The Virus - Are You Affected?

[Loren Pechtel]

Surplus deaths (deaths now minus average deaths at this time of year, for a given time period) is probably the least worst measure to get a grip on what's actually happening. But even those figures are likely to be wrong, particularly in badly affected areas, simply because coroners, doctors, and other officials who handle deaths, have far more important things to do than collect and report statistics for the bureaucrats.

Dead bodies have procedures that are applied to them, few will slip through the cracks.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Passed by a WalMart worker moving a pallet of toilet paper to the paper goods aisle. Another worker was there, he asked her, "What do i do with the ones that don't fit on the shelf?"
She looked at him, said, "Count to three."
Just then, two people ran up from different directions, grabbed two packs off the pallet, and kept running. Like they were going to be in trouble for taking it before it was technically shelved, or like they might miss out if they waited.
I guess should be glad no one went for their knife...

 

[bilby]

Surplus deaths (deaths now minus average deaths at this time of year, for a given time period) is probably the least worst measure to get a grip on what's actually happening. But even those figures are likely to be wrong, particularly in badly affected areas, simply because coroners, doctors, and other officials who handle deaths, have far more important things to do than collect and report statistics for the bureaucrats.

Dead bodies have procedures that are applied to them, few will slip through the cracks.

Few <> None

And the world is a big place, that includes large areas with very few "procedures" that are even close to being universally applied.

In the USA, few will fall through the cracks. In sub-Saharan Africa I wouldn't be at all surprised if most did. People are perfectly able to hold funerals and bury or cremate their dead without telling anyone in the government about it.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Surplus deaths (deaths now minus average deaths at this time of year, for a given time period) is probably the least worst measure to get a grip on what's actually happening. But even those figures are likely to be wrong, particularly in badly affected areas, simply because coroners, doctors, and other officials who handle deaths, have far more important things to do than collect and report statistics for the bureaucrats.

Dead bodies have procedures that are applied to them, few will slip through the cracks.

Few <> None

And the world is a big place, that includes large areas with very few "procedures" that are even close to being universally applied.

In the USA, few will fall through the cracks. In sub-Saharan Africa I wouldn't be at all surprised if most did. People are perfectly able to hold funerals and bury or cremate their dead without telling anyone in the government about it.

Sub-Saharan Africa I will agree with you. You don't just get rid of a body in the US, though--that's just asking for trouble with the police and things aren't so far gone that we wouldn't call it in.

 

[Rhea]

Well, except for that one nursing home with the bodies stacked in some back room...

 

[Jokodo]

Both Sweden and Denmark has an over-capacity in ICU's. That means restrictions in both countries have been too rigid.

What Sweden lacks above all is personal protective gear for health workers. This means that Covid-19 has ripped through old people's homes unchecked. Whoops. These are people who often wouldn't survive even with a ventilator

That is indeed what I think. Denmark has realized that natural herd immunity is not a reasonable goal and appears to be somewhat successful at stomping out the current wave and taking precautions to avoid future outbreaks. Sweden not so much.

You're delusional. Enjoy the voices in your head

Another point, and let's not even talk about deaths: there is still a lot we don't know about the virus. If, for example, we find out in a few months that long-term lung damage is more common than we thought even in relatively mild cases, with young and healthy patients, but there's a treatment that avoids it, a couple hundred thousand Swedes' lungs are already going to be damaged, and won't be made whole again by the new knowledge of the treatment - but only a few thousand Danes' or Norwegians'. I definitely wouldn't want to be in a Swedish politician's or government scientific advisor's skin then.

There is some evidence that this may actually be the case: A divers' doctor in Tyrol, Austria reported this week that out of six patients who were divers before and which he examined weeks after "light" COVID-19 cases, he couldn't declare one fit for diving in good conscience.

(just finding a reddit thread in English but this has been reported in serious news sources in German: https://www.reddit.com/r/scuba/comments/g3uf7o/doctors_in_austria_permanent_lung_damage_after/
https://www.derstandard.at/story/20...gefaehrlichen-folgen-einer-covid-19-infektion )

 

[ZiprHead]

Both Sweden and Denmark has an over-capacity in ICU's. That means restrictions in both countries have been too rigid.

What Sweden lacks above all is personal protective gear for health workers. This means that Covid-19 has ripped through old people's homes unchecked. Whoops. These are people who often wouldn't survive even with a ventilator

That is indeed what I think. Denmark has realized that natural herd immunity is not a reasonable goal and appears to be somewhat successful at stomping out the current wave and taking precautions to avoid future outbreaks. Sweden not so much.

You're delusional. Enjoy the voices in your head

Another point, and let's not even talk about deaths: there is still a lot we don't know about the virus. If, for example, we find out in a few months that long-term lung damage is more common than we thought even in relatively mild cases, with young and healthy patients, but there's a treatment that avoids it, a couple hundred thousand Swedes' lungs are already going to be damaged, and won't be made whole again by the new knowledge of the treatment - but only a few thousand Danes' or Norwegians'. I definitely wouldn't want to be in a Swedish politician's or government scientific advisor's skin then.

There is some evidence that this may actually be the case: A divers' doctor in Tyrol, Austria reported this week that out of six patients who were divers before and which he examined weeks after "light" COVID-19 cases, he couldn't declare one fit for diving in good conscience.

(just finding a reddit thread in English but this has been reported in serious news sources in German: https://www.reddit.com/r/scuba/comments/g3uf7o/doctors_in_austria_permanent_lung_damage_after/
https://www.derstandard.at/story/20...gefaehrlichen-folgen-einer-covid-19-infektion )

Rachel Maddow did a segment on the long term damage the virus does to patient's lungs, livers, and kidneys. Quite an eye opener. Unfortunately I cannot find it to post.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Passed by a WalMart worker moving a pallet of toilet paper to the paper goods aisle. Another worker was there, he asked her, "What do i do with the ones that don't fit on the shelf?"
She looked at him, said, "Count to three."
Just then, two people ran up from different directions, grabbed two packs off the pallet, and kept running. Like they were going to be in trouble for taking it before it was technically shelved, or like they might miss out if they waited.
I guess should be glad no one went for their knife...

People are still scared. Even among Trumpkins, they liked him for the attitude he displays but know he is not the leader to handle a crisis in such dire need of leadership.
We’ll see if he can convince enough of them that the continued deaths reported are fake news.
If he fucks this up the way I think he’s going to fuck this up (by dragging it out unnecessarily), he may just be responsible for his own loss come November.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Well, except for that one nursing home with the bodies stacked in some back room...

Delaying reporting, not non-reporting.

 

[Toni]

Surplus deaths (deaths now minus average deaths at this time of year, for a given time period) is probably the least worst measure to get a grip on what's actually happening. But even those figures are likely to be wrong, particularly in badly affected areas, simply because coroners, doctors, and other officials who handle deaths, have far more important things to do than collect and report statistics for the bureaucrats.

Dead bodies have procedures that are applied to them, few will slip through the cracks.

This is not accurate. Most bodies do not have or need to have autopsies performed. In my state, any body found unattended is automatically autopsied but otherwise, cause of death is almost always already established as most people die in a medical setting. Autopsies are performed only when the cause of death is unknown or if there is some other kind of investigation being conducted, such as a criminal investigation or if for some reason, an insurance company wants one or perhaps the family if they wish to dispute the presumptive cause of death.

Medical facilities are being overwhelmed with cases of COVID 19. Bodies are piling up. There are reports of mass graves. Do you really think that there are enough coroners or medical examiners to handle the number of deaths due to presumptive COVID 19? There simply are not, nor are there places to store bodies until samples can be collected tested and an autopsy can be conducted. Not to mention the risk of exposure to any person handling the body (yes, I know the virus is not known to be transmitted via blood but there are a lot of body fluids that are not blood).

There are rumors/reports that deaths due to COVID 19 are not being properly counted--either being vastly undercounted or vastly over counted, depending on situation and news source/political hay to be made.

 

[ZiprHead]

To add a little levity...

A Supermarket Director Had The Best Response To A Hoarder Who Tried To Return Products

John-Paul Drake told the story on his YouTube channel during his monthly show, “Retail Wrap.”

“I had my first customer yesterday who said he wanted to get a refund on 150 packs of 32-pack toilet paper and 150 units of one-liter sanitizer,” he said.

For the mathematically challenged, that’s freaking 4800 rolls of toilet paper. Even if you used a whole roll a day, it would take OVER 13 YEARS to get through that much TP.

Drake’s response? He flipped him the bird.

 

[Keith&Co.]

I may start a bingo game for weekly grocery shopping. Just list some random products and if the shelf for one is more than half empty, that's a mark.

Paper towels/toilet paper is the FREE space, naturally.

Today, the entire pepper aisle was down to one half of the green pepper bin. No red, yellow, orange, chili, jalapeno, nothing.
And the only herb was one bunch of cilantro.

Wonder if i could get the kids to make it a gambling game?

 

[GenesisNemesis]

Someone at work (I work at an Amazon warehouse) got infected, so now I'm staying the fuck home. Fortunately they're excusing unpaid time off, but it would, of course, be nice to have more paid leave...

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I may start a bingo game for weekly grocery shopping. Just list some random products and if the shelf for one is more than half empty, that's a mark.

Paper towels/toilet paper is the FREE space, naturally.

Today, the entire pepper aisle was down to one half of the green pepper bin. No red, yellow, orange, chili, jalapeno, nothing.
And the only herb was one bunch of cilantro.

Wonder if i could get the kids to make it a gambling game?

Ramen bare bones 5 to 1...

Over/Under on spaghetti sauce is 1.5 shelves.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Surplus deaths (deaths now minus average deaths at this time of year, for a given time period) is probably the least worst measure to get a grip on what's actually happening. But even those figures are likely to be wrong, particularly in badly affected areas, simply because coroners, doctors, and other officials who handle deaths, have far more important things to do than collect and report statistics for the bureaucrats.

Dead bodies have procedures that are applied to them, few will slip through the cracks.

This is not accurate. Most bodies do not have or need to have autopsies performed. In my state, any body found unattended is automatically autopsied but otherwise, cause of death is almost always already established as most people die in a medical setting. Autopsies are performed only when the cause of death is unknown or if there is some other kind of investigation being conducted, such as a criminal investigation or if for some reason, an insurance company wants one or perhaps the family if they wish to dispute the presumptive cause of death.

Medical facilities are being overwhelmed with cases of COVID 19. Bodies are piling up. There are reports of mass graves. Do you really think that there are enough coroners or medical examiners to handle the number of deaths due to presumptive COVID 19? There simply are not, nor are there places to store bodies until samples can be collected tested and an autopsy can be conducted. Not to mention the risk of exposure to any person handling the body (yes, I know the virus is not known to be transmitted via blood but there are a lot of body fluids that are not blood).

There are rumors/reports that deaths due to COVID 19 are not being properly counted--either being vastly undercounted or vastly over counted, depending on situation and news source/political hay to be made.

You misunderstand. Yes, we will never know the true cause of death. I was talking about the excess mortality, though--in the developed world we will see that because the deaths will be recorded even if the cause is unknown.

 

[Jayjay]

You misunderstand. Yes, we will never know the true cause of death. I was talking about the excess mortality, though--in the developed world we will see that because the deaths will be recorded even if the cause is unknown.

Actually, no. Or at least it will be misleading. This is because the measures taken to restrict the spread of the virus has positive impact on all kinds of other deaths: traffic deaths, other infectious diseases, accidents, drug overdoses, etc.

 

[Emily Lake]

And that is assuming it can even work. We don't know that: we don't know that surviving an infection (almost) universally grants longterm immunity. Sure, it's a very reasonable assumption given what we know about similar viruses

I am not an immunologist... but I thought that coronoviruses generally don't confer long-term immunity...which is one of the barriers to a cure for the common cold? IIRC, common cold is predominantly comprised of coronaviruses and rhinoviruses.

 

[Jokodo]

And that is assuming it can even work. We don't know that: we don't know that surviving an infection (almost) universally grants longterm immunity. Sure, it's a very reasonable assumption given what we know about similar viruses

I am not an immunologist... but I thought that coronoviruses generally don't confer long-term immunity...which is one of the barriers to a cure for the common cold? IIRC, common cold is predominantly comprised of coronaviruses and rhinoviruses.

Neither an i but it appears there is some evidence for immunity against SARS for at least a few years, possibly longer. The reason, as far as I know, we don't get immune against the common cold is mostly because there are so many strains circulating, we may actually gain immunity to any one if them. But I'm no virologist either.

 

[Keith&Co.]

You misunderstand. Yes, we will never know the true cause of death. I was talking about the excess mortality, though--in the developed world we will see that because the deaths will be recorded even if the cause is unknown.

Actually, no. Or at least it will be misleading. This is because the measures taken to restrict the spread of the virus has positive impact on all kinds of other deaths: traffic deaths, other infectious diseases, accidents, drug overdoses, etc.

Daily life.... if there are X deaths per year from people slipping in their shower, and 2 gazillion people stop going in to work (work from home or furloughed or fired), a percentage of them will take less regular dhowers. Fewer of those deaths, making a mockery of the actuarial tables. A Mockery!

 

[Loren Pechtel]

And that is assuming it can even work. We don't know that: we don't know that surviving an infection (almost) universally grants longterm immunity. Sure, it's a very reasonable assumption given what we know about similar viruses

I am not an immunologist... but I thought that coronoviruses generally don't confer long-term immunity...which is one of the barriers to a cure for the common cold? IIRC, common cold is predominantly comprised of coronaviruses and rhinoviruses.

The real problem with a vaccine for the common cold is which one--there are hundreds.