The COVID-19 pandemic

[danbrotherston]

This is a rather interesting article about the progress of the disease and what we can do about it:

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavir...9337092b56

[rickhd]

This is a rather interesting article about the progress of the disease and what we can do about it:

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavir...9337092b56

Excellent article.

[MidTowner]

This is a rather interesting article about the progress of the disease and what we can do about it:

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavir...9337092b56

Well, that's encouraging that the author posits that what he calls "the hammer" (our current social distancing and isolation) is needed for a matter of weeks, not months.

It's a good point too that, even if the most ambitious estimates put a vaccine at a year or more away, one or more effective treatments could be identified any day now.

[jeffster]

This is a rather interesting article about the progress of the disease and what we can do about it:

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavir...9337092b56

Good article:

Key point:

China’s measures were stronger. For example, people were limited to one person per household allowed to leave home every three days to buy food. Also, their enforcement was severe. It is likely that this severity stopped the epidemic faster.

Could that work here? It could, but we need to get it started and do it now. We'll be in the clear within 6 or 7 weeks, before the May 24 weekend.

[jordan2423]

Your not going to die from this......

Armchair doctor ^ ?

[MidTowner]

China’s measures were stronger. For example, people were limited to one person per household allowed to leave home every three days to buy food. Also, their enforcement was severe. It is likely that this severity stopped the epidemic faster.

Could that work here? It could, but we need to get it started and do it now. We'll be in the clear within 6 or 7 weeks, before the May 24 weekend.

No, that could not work here. It is not possible to restrict people to our homes.

He does go on to say:

South Korea had at some point the worst epidemic outside of China. Now, it’s largely under control. And they did it without asking people to stay home. They achieved it mostly with very aggressive testing, contact tracing, quarantines and isolations.

Even that would be tricky. From what I've read, much of what South Korea and Singapore are doing would rightly offend most Canadians' sensibilities when it comes to privacy, for instance. But it at least seems possible here, unlike what the Communist Party of China did to millions of its subjects, which is simply not.

[ijmorlan]

Your not going to die from this......

Armchair doctor ^ ?

Worse. I consider that on a level with encouraging sedition or inciting criminal activity. Nobody has any business contradicting the medical authorities under these circumstances without providing detailed reasoning, evidence, and citations in the same message as their contradiction.

Generally speaking, if I were running a message board, I would want to mostly let people say what they want to say and keep the banhammer stored safely in a closet, but this is the sort of case where if it were me I might bring it out.

On the other hand, I note there have already been several messages pointing out the insanity of the statement, so maybe this is a case of “more speech is better speech”.

[ijmorlan]

China’s measures were stronger. For example, people were limited to one person per household allowed to leave home every three days to buy food. Also, their enforcement was severe. It is likely that this severity stopped the epidemic faster.

Could that work here? It could, but we need to get it started and do it now. We'll be in the clear within 6 or 7 weeks, before the May 24 weekend.

No, that could not work here. It is not possible to restrict people to our homes.

If it becomes necessary, it will probably be possible.

Note that the Ezra Ave. party wasn’t just small this year — as far as I can tell from reports, it didn’t happen. My impression is the police didn’t even turn away that many people. Why? Because enough people got a clue to make a difference. Similarly, if we really got to the point where the only safe option would be for everybody to stay home unless they are specifically authorized, it would be because people were dying from the disease and almost everybody would understand that it was necessary and would trust the recommendation from the medical officer.

I don’t know what is going to happen, but if it turns out that the current state will continue for many months then I would prefer to have a short period of time during which we would ensure that everybody is stocked up, then a 3-4 week period of time during which literally nobody leaves the house except as specifically authorized by the emergency authorities (so roughly speaking emergency services, utilities, and patients going to the hospital). Theoretically, this should be a foolproof method of stopping the disease: current cases would go through whatever is going to happen, and there would be essentially no new cases. After 3-4 weeks anybody who was infected would be over it, one way or the other.

[tomh009]

This is a rather interesting article about the progress of the disease and what we can do about it:

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavir...9337092b56

It's quite good indeed. Some of the charts have made-up data and he has a lot of assumptions in order to get to things like the seven weeks to get to the easing of restrictions. But he does admit that he made those up, because the data doesn't exist -- or if it does exist, it's not accessible to the public.

I'll buy into his general concept. His numbers might be off by a factor of two, but even so, 14 weeks of clampdown would be something I could live with. And then the question is what the "new normal" will look like.

But, but, but. If we have uncontrolled, rampant spread of the virus in other countries (cough, cough, south of the border, cough) are we going to need to more or less eliminate travel as part of the "dance"?

[jeffster]

China’s measures were stronger. For example, people were limited to one person per household allowed to leave home every three days to buy food. Also, their enforcement was severe. It is likely that this severity stopped the epidemic faster.

Could that work here? It could, but we need to get it started and do it now. We'll be in the clear within 6 or 7 weeks, before the May 24 weekend.

No, that could not work here. It is not possible to restrict people to our homes.

He does go on to say:

South Korea had at some point the worst epidemic outside of China. Now, it’s largely under control. And they did it without asking people to stay home. They achieved it mostly with very aggressive testing, contact tracing, quarantines and isolations.

Even that would be tricky. From what I've read, much of what South Korea and Singapore are doing would rightly offend most Canadians' sensibilities when it comes to privacy, for instance. But it at least seems possible here, unlike what the Communist Party of China did to millions of its subjects, which is simply not.

Looks like Saskatchewan is taking steps to ensure isolation:

https://globalnews.ca/news/6710474/saska...-covid-19/

Granted, this is only for those that have to self-isolate for 14 days, but it could be extended for sure.

[tomh009]

Average case growth from yesterday, over the past seven days:

• Brazil: 372 cases 39% average/day
  
• Poland: 251 cases 35% average/day
  
• Portugal: 448 cases 34% average/day
  

But US, Canada and Portugal are already up around 80% from yesterday ... and Australia is more than double yesterday.

Today's data snip, five-day average increase:

• Ecuador: 367 cases, 67%
  
• Pakistan: 501 cases, 57%
  
• Luxembourg: 484 cases, 52%
  
• Chile 434: cases, 42%
  
• USA: 19101 cases, 40%
  
• Peru: 234 cases, 40%
  
• Ireland: 683 cases, 40%
  
• Armenia: 136 cases, 39%
  
• Brazil: 793 cases, 37%
  
• Portugal: 1020 cases, 33%
  
• ...
  
• Canada: 943: 30%
  

30% is not good for sure. Today was only 18% but yesterday was much higher. All the four big provinces (ON, QC, AB, BC) were in the 15-23% range today. We can only hope that this is the direction and not just an outlier.

On the other hand, NY was at 55% today (8310 cases!), MI was 65% (552) and TX at 52% (394). They are cracking down now but it will take quite some time before that will be reflected in the caseload.

[jeffster]

This is a rather interesting article about the progress of the disease and what we can do about it:

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavir...9337092b56

It's quite good indeed. Some of the charts have made-up data and he has a lot of assumptions in order to get to things like the seven weeks to get to the easing of restrictions. But he does admit that he made those up, because the data doesn't exist -- or if it does exist, it's not accessible to the public.

I'll buy into his general concept. His numbers might be off by a factor of two, but even so, 14 weeks of clampdown would be something I could live with. And then the question is what the "new normal" will look like.

But, but, but. If we have uncontrolled, rampant spread of the virus in other countries (cough, cough, south of the border, cough) are we going to need to more or less eliminate travel as part of the "dance"?

I think travel restrictions would exist for a long time. And the governments would need to enforce richlings from using their private jets to go elsewhere without permission, because people with a lot of money generally don't give a f***. That could mean an escort to the nearest airport by the RCAF and if warranted, shot 'em down.

However, restrictions could end abruptly when a successful (or successful enough) vaccine is created - so we could be talking 4 months at the very least or 18 months at the most probably.

[tomh009]

However, restrictions could end abruptly when a successful (or successful enough) vaccine is created - so we could be talking 4 months at the very least or 18 months at the most probably.

No way to get a vaccine in four months. If they get lucky and super-accelerate the approval process, maybe the end of the year at best, more likely next year.

What could be possible is that an existing medicine (hydroxychloroquine, for example) is confirmed as effective (and side effects as acceptable) in the near term, maybe 3-6 months. This could help the treatments and reduce the healthcare system overload. But this, too, is still uncertain.

[tomh009]

Locally we are now up to 12 confirmed cases, including the first two community transmissions (two females in their 20s).

https://www.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/healt...egion.aspx

Two more local cases today, for a total of 14. One of the two is a community transmission, and is the first hospitalized case in the region (a male in his 70s); the other patient caught the virus on a cruise.

One more today, a total of 15 now. The new case (male, 20s) was from close contact with a previously-infected person. Still only one person hospitalized.

[panamaniac]

However, restrictions could end abruptly when a successful (or successful enough) vaccine is created - so we could be talking 4 months at the very least or 18 months at the most probably.

No way to get a vaccine in four months. If they get lucky and super-accelerate the approval process, maybe the end of the year at best, more likely next year.

What could be possible is that an existing medicine (hydroxychloroquine, for example) is confirmed as effective (and side effects as acceptable) in the near term, maybe 3-6 months. This could help the treatments and reduce the healthcare system overload. But this, too, is still uncertain.

The talk of chloroquine has me remembering the time, almost 40 years ago now, when I was living abroad and required to take it for malaria prevention.  I managed to stay on it for a number of months, but the side effects were bad enough that I eventually stopped taking it an just took my chances.   I gather that the possible use against covid-19, if there turns out to be any validity to it, would be for much shorter periods so maybe not an issue.