons, outdoor dining) to have her back. She was here yesterday and told me that she is back to work in about 1/2 of her customers homes. I paid her during the time she did not work for me, however she told me I was one of only two customers who did. (She must clean at least 10+ homes).
I’ve read something posted by an acquaintance that makes me feel very discouraged about antibody and reinfection. Up until now I haven’t heard or seen any concrete study to prove that one can get re-infected with covid. The assumption is that if you have the antibodies you are relatively safe
This is her exact words:
"Want to know what sucks… testing positive again, after already being out of work for a week with COVID. Want to know what is even more frustrating.
Not being told you tested positive till 6 DAYS AFTER the fact (test on 5/28, result on 6/4) and being told you need to stay out of work for 2 weeks from the day they called you, not the day of the test. Which makes no sense, since I was back at work 8 days after my first positive test when I was actively sick and probably contagious.
Oh yea, I should throw in I had at least 2 negative tests prior to the positive test, plus I have confirmed antibodies. Which makes the fact that this is more than likely a false negative even more likely."
Just for the context - she is an art teacher who works at the elderly home. She reported to have tested positive for COVID late April, she was out for a while sick. She and everyone at her work are required to test for covid twice a week. She also got positive for antibody, which got her to reduce the covid test to once a week. Now she is out again due to covid, and apparently she felt sick and stayed home before the covid positive result came back.
As it has been discussed in the Inside Medicine thread, a molecular test is super sensitive and only shows that a small part of a pathogen’s nucleic acid is present. It does not tell if that pathogen is viable or completely dead. It is a known problem with molecular tests.
Dr. Vin Gupta was interviewed in thebToday show this morning. He was irate at WHO and their comments about asymptomatic transmission being rare. He cited this journal https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/ (hope that link works - it’s the latest issue of journal of emerging infectious diseases) with several studies documenting pre and asymptomatic transmission.
During normal times, our cleaning lady comes every two weeks. I asked her not to come for an initial six week period and restarted her service a few weeks ago.
We leave the house before she comes and return the next day. Have a place to stay nearby so it all works out well.
I’m about to schedule our annual window cleaning. Again, we’d leave the house for 24 hours.
An asymptomatic person is someone who doesn’t have symptoms and never develops symptoms. It’s not the same as someone who later develops symptoms, who would be classified as pre-symptomatic, WHO officials said.
They communicated this poorly - but if we all are rational, this makes sense. If you have Covid and are asymptomatic the whole time, it means you have a low viral load and are not spreading it. The problem is that you don’t know who is truly asymptomatic vs pre-symptomatic.
Listen to Dr. Mike Ryan, who’s much more careful and precise with words than Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove:
Was he precise? If its a big open question, then why did she say -
“From the data we have, it still seems to be rare that an asymptomatic person actually transmits onward to a secondary individual,” Kerkhove said at a news briefing Monday from the WHO’s Geneva headquarters. “It’s very rare.””
Either they have the data or they don’t? What a mess. He’s saying "we don’t know if truly asymptomatic people have a part in the spread (“Big Open Question”) and she’s saying that [truly/forever] asymptomatic people have a very low part in the spread. The confusion yesterday was that she wasn’t clear of the difference between truly (never become symptomatic) asymptomatic people vs symptomatic. Today, Dr. Ryan is blowing that up. So we are left with NOTHING except disdain.
“China found that it travels in air conditioning and heating systems. “
Here you go @Sybylla https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-0764_article. Although I’m pretty sure it’s been mentioned before.”
You seem to be conflating the virus being directly put into the flow of air from one person to another and travel in a heating or a/c SYSTEM traveling through walls.
The restaurant study you referenced would indicate that the virus is NOT traveling through the SYSTEM itself . No one in the restaurant not directly next to the table with the infected person got the virus. Not people in other areas of the restaurant, not the waiter who was higher ( standing) than the infected seated person.
Be careful with adding a HEPA filter on your HVAC if it is not designed for such a filter. It could over-stress your blower (fan assembly) as systems with variable speed blowers generate speed (CFM) based on the pressure that if ‘feels’ in the system feedback. (Adding a HEPA filter decreases airflow and thus increases pressure in the system.)
I wasn’t even considering having my cleaning lady back yet. I wouldn’t consider it until my county opens salons and gyms, but even then I’d be hesitant. My cleaning lady is a member of a singing group, and is very social. She also was more worried about losing electricity during this pandemic (!) than getting sick. So I don’t have a lot of faith in her being careful.
I’ve learned that I can actually clean the house almost as good as she can, and it gives me something to do. I’ve adapted a modified Flylady approach, and so the house stays cleaner than it does when I know someone will clean up my messes every two weeks,
I read somewhere else that the antibodies show up after 6 days of infection, so either she never really cleared her original infection, or somehow she is still showing up positive, but is not “active”. I recall reading about someone who is still showing positive 70 days later. so I dont think that your friend necessarily “recaught” it but never got “rid” of it to begin with.
This!! Better call the pros.
I’m at the gym right now in Palm Beach County. This place is PACKED today. Not a mask in sight. I wish we could post pictures on CC.
Maybe it’s just a false sense of security, but it looks like people down here have decided this pandemic is basically over.
A gym’s a good place to catch covid, if someone in the gym has it.
If the weather is good dh and I will arrange schedules so that we can just go for a two hour walk. I’m self-employed and dh does medical research with his own lab, so it’s easy for us to rearrange our hours.
We’ve got four bedrooms and a basement and no kids at home, so we could just rotate which rooms get cleaned each week. In fact we may do that anyway. I’m going to ask her not to do anything to the master bedroom, I can take care of that myself.
I cleaned myself for many years and maybe fifteen years ago my mother gave me a cleaning service as her birthday present to me. I’ve been addicted ever since. I’m one of those people who feels they have to tidy the house so the cleaner can clean, it keeps my natural disorderliness in check.
I am very aware of how lucky I am to be able to afford this luxury!
Yesterday I had my 2nd PT visit in two weeks. Each therapist has their own area of the clinic. Masks are required and they have boxes to stand inside or sit in the waiting area. I hadn’t been since early March so I was happy to get back to it.
Today is the dentist for a cleaning. They called yesterday and asked a series of questions. I’m to call when I get there and the hygienist will come out for me when she is ready for me. Masks are required until you get in the chair. I’ll report later how it went.
I would love for my cleaning person to come back. I haven’t heard from her, I know she lives with her elderly parents and also takes a bus an hour each way to get to my city. I don’t love cleaning but I’m surviving.
My son and DIL when to a protest. They have been advised by the protest organizers to get a test. I think DIL had hers scheduled for yesterday. My son on the other hand is lagging with scheduling. Anyone can get tested for free in our community. They did wear masks at the protest and march.
Back to the asymptomatic spread kerfluffle, WHO is dialing back their comments from yesterday, saying it was a “misunderstnding”:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/06/09/asymptomatic-coronavirus-spread-who/