BBC: China pneumonia outbreak: COVID-19 Global Pandemic

[TD_washingtonredskins]

 

 

2 hours ago, hail2skins said:

I do legitimately feel for certain business owners who have been adversely impacted by the situation, and hope that any future stimulus is smartly targeted to such people.

 

But again, do you hear many people who (correctly) acknowledge the economic impact also acknowledge the serious nature of the virus? No, they claim the virus is fake, the people who are counted as covid deaths actually died from something else, we haven't had any additional deaths this year than normal, etc. Its in people's own words.

 

 

This isn't true at all and is one of the fundamental issues ever having an honest conversation about the virus. So many people want to put you in box A or box B and that's simply unfair! 

 

I think there's a HUGE economic impact. I think the media and many people have overblown things. BUT, I know it's a real virus and I know it's extremely contagious. I honestly cannot be the first person you've encountered who is in the middle of that Venn diagram...

 

I'll probably regret admitting this, but I do believe SOME of the deaths counted as Covid deaths are from other things. Possibly not anymore, but I know that early on there were far too many anecdotal cases I heard about (my wife's uncle, for example) where they just classified it as Covid without any type of testing. So, I don't think it's a hoax or that MOST of the deaths are incorrectly assigned, but I believe it happened to some extent. 

[tshile]

1 minute ago, TD_washingtonredskins said:

I think the media and many people have overblown things

then you’re part of the problem. 
 

I realize you don’t want to be part of the problem. I realize you don’t think you are. But if your views consist of:

- the media is over blowing things

- I’m skeptical the death numbers attributed to covid are real

 

the reality is, pending actual evidence of bad numbers being reported (intentionally or unintentionally), the more likely situation is the number is underreported because early on deaths were attributed to things we didn’t know was caused by covid (or weren’t even thinking because it was before March anyways. ) we have learned since then that there are parts of this that cause death outside of respiratory failure related items. Mainly blood clots. They’ve reviews cases and contact tracing and found instances they’re sure were covid related but it was too late to do testing or whatever. 
 

im sure you can find some misclassifications too but no one has yet provided any real data suggest those cases exist on some sort of systemic level. But there is evidence the under reporting of deaths due to what I just said did exist on a systemic level. 
 

to date, pending someone providing actual evidence to the contrary, the narrative that the dwarves are over reported is akin to the narrative that the election had fraud issues. Ie: claims certain people are making with no actual evidence to back up the claim of a systemic level issue that alerted the numbers in any significant way. Meanwhile there’s actual evidence to the contrary: under reporting or voter suppression 

 

That may change in the future if someone provides evidence but that’s where we are right now. 
 

im not trying to be a dick. I’m just trying to be honest and direct. 
 

Based on pieces of your post I do not think the issue here is that we don’t understand you and your position at this time. 
 

I think the issue is that actually do understand you and your position at this time. I think the issue is you just don’t like what that means about you, at this time. 
 

I do not think you are a bad person. I do not think you mean harm. I think you are lacking in being informed on the issue, and given that it’s public information, that it’s been public for a while, and that you’re actively engaged in this conversation and still cling to these positions despite being told by multiple people the flaws in your opinions, that it’s willful ignorance at this point. 
 

(to be clear ignorance doesn’t mean you’re stupid and I do not intend it that way. It means that the information is out there, you’ve been shown it and have access to it, but choose not to accept it)
 

 

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

13 minutes ago, TD_washingtonredskins said:

This isn't true at all and is one of the fundamental issues ever having an honest conversation about the virus. So many people want to put you in box A or box B and that's simply unfair! 

It's not really about putting you in a box though.  It's that there are way too many people who don't take it seriously.  If everyone was in the middle of the diagram as you put it, we wouldn't be where we are today.  Ultimately, everyone in the diagram is paying the price for the actions of those who refuse to take it seriously.

[Larry]

12 minutes ago, tshile said:

the reality is, pending actual evidence of bad numbers being reported (intentionally or unintentionally), the more likely situation is the number is underreported because early on deaths were attributed to things we didn’t know was caused by covid (or weren’t even thinking because it was before March anyways. ) we have learned since then that there are parts of this that cause death outside of respiratory failure related items. Mainly blood clots. They’ve reviews cases and contact tracing and found instances they’re sure were covid related but it was too late to do testing or whatever. 

 

Was going to help support the argument for undercounting Covid deaths with a statistic I remembered from earlier.  But when Googling for an article for the actual statustic, I find a Politifact article that the claim I was going to quote, is, well, I'd say misleading.  Disclosure compels me to rebut the point I was going to make, here.  

 

Politifact: Claim that Florida is undercounting COVID-19 deaths uses flawed comparison

 

Short explanation:  (My words).  

 

The statistic I remembered seeing was that, if you go to the CDCs website, and search for deaths in Florida for the months of Mar-July, for pneumonia, for the last 20 years, what you get is:  

 

19 years of 900 deaths +/- 10.  

1 year of 2,700.  

 

The Politifact article points out that that's because it's an apples and oranges comparison.  

 

It seems that, for the current year, the CDC lists every death in which pneumonia was listed as a cause.  But at the end of the year, they go through the statistics, and list the deaths for which it was the primary cause.  So it's perfectly normal for the current year statistic to be much larger.  

 

Figured other people might be retaining that untrue statistic, just like I was.  

 

[hail2skins]

34 minutes ago, TD_washingtonredskins said:

This isn't true at all and is one of the fundamental issues ever having an honest conversation about the virus. So many people want to put you in box A or box B and that's simply unfair!  

TD, it is likely that you have a larger social circle than I do, since I'm mainly limited to folks at work and a few people who live in my building.  But I have yet to meet a person who says "we probably shouldn't have shut down to the extent we did" who also follows up with "but I know this thing is serious and know that we had to do something." Nope......its always "hoax" and "should've left things open to play out" and "all of these deaths are from something else besides covid."  It is what it is.

 

Its kind of like in the run-up to the election and in the aftermath. Everyone on here knows I predicted Trump to win and wasn't a huge critic of his policies, but thought that the election would be at least as close as 2016's and probably closer, mainly because Trump overdid it on social media. And yet there are people who, although disappointed that he lost, just can't admit that Trump's behavior on social media did not contribute to his defeat. It is denial that borders on insanity. 

[bcl05]

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/12/how-iowa-mishandled-coronavirus-pandemic/617252/

 

This is a good article about what it is like to be a healthcare worker in the midwest right now.  I'm a doc in MN, and am on the C19 frontline team for our hospital (not my usual area of expertise at all, but this is an all-hands-on-deck situation).  The constant waves of sick and dying people are overwhelming us, and yet people still don't take it seriously and go about their day going to stores and restaurants and parties.  I've had patients yell at me that I'm crazy and that their disease is a hoax, or just a cold, or I'm just in it for the money, or whatever, and a few days later they are intubated or dead.  

 

If you are not taking this seriously and still not wearing a mask or going out with friends and going to restaurants, you are part of the problem.  If you are debating about whether the deaths are real or overhyped, you are insulting the suffering of patients, their families, and all the healthcare workers who are fighting this every day.  I hate that this has exposed such selfishness and callousness in our society.   

[Larry]

Now, though, I do think tshile is bringing up a good point.  That at least some times, the best way to measure the impact of major events is the "excess deaths" statistic.  Basically "how many people died this year, compared to previous years, regardless of particular reasons?"  

 

Example:  Hurricane Maria.  

 

The number of people who died because, say, they were trapped in their house by rising flood waters, and drowned during the hurricane, was relatively small.  

 

But what about, say, somebody who got trapped when their house collapsed, and died two days later?  Was that person killed by the hurricane, too?  

 

What about, say, the person who had a heart attack, and nobody could call 911 because the phones were down?  Or the ambulance couldn't get to them?  Or they got electrocuted because they tried to move a downed power line that they thought was dead?  

 

Back to Covid:  

 

It's undeniable that early on, people died of Covid and didn't get listed in the "death count".  

 

Early on, the worst outbreak in the country was at a nursing home in Seattle.  Pulling from memory, they had an outbreak.  And in a one week period, 28 residents died.  

 

But in those days:  

 

1)  To be called a Covid death, there had to be a positive Covid test, prior to death.

2)  To be tested, the patient had to be admitted to the hospital.  

3)  And 15 of those 28 patients died so quickly that they didn't make it to the hospital.  Therefore, no Covid test.  Therefore, they didn't count.  

 

Now, in terms of the few months later?  

 

How many people died due to strokes or heart attacks caused by Covid, that didn't get counted as Covid, because in those days, we thought Covid only affected the lungs?  

 

How many people were scheduled for, say, a cardiac bypass, but because of the Covid surge, elective procedures got cancelled?  Should those people count as "Covid deaths"?  

 

[hail2skins]

3 minutes ago, Larry said:

How many people were scheduled for, say, a cardiac bypass, but because of the Covid surge, elective procedures got cancelled?  Should those people count as "Covid deaths"?  

 

I don't think that scenario should count as a covid death.

 

I struggle with the scenario though. If such a bypass procedure was cancelled by the provider, then that's an indictment on the health care system. However, if the patient cancelled it due to fears of being around a medical facility during covid, then that's on the individual.

 

Either way, there needs to be a 9/11-type commission at some point on how this could've been handled better across the board. 

[Larry]

3 minutes ago, hail2skins said:

I struggle with the scenario though. If such a bypass procedure was cancelled by the provider, then that's an indictment on the health care system. However, if the patient cancelled it due to fears of being around a medical facility during covid, then that's on the individual.

 

Yep.  The true blame in that hypothetical is that either the physician or the patient looked at the risks of going to a hospital during the surge of a contagious, deadly, disease, versus an elective medical procedure, and didn't choose "let's ignore the deadly disease", the way they clearly should have.  

 

8 minutes ago, hail2skins said:

Either way, there needs to be a 9/11-type commission at some point on how this could've been handled better across the board. 

 

You mean, like, pay attention to the things we've known for 100 years, about how to limit the spread of contagious diseases, and not have a major political party intentionally lie to the public, to encourage them not to follow such rules?  

[tshile]

42 minutes ago, Larry said:

 

Figured other people might be retaining that untrue statistic, just like I was.  

 

Well it depends on who you’re using. 
 

To my knowledge, most major media outlets are using John’s Hopkins not the CDC

 

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

 

If I’m understanding your point, and their write up, correctly then the ~270k death number is based on confirmed cases. Not the CDC’s numbers based on what politico is talking about. 
 

if I’m missing something let me know. 

[tshile]

26 minutes ago, Larry said:

Now, though, I do think tshile is bringing up a good point.

I agree with most of this post except I’m not sure how I feel about using excess deaths as a measurement. 
 

my understanding is the 270k number is from JHU and they are working on confirmed cases. 
 

not excess deaths. 
 

im honestly not sure how I feel about excess deaths as a calculator beyond this: it’s better than nothing but it’s not an accurate picture and there’s a number of reasons why it may be over or under representing the true number. 
 

if I’m wrong about JHU then I’ll gladly reevaluate the entire conversation.  
 

tagging @TD_washingtonredskins since he seemed to think you were making a good point, but as I’ve said I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing. 
 

hes accusing the 270k number of being wrong. JHU is responsible for that number and claims it’s based on confirmed cases. So if you’ve got some actual evidence that JHU is wrong, please share. Otherwise it sounds like bull **** hand waving for one reason or another, and denial of information being provided by an organization respected worldwide on the subject. 

[tshile]

38 minutes ago, hail2skins said:

I don't think that scenario should count as a covid death.

 

I struggle with the scenario though. If such a bypass procedure was cancelled by the provider, then that's an indictment on the health care system. However, if the patient cancelled it due to fears of being around a medical facility during covid, then that's on the individual.

 

Either way, there needs to be a 9/11-type commission at some point on how this could've been handled better across the board. 
 

 

I disagree. To an extent. To my knowledge the only procedures being put off are non-essential or elective ones. To my knowledge surgeries required to ensure someone’s life are not being cancelled. I may be wrong. It’s a big country. I surely cannot be aware of all of it. In fact my awareness is quite limited in scope to my region. 
 

outside of rationing care, I’m not aware of important procedures being canceled due to covid on a statistically significant level (I mention it because I’m sure you can find a case or a handful but we’re talking about 270k deaths so you’re gonna have to show a sizable number to back up a claim the overall number is significantly off)

 

that out of the way - if someone’s death is because they cannot receive care due to covid, even though their care was unrelated to covid, then that’s a covid death to me. The same way someone that has a heart attack during a hurricane when services aren’t available, and it’s otherwise reasonable to assume they would have survived had services been available, is a hurricane related death. 
 

is it a heart attack death?

 

yes. Absolutely. 
 

but in the context of trying to account for deaths related to a specific, significant event and the “damage” the event caused, it’s also important that it be counted as a hurricane death. Those numbers are meaningful in how we analyze the impact of an event and better prepare for another one. Discounting it misses the boat on what’s important and why. 
 

 

 

30 minutes ago, Larry said:

 

You mean, like, pay attention to the things we've known for 100 years, about how to limit the spread of contagious diseases, and not have a major political party intentionally lie to the public, to encourage them not to follow such rules?  

I can’t speak for him but I’ve been advocating for this from the start. And my answer is NO!

 

what it needs to be about is the federal and state responses. Also the individual healthcare facilities and how they responded. 
 

im not at liberty to divulge but on a basic level: there’s a whole hell of a lot to this story that isn’t getting out there, that is bad/scary/sad/unacceptable, and when the time is right it needs to be aired and dissected and responsible parties need to be named and held accountable. 
 

the notion that all our healthcare workers are hero’s and everyone’s doing their best is utter bull****. There’s a lot of bad actors here, mostly due to ignorance, stupidity, lack of real meaningful important leadership qualities, indecisiveness, and lacking courage to do what’s right for petty or stupid reasons. 
 

it needs to be known.

 

kind of like how the 9-11 commission report revealed that our ability to communicate during an unexpected disaster was, at best, pathetic and damaging. Did you listen to the tapes? It was a disaster. For many reasons. 
 

we’re gonna find similar issues with this. Without even getting to the federal/state level. 
 

it’s embarrassing as a citizen and it’s deeply troubling the bull**** that’s gone on behind the scenes. We’ve failed as a society. On multiple levels. 
 

I eagerly await when this is done and the instant “America is awesome look how we defeated the virus!” Bull**** that will come out about it. And that it’ll likely come from the same group of people that have caused it to be so awful. It’ll be wrong. It’ll be lies. We need a thorough investigation to expose that fact. 

or we will have not learned and changed what’s needed to be better prepared next time. 

[Fergasun]

Twenty five years ago, you would never believe that a mass of people would believe "random non-experts who you have never met" over credentialed doctors, yet here we are.  That situation is "not so bad" when it comes to national policy on national domestic policy.  But it is horrible when we are dealing with a global pandemic. 

 

[PleaseBlitz]

Quote

Anthony S. Fauci, the country’s top infectious-disease expert, said Thursday that he plans to stay on in his role as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases after the Biden administration takes office.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/12/03/coronavirus-covid-live-updates-us/#link-AKO7253D2FH7ZBEKVOMSTRBPMA

 

Thank you baby jesus.  

Edited December 3, 2020 by PleaseBlitz

[mistertim]

13 hours ago, China said:

Ohio Department of Health now recommending those in Ohio avoid traveling to Ohio

 

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio has been added to the Ohio Department of Health’s COVID-19 Travel Advisory map, meaning the state is recommending Ohioans avoid traveling to Ohio, and those entering Ohio after traveling from Ohio are advised to self-quarantine in Ohio for 14 days.

 

 

Obviously, outside of The Matrix or a Christopher Nolan movie, this is physically impossible. To be clear, you are free to move about the state, but the ODH recommends staying home except for necessary trips.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

JFC Idaho. Are you TRYING to be the worst or does it just come naturally?

 

(Disclaimer: my family on my mother's side is from Idaho. So I know the answer is actually #2)

[visionary]

 

[Dan T.]

Former Md. Rep. John Delaney has made an interesting proposal:

 

 

 

[Barry.Randolphe]

that is actually a solid idea....that'll force these anti-maskers to get vaccinated to get their stimulus

[Larry]

28 minutes ago, Dan T. said:

Former Md. Rep. John Delaney has made an interesting proposal:

 

"The Democrats are trying to create a Democrat-only stimulus package."  

[China]

Dr. Ashish Jha: more people dying at home because hospitals are full

 

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) – Coronavirus deaths are on the rise in Rhode Island. One medical expert is sounding the alarm on a trend he’s seeing in hospitals locally and across the country that could be contributing to those deaths.

 

Brown University Dean of School of Public Health, Dr. Ashish Jha, says because hospitals are full and beds for critically ill are scarce, he believes patients who would’ve been admitted a few months ago, could be sent home now as beds are being saved for the sickest of the sick.

 

“I’m really worried about what’s happening with hospitals both in Rhode Island and across the country,” Dr. Jha said. “Just in terms of availability, when hospitals fill up it gets harder and harder for people to find care.”

 

Dr. Jha spent weeks combing through the data watching cases rise, but the number of hospitalizations not nearly matching what is expected.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[visionary]

 

[Riggo-toni]

 

[visionary]

 

[China]

More Americans died of COVID-19 on Wednesday than the number of people killed on 9/11

 

On Wednesday, the US recorded 3,157 coronavirus deaths, marking a new single-day high, according to Johns Hopkins University.

More people died from COVID-19 in the US on Wednesday than the number of people killed in the 9/11 terror attacks: 2,977.

There have been more than 273,000 reported COVID-19 deaths in the US and it's closing in on 14 million confirmed cases.

CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield on Wednesday warned that the coming months are going to be the "most difficult in the public health history" of the country.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[LD0506]