SARS-CoV-2; CoVID-19; Coronavirus; Updates and Information

Baal said:

The fact that we are at 65,000 now (actually more) even with steps taken (especially in California) makes that argument ring strongly false to me, but in any case what's the point? 200,000 is supposed to be an acceptable number?

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The interviewee, who is a Professor at Stanford Medical school, believes that mask wearing and hygienic practices seemed to slow the disease spread in every situation he looked at even before the advent of social distancing. His issue with the 2mm number was that it didn't track with any data he has looked at on the disease spread in any country ( and since he took an interest in Wuhan quite early as he had friends in China he actually was analyzing their pandemic in real time).

Part of the issue here is not whether 200,000 deaths is an acceptable number as once the disease is in your population, and if you don't prevent the spread to the elderly population (90% of the deaths come from that population), you are going to get higher casualties. He argues that if economic shutdown had zero costs, then of course you should do it to save lives. But In his view, the shutdown will cost more lives ultimately than the virus will take. That is the point that people are not willing to discuss and that is why having an accurate estimate of the death toll and what it would take to control it is important.

It is a good interview and I am not doing it justice. But in the end, policy making needs to balance things out and know what is necessary and what is not.

All of these arguments have an embedded assumption that the only two disease outcomes are death and being totally fine. Do we actually know that?

Anyone who has had shingles knows viruses are not always really gone when you think they are gone.

I'm also not 100% convinced the shutdown will net take lives. Road deaths are way down for one thing.

But even if shutdown does kill more than virus, we should realize that in an affluent society like america any deaths resulting from an economic disruption were a societal choice and not an inevitable fact. The forces that control us are determined to maintain the pretense of scarcity while we are drowning in abundance. Things could be different, but they're not.

Brs said:

All of these arguments have an embedded assumption that the only two disease outcomes are death and being totally fine. Do we actually know that?

Anyone who has had shingles knows viruses are not always really gone when you think they are gone.

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I already pointed out above that we dont know that. In fact, survivors who were serious enough to be hospitalized may be facing some serious health outcomes down the road such as pulmonary fibrosis or kidney fsilure, possibly neurological issues. This is based on studies showing where the SARS-CoV-2 virus infected cells in post mortum tissues. You are right about shingles. I also point out that in the US these days most HIV positive people dont die of AIDS, they die of kidney failure, heart failure, etc. for the same reason.

Regarding models, the thing to keep in mind is that the best they can do is advise decision making as to likely affects of actions taken, and they need to be constantly checked against real numbers. That is why I like the charts and numbers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory Covid-19 site. They give worst case, midcase and best case scenarios and compare the results of those models against REPORTED numbers to see which model fits best and then extrapolate that to what you would get if current policies are the same. Also, deaths of people 0 to 65 in New York City is actually 27% of total on the Worldometer on April 16.

Of course, we also have historical numbers of what happened in 1918, which us a big part of Fauci's concern..

By the way, nobody thinks that the official death numbers are fully counting the reality.

Occasionally you see people saying out loud the parts that are supposed to be kept quiet -- "let the weak people die" (like some guy on the city planning commission in a town in California, or the Lieutenant Governor of Texas). Some of the high officials not saying that are doing things that indicate that's what they think. History has not been kind to that in the past.

I find it ironic that people keep comparing low death percentage of young versus old people. All lives are precious, correct? The comparison has a bad consequence, i.e. it gives some (young and healthy) a false sense of security that they are invincible. Fortunately these young/healthy folks still are not the ones who make decision but they can riot, complain, do all kind of stupid things which affect others. It is almost impossible to control them in US and we will see more violence as a result. In Vietnam life seems to go back to normal as citizens are used to listen to authority. They volunteered to quarantine or got reported to police to be taken away. Can't do it here!
I strongly believe we need to find ways to balance economy and health. Many what if's scenarios should be studied with life is the most critical factor and treated equally among all human beings. Thus effort to treat, prevent, test should be put at the top of the list. Testing is probably the best way right now to see how we can reopen US economy . It is sad to see up to now testing is still lacking and seems not accurate enough in this country!

Looks like CNN is finally beginning to realize that it can't continue to advocate mindlessly for locking down the whole economy. Smerconish yesterday and this today.

https://youtu.be/92ro9jN0b4E

Yeah, well then there's this.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...9911f4-8b54-11ea-9dfd-990f9dcc71fc_story.html

Baal said:

Yeah, well then there's this.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...9911f4-8b54-11ea-9dfd-990f9dcc71fc_story.html

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The incompetence continues...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ez7htYA5280

Last month, White House National Economic Council chairman Larry Kudlow claimed in an interview that “The cure can’t be worse than the disease, and we’re gonna have to make some difficult trade-offs.” Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said on live television that “lots of grandparents” are willing to “take a chance” on their survival for the good of the economy. Brit Hume of Fox News said it’s “entirely reasonable” to let family members die for the stock market. “We’ll gradually bring those people back and see what happens. Some of them will get sick, some may even die, I don’t know. “ said Dick Kovacevich, former CEO of Wells Fargo. “The damages of keeping the economy closed as it is could be worse than losing a few more people.” Tom Golisano, the founder and chairman of payroll processor Paychex Inc.

For the record, I'll just say that I find those remarks utterly nauseating. But these are not isolated opinions. Of course, those people will be safe where they live and work.

NextLevel said:

The incompetence continues...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ez7htYA5280

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They also withdrew the US from an international vaccine consortium..No explanation was given. I find that even more disturbing.

NextLevel said:

The incompetence continues...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ez7htYA5280

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Seems like this link provides a little more background info:
https://asiatimes.com/2020/04/why-us-outsourced-bat-virus-research-to-wuhan/

Sort of but with a really weird slant to it. It doesn't state why the US provided money for coronavirus research in various species in Wuhan in the first place, and it quotes rightwing extremist Lou Dobbs without noting that independent academic researchers and US intelligence now conclude that SARS-CoV-2 was not man made. There are quite a few reports that that lab had issues. Lots of people have an agenda about that so demand evidence, it may or may not have been as serious as some claim.

Baal said:

Sort of but with a really weird slant to it. It doesn't state why the US provided money for coronavirus research in various species in Wuhan in the first place, and it quotes rightwing extremist Lou Dobbs without noting that independent academic researchers and US intelligence now conclude that SARS-CoV-2 was not man made.

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LOL@ Lou Dobbs... I think that was inserted for its entertainment (or irritant) value. One thrust of the article was the possibility of an accidental leak. Until this outbreak, reading other sources, I did not realize, even with the best protocols, accidents have happened.

I found this interesting from the article,: "indeed in January 2018 the US Embassy in Beijing sent cables warning about the safety of the Wuhan lab and asked for help." (I will follow the link later to see what that was about.)

As early as 2007, researchers have warned about a possible pandemic arising from the wet markets:

The presence of a large reservoir of SARS-CoV-like viruses in horseshoe bats, together withthe culture of eating exotic mammals in southern China, is a timebomb. The possibility of the reemergence of SARS and othernovel viruses from animals or laboratories and therefore the need for preparedness should not be ignored.

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[emphasis added]
https://cmr.asm.org/content/cmr/20/4/660.full.pdf

Baal said:

Sort of but with a really weird slant to it. It doesn't state why the US provided money for coronavirus research in various species in Wuhan in the first place...

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Seems to me like the article does explain why:

In the face of a moratorium in the US, Dr Anthony Fauci – the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and currently the leading doctor in the US Coronavirus Task Force – outsourced in 2015 the GOF research to China’s Wuhan lab and licensed the lab to continue receiving US government funding.

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Perhaps Fauci’s thinking was that his own agency couldn’t safely carry out this research, but a Chinese laboratory could.

Takkyu_ga_suki said:

Seems like this link provides a little more background info:
https://asiatimes.com/2020/04/why-us-outsourced-bat-virus-research-to-wuhan/

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My father sent me that a while back and I posted it here. I don't think it is clear to me what that article really means. The bioweapon angle in a lab with such low funding makes me feel some of it is overblown. But I would need more benchmarks for an intelligently evaluation. It read more like an attempt to fire a salvo in a PR war.

NextLevel said:

My father sent me that a while back and I posted it here. I don't think it is clear to me what that article really means. The bioweapon angle in a lab with such low funding makes me feel some of it is overblown. But I would need more benchmarks for an intelligently evaluation. It read more like an attempt to fire a salvo in a PR war.

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Seems to me the youtube link was more slanted. At least this article presented more background and gives the impression that this research could be brought home rather than outsourced, if necessary after studying the risks, etc. The youtube vid makes it sound like that's it for this kind of research and neither did it present the risks involved in this kind of research (regardless of whether the virus leaked from the lab). Ie., the reporting seemed way more lopsided.

But sorry for re-posting... I usually read threads from the beginning.

Baal said:

Last month, White House National Economic Council chairman Larry Kudlow claimed in an interview that “The cure can’t be worse than the disease, and we’re gonna have to make some difficult trade-offs.” Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said on live television that “lots of grandparents” are willing to “take a chance” on their survival for the good of the economy. Brit Hume of Fox News said it’s “entirely reasonable” to let family members die for the stock market. “We’ll gradually bring those people back and see what happens. Some of them will get sick, some may even die, I don’t know. “ said Dick Kovacevich, former CEO of Wells Fargo. “The damages of keeping the economy closed as it is could be worse than losing a few more people.” Tom Golisano, the founder and chairman of payroll processor Paychex Inc.

For the record, I'll just say that I find those remarks utterly nauseating. But these are not isolated opinions. Of course, those people will be safe where they live and work.

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Some or them are clearly misrepresented but let us leave that aside for a second. Are you saying that your grandparents would not be willing to die to guarantee you a better future if they were presented with the issue as a binary choice (forget the political dimension for a second)?

The Wuhan lab got NIH funds because many coronaviruses are endemic to animals in China and other parts of east Asia, and people have been predicting for a long time that another one would jump to humans and this lab was established for the purpose of learning about them. Coronaviruses were specifically mentioned in the 2016 Pandemic Playbook created by the US National Security Council (which was sadly ignored). It is certainly possible that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from the facility through accident and negligence. I don't trust the people loudly making the claim. But it is possible.

Takkyu_ga_suki said:

Seems to me the youtube link was more slanted. At least this article presented more background and gives the impression that this research could be brought home rather than outsourced, if necessary after studying the risks, etc. The youtube vid makes it sound like that's it for this kind of research and neither did it present the risks involved in this kind of research (regardless of whether the virus leaked from the lab). Ie., the reporting seemed way more lopsided.

But sorry for re-posting... I usually read threads from the beginning.

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Your point is well made and taken. In my mind, the researchers would have made the point if that was the goal. But maybe it is being done secretly and that is my blindspot.

NextLevel said:

Some or them are clearly misrepresented but let us leave that aside for a second. Are you saying that your grandparents would not be willing to die to guarantee you a better future if they were presented with the issue as a binary choice (forget the political dimension for a second)?

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I think they are not misrepresented at all. And it is a false choice. Are you willing to die for Dow-Jones? Should workers be required to work in hazardous conditions without legal and physical protections? This is my last comment that deals with something other than biology or medicine a d I shouldnt have made the last few posts.