Covid 19 virus

[Sal Ammoniac]

Here in Helsinki, Finland, there is a suprising number of people who simply ignore any recommendations for social isolation. (I mean, they go out with friends to have fun, and thus endanger those who have to interact with others to keep the society going.) It seems stupidity will prevail even over a pandemic.

The same thing is happening here, especially with the young generations. There are photos in the news of big crowds of college kids frolicking on beaches in Florida like they do every year. I've heard that they think even if they do get the virus, it won't be so bad because they're young and healthy. What they selfishly don't seem to realize is that if they do contract the virus they'll be carriers and infect others, including those who aren't young and healthy.

[Muttley Snickers]

Yesterday I had a billing concern with my ISP Optus so I rang them to rectify their error and was confronted with a recorded message stating that due to the Covid 19 virus they were unable to assist with my enquiry.   

Optus are completely useless at the best of times and now it's even worse, I didn't think that was even possible. The message just directs customers to use a mobile phone application or to send them an email message.   

[Nominal Animal]

Has anyone seen statistics on the average duration from infection or onset of symptoms till death, for those perished due to the virus?

[edavid]

That is essentially what I was getting at, it's not just me that is screwed but everybody. The #1 priority needs to be keep the economy going because if that all comes crashing down then everything else is moot.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/coronavirus-will-bankrupt-more-people-than-it-kills-%E2%80%94-and-thats-the-real-global-emergency/ar-BB116Wlf

Yeah, I don't believe that.  The US is a rich country, and even if the economy were completely shut down for a month, we could afford it.  What we don't have is a lot of excess healthcare capacity.  Even if CV was no worse than flu, we can't handle a whole year's worth of sick people and deaths compressed into a month.

[SiliconWizard]

Here in Helsinki, Finland, there is a suprising number of people who simply ignore any recommendations for social isolation. (I mean, they go out with friends to have fun, and thus endanger those who have to interact with others to keep the society going.) It seems stupidity will prevail even over a pandemic.

The same thing is happening here, especially with the young generations. There are photos in the news of big crowds of college kids frolicking on beaches in Florida like they do every year. I've heard that they think even if they do get the virus, it won't be so bad because they're young and healthy. What they selfishly don't seem to realize is that if they do contract the virus they'll be carriers and infect others, including those who aren't young and healthy.

Yep.
I'm surprised it's still authorized to gather like this over there. Over here, it's not, and if you do, you're pretty likely to get fined.

[edavid]

Here in Helsinki, Finland, there is a suprising number of people who simply ignore any recommendations for social isolation. (I mean, they go out with friends to have fun, and thus endanger those who have to interact with others to keep the society going.) It seems stupidity will prevail even over a pandemic.

The same thing is happening here, especially with the young generations. There are photos in the news of big crowds of college kids frolicking on beaches in Florida like they do every year. I've heard that they think even if they do get the virus, it won't be so bad because they're young and healthy. What they selfishly don't seem to realize is that if they do contract the virus they'll be carriers and infect others, including those who aren't young and healthy.

That's over:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/coronavirus-comes-spring-break-locals-close-florida-beaches-after-governor-n1163741

[Mr. Scram]

I just went shopping and here it looks like the hoarding craze is dying down. Some shelves still were emptier than usual but everything looked a lot more normal. I asked staff and they confirmed things were a lot less hectic than they have been. It seems supply is picking up and demand is dying down.

[vodka]

Countries in East Asia are getting used to waves of infection, and they've learned what works and what doesn't. They've had SARS, and bird flu, and swine flu, and MERS and they are getting used to epidemic management. Finding the infected quickly, and isolating them is a big win (i.e. test as soon as someone realises they might have an issue, SK style).

As a westerner, my own appreciation of Chinese efforts is about exactly that.  I've not talked about anything else, only considered the (forced) isolation efforts.  It is increasingly looking like those efforts are what is needed to minimize both human lives lost, but also the financial impact, of this pandemic.
(In particular, I have not considered what happened in Nov/Dec 2019, with early whistleblowers, et cetera.)

Here in Helsinki, Finland, there is a suprising number of people who simply ignore any recommendations for social isolation. (I mean, they go out with friends to have fun, and thus endanger those who have to interact with others to keep the society going.) It seems stupidity will prevail even over a pandemic.

The Finnish numbers are a complete lie, by the way: only some "special" patients get to be tested.
They say this is because of lack of resources for testing, but considering there are Finnish companies exporting millions of these tests, and while the testing stations need trained people to run the tests, we have had weeks to crash-course a few dozen specialists to help with that.. we just have chosen not to, because our leaders have more important things on their mind than a pandemic. 

You have declared  Emergency Powers Act superlight compared with ours,what it seem a light martial law.  Because ,we are totally banned to stay in the street without any reason. Only we are allowed to go to buy or work, and another exceptions duly justified.
haven't you fines and charges? Because our fines are 200€-600,000€ and 1 or 2 years of jail.

[coppice]

Here in Helsinki, Finland, there is a suprising number of people who simply ignore any recommendations for social isolation. (I mean, they go out with friends to have fun, and thus endanger those who have to interact with others to keep the society going.) It seems stupidity will prevail even over a pandemic.

The same thing is happening here, especially with the young generations. There are photos in the news of big crowds of college kids frolicking on beaches in Florida like they do every year. I've heard that they think even if they do get the virus, it won't be so bad because they're young and healthy. What they selfishly don't seem to realize is that if they do contract the virus they'll be carriers and infect others, including those who aren't young and healthy.

College used to be for the smart or wealthy. Now they'll lend a fortune to any idiot and they're suddenly a student.  The attitude you describe is exactly like the parents of unvaccinated kids who get angry when schools won't accept them.

[Nominal Animal]

Haven't you fines and charges? Because our fines are 200€-600,000€ and 1 or 2 years of jail.

Nope.  We even have lots of elder folks, who are saying that they refuse to stay indoors; if they get the virus, then they get the virus.  They trust the Finnish health system to take care of them, they say.

Other people think that because they themselves are unlikely to die from the virus, they can ignore the situation.  It just does not matter to some people that they will be spreading the virus.  Perhaps some of them don't realize it, but definitely some just do not care.  This is why I liked the "heavy-handed" approach: it stops the stupid from peeing into the pool, so to speak.

As I asked above, I'm wondering about the statistics on the duration from infection to death.  It seems to me that this is a critical factor in the health system overload, but I haven't seen actual numbers yet.  If anybody knows or has seen 'em, please let me know.

[james_s]

That is essentially what I was getting at, it's not just me that is screwed but everybody. The #1 priority needs to be keep the economy going because if that all comes crashing down then everything else is moot.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/coronavirus-will-bankrupt-more-people-than-it-kills-%E2%80%94-and-thats-the-real-global-emergency/ar-BB116Wlf

Yeah, I don't believe that.  The US is a rich country, and even if the economy were completely shut down for a month, we could afford it.  What we don't have is a lot of excess healthcare capacity.  Even if CV was no worse than flu, we can't handle a whole year's worth of sick people and deaths compressed into a month.

Don't be so sure. The dot com bust and the recession in 2008 were devastating and took years to recover from, this could lead into another Great Depression which took a major world war to break out of. Numerous businesses around me have already laid off large numbers of people, the dominoes are falling and it may be impossible to stop. We may be a wealthy country but millions of people live paycheck to paycheck and everything is intertwined. One thing goes down and that starts pulling other things down, we have seen the same on a rare few occasions with the power grid resulting in massive blackouts. The whole thing is a house of cards that is quite fragile. We are not immune to a catastrophic collapse.

[nctnico]

The Finnish numbers are a complete lie, by the way: only some "special" patients get to be tested.
They say this is because of lack of resources for testing,

The same over here but what does testing lots of people actually accomplish right now? Nothing because in the end you can't catch all cases if you are not going to test everyone in a country. The point where mass-testing serves a purpose (containment) is far behind us.

In the Netherlands they are going to test blood and plasma (past and future donations) from donors for Corona anti-bodies to get solid numbers on how many people have been infected in total. From there they can get some solid data on how many people got infected and from where the infection has spread.

[james_s]

I just went shopping and here it looks like the hoarding craze is dying down. Some shelves still were emptier than usual but everything looked a lot more normal. I asked staff and they confirmed things were a lot less hectic than they have been. It seems supply is picking up and demand is dying down.

Control loop theory applies. The system experienced a massive step change that it was not tuned to cope with. Now it will likely overshoot and oscillate a bit for some time then settle down.

[SiliconWizard]

The Finnish numbers are a complete lie, by the way: only some "special" patients get to be tested.
They say this is because of lack of resources for testing,

The same over here but what does testing lots of people actually accomplish right now? Nothing because in the end you can't catch all cases if you are not going to test everyone in a country. The point where mass-testing serves a purpose (containment) is far behind us.

Maybe it's too late for this now, but every country that did mass-testing early are a lot better off by now than the others.

As to the current situation, we could still use testing as a mitigating step to reduce confinement. Instead of confining EVERYONE, we could just confine people that are either NOT tested yet or tested positive. People tested negative with a valid proof could be waived of confinement. Pretty simple.

[rgarito]

No country has infinite resources

normally i would say "no, US can print as many Dollars as they wish", but now with Covid-19 they will have soon no paper anymore, or toilet paper will be more worth than Dollar ^^  that means i agree with you, this time.

That reinforces a statement I made the other day....  If the economy keeps crashing like this, we (literally) will start to see a regression back to a barter-related economy...  (in Russia, my ex-wife tells me that already is common in the more rural areas, long before this zombie apocalypse even started)

[rgarito]

Here in Helsinki, Finland, there is a suprising number of people who simply ignore any recommendations for social isolation. (I mean, they go out with friends to have fun, and thus endanger those who have to interact with others to keep the society going.) It seems stupidity will prevail even over a pandemic.

The same thing is happening here, especially with the young generations. There are photos in the news of big crowds of college kids frolicking on beaches in Florida like they do every year. I've heard that they think even if they do get the virus, it won't be so bad because they're young and healthy. What they selfishly don't seem to realize is that if they do contract the virus they'll be carriers and infect others, including those who aren't young and healthy.

I South Florida, the most popular Spring Break beaches were closed on Sunday.  So what did the damn kids do?  They all moved over to the west (Gulf) coast of Florida and moved the party there....  (it's about a 90 mile drive away)  SMH.  These damn kids just refuse to "get it."  Not sure if they finally decided to close those beaches, too.

[edavid]

That reinforces a statement I made the other day....  If the economy keeps crashing like this, we (literally) will start to see a regression back to a barter-related economy...  (in Russia, my ex-wife tells me that already is common in the more rural areas, long before this zombie apocalypse even started)

That makes no sense to me.  You see barter when the central banks aren't trusted, or when there's high inflation.  There's no sign of either of those happening.

Around here people don't even want to make cash transactions, let alone bartering.  Too much personal contact.

[james_s]

I South Florida, the most popular Spring Break beaches were closed on Sunday.  So what did the damn kids do?  They all moved over to the west (Gulf) coast of Florida and moved the party there....  (it's about a 90 mile drive away)  SMH.  These damn kids just refuse to "get it."  Not sure if they finally decided to close those beaches, too.

What else would you expect kids to do? Were you never an invincible teenager yourself? I don't think it's reasonable to expect kids to "get it", and most of them are probably right in that the vast majority won't get very ill and of those who get ill very few will die. The part they are not considering is the risk of spreading it to others who are more vulnerable but it's probably best to stay away from the kids rather than expect them to greatly alter their behavior.

[Nominal Animal]

The same over here but what does testing lots of people actually accomplish right now? Nothing because in the end you can't catch all cases if you are not going to test everyone in a country. The point where mass-testing serves a purpose (containment) is far behind us.

Nope.  In Finland, Helsinki region is worst hit; basically everywhere else is fine.

The problem in Helsinki is that due to a number of reasons, the social pressure is weakest here, and people are not following the social isolation recommendations.

If we did test, we would have the numbers to show the stupid ones that they too have to isolate.  Over half of the Finnish cases are in the Greater Helsinki region (Helsinki-Vantaa-Espoo), with about 1.2 million people.

Instead, our "official" figures are something like 400, whereas looking at the curve, you can trivially extrapolate the correct number to be around 800 -- on the order of Canada; Finland and Canada tracked very closely till Mar 14, when testing was essentially stopped in Helsinki region in Finland.

The numbers would help officials and people realize the importance of social distancing.  Alternatively, the officials could just fake the numbers to achieve the same.  As it stands, everyone is going based on their "gut feeling" instead, and too many here feel that it Is Somebody Elses Problem for now.

Do remember, that from infection, a person will start spreading the virus within 6 hours to a day and a half, whereas it takes about five days on average for the symptoms.  So, a lot of people who believe, erroneously, that they are healthy, are spreading the virus.  It is those that we need to stop and isolate.  The ones who are already ill, well, people naturally tend to avoid those; it's the healthy-looking virus spreaders that are doing the damage right now.
Testing, even random testing to find out the actual number of infected, would help make that visible, and help enforce harder isolation rules and penalties, as the true extent of the problem would be undeniable.

[james_s]

That makes no sense to me.  You see barter when the central banks aren't trusted, or when there's high inflation.  There's no sign of either of those happening.

Around here people don't even want to make cash transactions, let alone bartering.  Too much personal contact.

I read yesterday that there is a problem now with people pulling their money out of banks but I don't know how widespread it is. Don't underestimate the levels of irrational behavior that can be caused by panic, it spreads like a virus itself and leads to all kinds of crazy things and self-fulfilling prophecies. It's a basic human trait, I mean people get killed in stampedes to get cheap discounted junk in stores on black friday sales. Nobody is going to say it's rational to stampede and kill someone over a waffle maker but it happens.

[rgarito]

And in South Florida right now:

Temporary hospitals are being built...

https://www.local10.com/news/local/2020/03/19/supplies-arrive-to-build-mobile-hospital-at-fort-lauderdale-executive-airport/


The location is literally 2 blocks from where I work (or at least used to, before we all migrated to work from home)

[Nominal Animal]

Instead of confining EVERYONE, we could just confine people that are either NOT tested yet or tested positive. People tested negative with a valid proof could be waived of confinement. Pretty simple.

Or better yet, test people like cashiers and postmen and delivery people, so that those who need to interact with others would not be spreading the virus.

[Wimberleytech]

Another Lesson Learned from this situation is the US and EU should return production of some materials, chemicals, equipment and other important goods back to US and EU.

Absolutely!

[james_s]

I'm skeptical of the efficacy of testing. Say you get tested, then on the way out of the clinic or on your way home you pick up the virus. A day or so later, however long the test results take you are notified that you are negative so you go out and interact with others except you are not actually negative because you picked up the virus after being tested and now you have a false sense of security from the negative test. Perhaps I'm overlooking something though.

[rgarito]

Instead of confining EVERYONE, we could just confine people that are either NOT tested yet or tested positive. People tested negative with a valid proof could be waived of confinement. Pretty simple.

Or better yet, test people like cashiers and postmen and delivery people, so that those who need to interact with others would not be spreading the virus.

Nah, in America, we are concentrating on testing members of sports teams...