covid-19

I haven't been to my work site since the 9th of last month. Last time I did any in person work was passports the weekend before processing was halted.

We are on week 2 of telecommuting for professional development. 2nd stage of emergency operations rolled out yesterday asking us if we have any underlying issues that could be a red flag with covid-19. So it looks like they are still moving forward with using us to handle the covid camps that we are projected to need in a couple of weeks.

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UK's curve for mortality was basically indistinguishable from Italy's, but should diverge a lot if official stats start including strongly suspected covid-deaths in addition to confirmed ones. Today's number would boost the UK by a couple of days relative to Italy.

Today's number was a bad one in the UK. :(

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Least surprising news yet.

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

Why don't you start with the outlet that was calling the coronavirus a hoax a few short weeks ago, rather than one that used the wrong piece of footage to talk about something that is actually happening?

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Originally Posted by Hazir

How relevant to the reality of what is happening is that piece of footage? How relevant is the deluge of misinformation that Fox News is spewing over the nation? You loose buddy, you think it's business as usual in the midst of a crisis of biblical proportions. Nobody gives a fuck about your jihad against 'liberal bias' when people are dying by the hundreds and the entire health system is being overwhelmed. I do know what the cold type of behavior you show leads to in times of crisis. You will know it yourself when it's no longer liberals struggling with this pandemic but your own sorry lot. This virus doesn't care much for political affiliation, but it's awfully fond of killing fat people by drowning them in their own fluids.

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Ah but remember, Lewk thinks it IS a hoax, and wildly overblown and things like this "liberal media bias" throwing up "fake footage" is how it's being perpetrated. Because it's not like HE'S likely to die from the coronavirus.

And otherwise Lewk thinks New Yorkers behaviour is responsible for the illness.

Governor finally grew a pair and shut the state down. Stay at home order for everyone till the end of the month. I'm curious how my work will react. 30 days of webinars is a lot of webinars for those that don't get activated for emergency operations.

Sadly, based off the projections this stay at home order looks like it's going to be a few weeks to late to help the initial hospital overcrowding coming over the next 10 to 14 days. Hope the curve drops sharply after that.

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

Governor finally grew a pair and shut the state down. Stay at home order for everyone till the end of the month. I'm curious how my work will react. 30 days of webinars is a lot of webinars for those that don't get activated for emergency operations.

Sadly, based off the projections this stay at home order looks like it's going to be a few weeks to late to help the initial hospital overcrowding coming over the next 10 to 14 days. Hope the curve drops sharply after that.

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Optimistic projection peak hospital resource use abt 1 month away. Take care :up:

The new normal: I saw an airplane. I mean; I heard its sound and was surprised to see it. Right where a couple of weeks ago there was a busy approach route to Schiphol Airport.

Nothing to worry about, we have Stable Genius-in-Chief taking care of things and looking closely at implementing the playbook laid out by Hungary.

A politician who just doesn't know how to not lie:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EUR-ep3W...png&name=small

Not even in a time where truthfulness is more important than ever.

Yeah, isn't it lovely how he uses the projections of suppression to 'disprove' the projections of doing nothing.

I don't consider the man intelligent enough to cobble together a lie.

It's worse than that... wrong research group, but also wrong number. Doubly wrong. Apparently he's given up Twitter for Lent but he's still good with lying.

Shame the end of the article was cut off but it's correct to keep in mind the opportunity cost of any actions taken - and to ensure any necessary but temporary Draconian state powers remain temporary.

The emergency legislation that was passed put forth the most Draconian Police powers ever put forward, the largest state seizure of power since the Dark Ages. Larger even than WWII.

It's often joked that during the Napoleonic War a temporary tax was put in place called Income Tax and the rest is history. We must keep a track on the seizure by the state of powers during this pandemic and ensure when it is safe to do so those powers are relinquished.

The pandemic is serious but fighting it must not come at the cost of permanently curtailing hard won liberties. This must not be a Reichstag Fire incident.

There is no interest group in society that's going to want these measures kept in place a minute longer than necessary. The public will want their lives back, business will want people back to work and spending to make money for them. If anything, the concern would be ending the measures too early because it looks like we're on the right track, and then seeing a second flare up.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

Shame the end of the article was cut off but it's correct to keep in mind the opportunity cost of any actions taken - and to ensure any necessary but temporary Draconian state powers remain temporary.

The emergency legislation that was passed put forth the most Draconian Police powers ever put forward, the largest state seizure of power since the Dark Ages. Larger even than WWII.

It's often joked that during the Napoleonic War a temporary tax was put in place called Income Tax and the rest is history. We must keep a track on the seizure by the state of powers during this pandemic and ensure when it is safe to do so those powers are relinquished.

The pandemic is serious but fighting it must not come at the cost of permanently curtailing hard won liberties. This must not be a Reichstag Fire incident.

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Interesting how little you trust your Conservative government. Do you seriously think that your PM needs an article that denies the seriousness of the situation to understand that it would not be diligent to throw out the baby with the bathwater?

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Originally Posted by Hazir

How relevant to the reality of what is happening is that piece of footage? How relevant is the deluge of misinformation that Fox News is spewing over the nation? You loose buddy, you think it's business as usual in the midst of a crisis of biblical proportions. Nobody gives a fuck about your jihad against 'liberal bias' when people are dying by the hundreds and the entire health system is being overwhelmed. I do know what the cold type of behavior you show leads to in times of crisis. You will know it yourself when it's no longer liberals struggling with this pandemic but your own sorry lot. This virus doesn't care much for political affiliation, but it's awfully fond of killing fat people by drowning them in their own fluids.

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First time I've been called loose during an internet discussion. ;)

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Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy

Ah but remember, Lewk thinks it IS a hoax, and wildly overblown and things like this "liberal media bias" throwing up "fake footage" is how it's being perpetrated. Because it's not like HE'S likely to die from the coronavirus.

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Negative ghost rider. The China Virus isn't a hoax (though it is a hoax that Trump implied the virus was a hoax). I can admit my predictions were unfortunately wrong in terms of how widespread and deadly the disease would be. China covered up a lot of it and it wasn't until Italy started to go to shit that we realized how bad this could get. Trump actually took some wise precautions such as banning travel to China at the same time the WHO said that it wasn't necessary. A week after that took placed Pelosi was encouraging people to attend public events. Two weeks after that NY politicians were encouraging people to continue dining out. Politicians, pundits and yes even doctors were varying degrees of wrong on their predictions.

This is the type of shit that gets encouraged when you call pandemics hoaxes
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/nati...y/2355727/?amp

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Originally Posted by Loki

I second Aimless. What the heck is wrong with you? Most of my family lives in NYC. At least one family member has the virus, and I can freaking assure you that it's impossible to get into a hospital there right now as long as you're incapable of breathing on your own. It's also virtually impossible to get appointments with GPs, who are totally swamped. But sure, trust your Dear Leader and his band of anti-life psychopaths. It's not like they lie every time they open their mouth. Let's pretend an innocent mistake is indicative of some major conspiracy to make the freaking worst president in American history (he's earned the title with his coronavirus response) look bad. Like he needs any help.

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Agreed! What's wrong with Lewk is he's been listening to Trump FakeSpeak and Fox News. What's scary is that millions of others do, too. :picard:

<I hope your family is doing okay, Loki. And Aimless, good luck with your mom!>



edit: It's about time Florida got with the program. Hope it's not too late...
Wonder what he'll do about the cruise ships with sick (and dead) people hoping to dock?

On that note, I wonder what the Navy will do about their battle ships with sick sailors? It's pathetic that an Admiral has to beg for help.
AND that Trump used the Coronavirus Task Force briefing to have the DoD brag about the war on drugs, and The Wall.

It's clear that association with Fox rots the brain:

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These people are just the worst. They are also the dumbest.

Well, even Swedes are taking risks that can't be blamed on Fox News. :bulb:

Sorry, I was referring to the thread and Hume's endorsement of it, not to the tweet. Updated my post.

And I was saying that even you (a physician) can't convince your mother to change her behavior, even tho it puts her in an (even) higher risk group. Fox News has nothing to do with that...

This is good: https://medium.com/@noahhaber/flatte...y-9aa8cf92d652

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

This is good: https://medium.com/@noahhaber/flatte...y-9aa8cf92d652

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The irony of you posting this so soon after your asinine take on "suppression"... can't help but wonder if you've even read it.

haha, it's so fun to make our failures funny, but the timing is off :donkey:

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Originally Posted by GGT

And I was saying that even you (a physician) can't convince your mother to change her behavior, even tho it puts her in an (even) higher risk group. Fox News has nothing to do with that...

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I think you have misunderstood my mother's attitude towards this, and therefore drawn a parallel that isn't informative. My mother is not reckless, any more than any other person her age willing to work with sick patients during a pandemic that puts them at high risk of harm, or any other person who has nobody to help them where they live. It's not irrational to want to work with sick people even if it puts you at higher risk of harm.

However, that has nothing to do with the thread I posted about. The thread calls into question NYC's reported numbers of covid19 deaths on the basis of, well, a stupid and ignorant analysis. Hume, a popular Fox contributor, endorsed this stupid and ignorant analysis, unfairly undermining solidarity with NYC when the city needs solidarity more than ever.

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Originally Posted by Aimless

The irony of you posting this so soon after your asinine take on "suppression"... can't help but wonder if you've even read it.

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No point going round in circles again but my take on suppression was based upon the government and media's definition of containment v suppression v mitigation.

The report you quoted gave suppression or mitigation as the only options and not containment. What you defined as suppression I'd define as containment and if we're talking cross-purposes with different definitions then that's the issue with the English language, words can mean multiple things.

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Originally Posted by Aimless

I think you have misunderstood my mother's attitude towards this, and therefore drawn a parallel that isn't informative. My mother is not reckless, any more than any other person her age willing to work with sick patients during a pandemic that puts them at high risk of harm, or any other person who has nobody to help them where they live. It's not irrational to want to work with sick people even if it puts you at higher risk of harm.

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But you agree that it's not wise to travel 2-3 hours on public transportation, because that poses a greater risk for anyone, especially for senior citizens, and if your country's policies aren't grounded in scientific models around social distancing, it's an ever greater risk. Right? Otherwise you wouldn't worry.

I'm not criticizing your mother's humanitarian instincts. She sounds like a jewel. The only thing that's irrational -- or reckless -- are policies that don't protect people like her (or you, for that matter) and it sounds like Sweden hasn't done a better job at that than the US.

Developed nations have failed miserably during this covid-19 crisis, but it can't *all* be blamed on Fox News, or even Trump. Those are just symptoms of larger, systemic, global problems that have been festering for decades, even generations. :(

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

There is no interest group in society that's going to want these measures kept in place a minute longer than necessary. The public will want their lives back, business will want people back to work and spending to make money for them. If anything, the concern would be ending the measures too early because it looks like we're on the right track, and then seeing a second flare up.

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Originally Posted by Hazir

Interesting how little you trust your Conservative government. Do you seriously think that your PM needs an article that denies the seriousness of the situation to understand that it would not be diligent to throw out the baby with the bathwater?

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Related posts but yes I don't trust the Civil Service, especially the Home Office - and I don't regardless of politics. I am not a partisan hack and don't believe in "my party right or wrong" - I quite consistently opposed the party I'd normally support last year because it was going against what I believe in.

There are always some who believe 'why let a good crisis go to waste' - even to the disgusting point of on the day of 9/11 a then government advisor said it was "a good day to bury bad news". A lot of powers that I would 100% oppose in normal circumstances have been taken and given to the Police - many in the Police and the Home Office etc will want some of those powers to remain after this pandemic is history.

Under no circumstances can that be permitted. The law has been changed more than just to have a lockdown - and all of that must be tracked and reversed afterwards.

Freeeedom! *cough*

Freedom matters.

What powers are you concerned might be retained, exactly?

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

The UK having a higher per capita rate of testing depends on what the other countries the news source decided to cherry pick for their graph are, the purpose of which is to show how bad the US is failing at this. I (can't be bothered to) find a full data set that's easily

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Funny story.

Coronavirus: Health experts 'frustrated' by low UK virus testing

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Twitter Link

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

What powers are you concerned might be retained, exactly?

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For a start: It has been made illegal to refuse to co-operate with the Police or to refuse to answer a Police officers questions or to refuse to follow an officers instructions.

Do you see see any concerns with that if any element of that was kept post-coronavirus?

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Originally Posted by Steely Glint

Funny story.

Coronavirus: Health experts 'frustrated' by low UK virus testing

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I agree with you 100% on this. What was a strength has absolutely now become a major weakness.

There is a global shortage of reagents etc to produce tests but everything must be done to ramp up production. Also PHE must decentralise it.

Just as there was an effort to ramp up production of ventilators which extended to companies that had never previously done it including the likes of Dyson and McClaren etc the same should happen with testing. Whatever can be done should be mobilised to ramp up testing as fast as possible.

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

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Action now would be later than ideal but is never too late. The US is much bigger than the European nations so per capita its not so bad - yet - and the USA has many major structural advantages over Europe that means it should spread less than in Europe, but inaction means it will probably spread more in the end.