Coronavirus Thread

[Techster]

And your condescending personal attacks are an embarrassment to this site. Its a shame that everytime there is a discussion involving assertions that you make that people on here dispute, this is how your language devolves. Its really sad.

I readily admit that I can be condescending and sarcastic at times, but if you want to call anyone out, I suggest you look in the mirror first. Hell, I don't think I'm saying anything new when I admit I can be an @sshole at times. At least I own it.

I suggest you take a good look in the mirror, buddy. I'm not the only one that's called you out for doing what you accuse others of. You should stop projecting.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Well you seem to know the unknowable. So, with all of your knowledge and hard facts from all these links you refer to, please prove or disprove the United States does not represent a quarter of the world's infections. I mean, I've said multiple times that the Johns Hopkins data doesn't represent the REAL numbers because there are a lot of unknowns, but its the numbers that are being reported and that's what I choose to work with.

Please enlighten us all with your knowledge since you have all these links to data that knows the unkown cases...

I've already typed it three times in the last hour. People by the thousands and thousands and thousands dying around the world uncounted, according to their own countries. With a death rate of 2%-5%, that could equate to about a couple million undiagnosed cases worldwide. Many of these countries' health officials publicly state they probably have 10-15x as many cases as were officially documented. Now lets shift to the US to see if we fall into that same category - do you read anything about a single person not getting a ventilator? Thousand and thousands and thousands of people dying at home, undiagnosed and uncounted because there is no room in hospitals and no ventilators? Do you read about thousands and thousands and thousands of mass graves being dug here 5 people deep? Look at the death rates in all these countries, most of whom you'd probably argue have a much better healthcare system than we do.

So I've typed it 4x now. If you choose to ignore all this major data that is different between us and other countries, or if you choose to state that you don't think it tells us anything, that's your opinion and have at it. But that's why the rest of us on here said we think you're incredibly wrong if you think a quarter of the world's cases are here.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

I readily admit that I can be condescending and sarcastic at times, but if you want to call anyone out, I suggest you look in the mirror first. Hell, I don't think I'm saying anything new when I admit I can be an @sshole at times. At least I own it.

I suggest you take a good look in the mirror, buddy. I'm not the only one that's called you out for doing what you accuse others of. You should stop projecting.

So when faced with feedback like this, you response is to double down? If I ever attack you personally, then speak up. All I ever hear is 'well you do it too', but you never point it out when it happens for some reason.

 

[Techster]

I've already typed it three times in the last hour. People by the thousands and thousands and thousands dying around the world uncounted, according to their own countries. With a death rate of 2%-5%, that could equate to about a couple million undiagnosed cases worldwide. Many of these countries' health officials publicly state they probably have 10-15x as many cases as were officially documented. Now lets shift to the US to see if we fall into that same category - do you read anything about a single person not getting a ventilator? Thousand and thousands and thousands of people dying at home, undiagnosed and uncounted because there is no room in hospitals and no ventilators? Do you read about thousands and thousands and thousands of mass graves being dug here 5 people deep? Look at the death rates in all these countries, most of whom you'd probably argue have a much better healthcare system than we do.

So I've typed it 4x now. If you choose to ignore all this major data that is different between us and other countries, or if you choose to state that you don't think it tells us anything, that's your opinion and have at it. But that's why the rest of us on here said we think you're incredibly wrong if you think a quarter of the world's cases are here.

Please don't give me numbers that have no attributable references. You said you linked to all these sites that disproves my posts. Please kindly link to that data so we can all do our own analysis. If you can link to sites that have a count on all the unkown cases of infections I would be happy to re-calculate the numbers. I'm more than happy to be wrong if the data you present shows it.

I just want the data (like the Johns Hopkins site)...not posts of you making up numbers that have no defined source to attribute to.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Please don't give me numbers that have no attributable references. You said you linked to all these sites that disproves my posts. Please kindly link to that data so we can all do our own analysis. If you can link to sites that have a count on all the unkown cases of infections I would be happy to re-calculate the numbers. I'm more than happy to be wrong if the data you present shows it.
I just want the data (like the Johns Hopkins site)...not posts of you making up numbers that have no defined source to attribute to.

Stop accusing me of lying. You're behavior is so obnoxious.

Why can't you follow the links I post and do the Google searches I post? Good lord almighty, here you go again:
Brazil mass graves:
Brazil mass graves:
Brazil estimates and testing limitations: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...than-official-count-study-finds-idUSKCN21V1X1
Brazil labs idle due to lack of available resources: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...g-lags-available-labs-go-unused-idUSKCN21X36V
1 week ago they had 1.6m tests run with 900,000 positive cases (Johns Hopkins) - that's a 55% positive test rate. Obviously they are missing at least a few million cases.
Thousands of people dying at home undiagnosed. No ventilators, etc.: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/24/ita...seen-10-times-higher-than-official-tally.html
More: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...ll-of-italys-coronavirus-crisis-idUSKBN21N08X
Nobody over 60 gets a ventilator: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/11232070/doctors-italy-ventilators-shortage-coronavirus/
Death rate extrapolations (ie, if mortality rates were 5%, how many more cases are out there undiagnosed):
UK: 560,000
Spain: 325,000
Italy: 460,000
France: 400,000
Mexico: 275,000
And on and on - the point is if there are thousands and thousands of people in these countries dying undiagnosed, you multiply that by 20 (5% mortality rate) and these numbers of 'missing cases' increases by several hundred more thousand.

So if you add up all these likely missed cases (due to artificially high mortality rates of first world countries that have first world healthcare systems) and you also account for the number of people these countries are publicly saying died at home uncounted and add in that multiple for cases, just in these major countries you're already at another probably 50% increase in cases worldwide.

We don't have tons of mass graves here. We don't have thousands upon thousands of people dying at home uncounted. We don't have people unable to get a ventilator. We don't have 10%+ mortality rates (implying tons of uncounted cases). We don't have 50% positive test rates.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

 

[Milwaukee]

 

[Deleted member 2897]

As you know, I'm not one to defend the media, but in this case these deaths show us where we were back from when we first opened up. Hospitalization is hitting all time record highs in most of the states. Will these lead to higher deaths? We will have to see, as many of the new cases are in younger people. And maybe we'll get better about treating it too. But in South Carolina, for example, we went from 450 COVID-19 cases in hospitals (from back when we first opened up) to 700 today. I think give it 1 week from now and we'll see what deaths do. I think 20-30 other states are on the same type of curve we are now. Hopefully deaths won't rise substantially, but we're not to that point yet in the lag time from case acquisition.

 

[684Bee]

I can verify this as a true statement.

 

[mts315]

As you know, I'm not one to defend the media, but in this case these deaths show us where we were back from when we first opened up. Hospitalization is hitting all time record highs in most of the states. Will these lead to higher deaths? We will have to see, as many of the new cases are in younger people. And maybe we'll get better about treating it too. But in South Carolina, for example, we went from 450 COVID-19 cases in hospitals (from back when we first opened up) to 700 today. I think give it 1 week from now and we'll see what deaths do. I think 20-30 other states are on the same type of curve we are now. Hopefully deaths won't rise substantially, but we're not to that point yet in the lag time from case acquisition.

This was to be expected though. We didn't eradicate the virus, we flattened the curve to enable us to get to a point with rapid testing and hospital capacity. We are better equipped now than we were in March. An increase in cases was always going to happen when States began to reduce the restrictions, I'm not sure why everyone is so shocked by this.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

This was to be expected though. We didn't eradicate the virus, we flattened the curve to enable us to get to a point with rapid testing and hospital capacity. We are better equipped now than we were in March. An increase in cases was always going to happen when States began to reduce the restrictions, I'm not sure why everyone is so shocked by this.

Not to speak for others, and I wouldn't say I'm "shocked", but what dismays me is that we could all go about our happy go-lucky lives, but wear masks and stay a few feet apart from people and we would have been in a completely different case circumstance right now. In other words, its not that we opened back up, its the behavior. In hindsight, I remember marveling at how we had 30,000 new cases per day back when we were shut down. Well its clear now it was because people weren't behaving responsibly...so now when we opened up its just pouring gas on the fire unnecessarily.

 

[mts315]

Not to speak for others, and I wouldn't say I'm "shocked", but what dismays me is that we could all go about our happy go-lucky lives, but wear masks and stay a few feet apart from people and we would have been in a completely different case circumstance right now. In other words, its not that we opened back up, its the behavior. In hindsight, I remember marveling at how we had 30,000 new cases per day back when we were shut down. Well its clear now it was because people weren't behaving responsibly...so now when we opened up its just pouring gas on the fire unnecessarily.

The gasoline on the fire was the lockdown and then money giveaway. What should have happened was we protected the vulnerable and asked those less vulnerable to wear masks and be careful but live as normal a life as possible. Instead what we did was close a lot of businesses, told everyone to stay home, and then gave a large group of people more money for free to stay home than they would have made other wise. We basically made everyone stir crazy and cash rich and then opened the flood gates.

 

[takethepoints]

The problem with that analysis is that not all of the numbers are trustworthy. Do you actually believe that China still only has 84,000 total cases? India shows 25% as many cases, but has only conducted 25% as many tests while they have 4 times the population. If the percentages projected correctly, then India has about 4 times the number of cases as the US. (Not stating that the percentages project correctly).

There have been news reports lately about potential cases of COVID-19 earlier in 2019 than first reported and cases in other parts of the world(including the US) as early as December of 2019. I am not proclaiming that the disease did indeed start earlier than first reported, just pointing out that the epidemiology isn't settled at this point. It is entirely possible that the number of reported confirmed cases is under the actual number of infections by several orders of magnitude.

I think that you are taking some numbers to make a political point, when those numbers don't actually make the point you are trying to make. Your quote should be modified:

"The US makes up about 4% of the world's population, but we're responsible for have 24% of the world's infections publicly reported confirmed cases."

India is perhaps not the best example. The country is not very highly urbanized (11.4%; the US = 82%) and the population is widely dispersed in small villages. I wouldn't be at all surprised if their stats are fairly accurate, largely because their testing is probably confined largely to the places (cities) where transmission is most likely.

Then again, maybe not. again, this is something we'll find out after the fire is out.

 

[takethepoints]

Sadly, even studies we’ve discussed here failed that same cartoon test. It’s like saying the more churches there are in a city, the more rapes and murders there are. A ha! It’s churches that are the problem!

We’ve seen that during the coronavirus (drug studies), we see it in climate science...I’ve seen it in other health studies, like heart issues in endurance athletes. It’s an epidemic even with the studies themselves.

1. Most of the "studies" discussed here are news stories about studies, not the studies themselves. That's the real problem. I know this isn't a science seminar and that people here will have as hard a time as I do making sense out of some of the studies covered. (I give up regularly.) But at least a look to see if the news stories are reliably reporting what even the abstracts are saying would be a step in the right direction. I'll try to do that myself in future. When I cite a journalist, that is. I try to avoid that.

2. There can be problems with how scientists handle stats. One of the difficulties with present practice in some fields is that the practitioners get a "monkey see, monkey do" exposure to how to analyze data and often depend on grad students or junior associates to do the grunt work. That does lead to difficulties, as does the persistent use of underpowered datasets. But … I think these are largely self-correcting problems, as showed up most recently with the Surgisphere studies. Those results were called out and retracted almost at once. As for climate change: the problem there is that all data is retrospective and often deduced from prior records. That leads to pretty wide confidence intervals to get to precise results. What the "man on the street" wants is point estimates and these are always inexact. Sooooo … people say "the science isn't definite." But, of course, it is, as far as the data lets it be.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

3 weeks ago, 7 COVID-19 patients at 1 of our local hospitals. 10 days later it was 22. It’s 33 now. 5x increase in less than 3 weeks.

Annnnnnnd just a couple days later its gone from 33 to 40. 7 COVID-19 patients in one of our local hospitals to 40 in 3 weeks.

 

[slugboy]

1. Most of the "studies" discussed here are news stories about studies, not the studies themselves. That's the real problem. I know this isn't a science seminar and that people here will have as hard a time as I do making sense out of some of the studies covered. (I give up regularly.) But at least a look to see if the news stories are reliably reporting what even the abstracts are saying would be a step in the right direction. I'll try to do that myself in future. When I cite a journalist, that is. I try to avoid that.

2. There can be problems with how scientists handle stats. One of the difficulties with present practice in some fields is that the practitioners get a "monkey see, monkey do" exposure to how to analyze data and often depend on grad students or junior associates to do the grunt work. That does lead to difficulties, as does the persistent use of underpowered datasets. But … I think these are largely self-correcting problems, as showed up most recently with the Surgisphere studies. Those results were called out and retracted almost at once. As for climate change: the problem there is that all data is retrospective and often deduced from prior records. That leads to pretty wide confidence intervals to get to precise results. What the "man on the street" wants is point estimates and these are always inexact. Sooooo … people say "the science isn't definite." But, of course, it is, as far as the data lets it be.

The good news is that the online news articles I’ve seen have often linked to the study they’re referencing. It lets me read the study myself, which has been better than the article that tries to summarize it (incorrectly, a lot of the time).

On the other hand, some people are publishing their own analyses on medium.com, and I’ve found that to be a mess. A few people have published decent information there, but there are a lot more people pushing an agenda one way or the other. I see people who have never learned statistics citing these studies on social media, and it’s huge wave of misinformation.

Personally, I’m trying to stick with known researchers and statisticians as much as I can.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Techster]

Here comes the wave of hospitals filling to capacity. If people have been paying attention and understand that there's a relationship to infections rate to hospital numbers...and finally death, this isn't surprising. But here we are (btw, read the thread):

 

[Milwaukee]

Isn’t it funny how one side is saying the end of the world is coming, hospitalizations are RISING.

And the other side is looking at deaths going down and don’t give a damn about positive cases and hospitalizations.

And some of us are looking at the actual facts. Deaths are nose diving while cases are rising.

Long story short: Stop being drama queens. Millions are gonna test positive, and that’s okay. It’s a cold virus, it’s not HIV or a slug to the chest.

 

[Techster]

 

[RamblinRed]

The gasoline on the fire was the lockdown and then money giveaway. What should have happened was we protected the vulnerable and asked those less vulnerable to wear masks and be careful but live as normal a life as possible. Instead what we did was close a lot of businesses, told everyone to stay home, and then gave a large group of people more money for free to stay home than they would have made other wise. We basically made everyone stir crazy and cash rich and then opened the flood gates.

No nation has yet figured out how to 'protect the vulnerable' - that was basically Sweden's strategy and it failed miserably - and it didn't save the economy for more than another month or so as their economic numbers are now right in line with the EU average. Even now, while the majority of the cases in the US are in younger populations compared to April/May, the majority of people in the hospitals are older. The other issue for the US is we have too many unhealthy people. If you took all the people that would be considered 'susceptible' it would be over 40% of the US adult population. It's hard to 'protect' that high of a percentage.

Also, we did not close businesses - the virus did. There are a number of studies out there that show that people's behavior changed before stay at home orders - roughly 75% of US economic activity dropped before stay at home orders were issued, only about 25% of lost economic activity was due to shutdowns.
We are starting to see it again. i saw a chart today, in the last 4 days eating in at restaurants has dropped by over 50% in Texas, over 40% in AZ and GA and by over 35% in FL. as cases rise economic activity will fall.

Finally, while deaths are currently flat (there was a little over 700 today) that is hardly something to praise. That is still the 3rd largest cause of death in the US and the largest cause that is infectious by 7X. Deaths are the most trailing indicator so they will likely rise in the next couple of weeks. Some of the models have been very good on this. They have generally had deaths decreasing until late June/beginning of July and then slowly increasing through July and August (fortunately not anywhere near the heights of April/May). in some states the death peak came as far as a month after the case peak in April/May. The states hit hardest at the time had the least delay between the case peak and the death peak and the average was about 10 days. Given the current surge appears to be hitting younger populations first and then transitioning into older populations the death peak is likely to be a longer delay. My hope is that the models are pretty accurate and the increase in death rates is relatively low.

We look like we are headed back into a difficult period, hopefully we do better this time. Today is the single largest case day in the US during the whole pandemic (though in reality it certainly isn't the day with the most cases as we test more now) - but still the positive case rate is now going up quickly so it is getting worse in a hurry. The 7 day avg case rate is now right near what it was in early April. AZ is down to 12% capacity in their hopsitals. Houston is at 97% capacity tonight. As of this evening FL is at 20% ICU capacity (and i believe that is after they misleadingly changed how they count bed utilization). 7 states are currently at all time highs in hopsitalizations. The big issue is starting around Memorial Day we simply stopped doing the little things we need to do to be able to have a relatively normal life - we aren't wearing masks, we aren't maintaining social distance, we are gathering too many people in one place. For some reason we watched what other countries did (or maybe we didn't watch) and then decided we didn't need to do those same things.