coronavirus - The Legacy

[mookiemcgee]

The WHO said COVID-19 is killing 3.4% of people infected. Given that's 3.4% across all age groups, the stats in Duk's picture sound perfectly plausible.

They did say this, however since most people who are sick (but not dying sick) aren't being tested there is no accurate denomonator to use in the equation. The real number is more likely .5-1% mortality rate

[mrswdk]

The WHO said COVID-19 is killing 3.4% of people infected. Given that's 3.4% across all age groups, the stats in Duk's picture sound perfectly plausible.

They did say this, however since most people who are sick (but not dying sick) aren't being tested there is no accurate denomonator to use in the equation. The real number is more likely .5-1% mortality rate

Yeah, your sweeping assumption and finger-in-the-air guess are probably a more credible source of evidence than the WHO's official statistics.

[jimboston]

The WHO said COVID-19 is killing 3.4% of people infected. Given that's 3.4% across all age groups, the stats in Duk's picture sound perfectly plausible.

They did say this, however since most people who are sick (but not dying sick) aren't being tested there is no accurate denomonator to use in the equation. The real number is more likely .5-1% mortality rate

Yeah, your sweeping assumption and finger-in-the-air guess are probably a more credible source of evidence than the WHO's official statistics.

It’s funny, you’re usually the one rallying against organizations like the WHO as “Tools of Capitalist America”.

Anyway... the WHO and others have admitted they can’t give an accurate mortality rate because they believe there are many untested / unreported cases floating g around.

[jusplay4fun]

Part of the problem is the lack of transparency of the Chinese national government. The disease may not have spread so fast if the local health and government had not had to wait for the Central (National) government under Xi Jinping make decisions.

JP4Fun

The WHO said COVID-19 is killing 3.4% of people infected. Given that's 3.4% across all age groups, the stats in Duk's picture sound perfectly plausible.

They did say this, however since most people who are sick (but not dying sick) aren't being tested there is no accurate denomonator to use in the equation. The real number is more likely .5-1% mortality rate

Yeah, your sweeping assumption and finger-in-the-air guess are probably a more credible source of evidence than the WHO's official statistics.

[jusplay4fun]

Speaking of WHO.....who? Hu?, no, WHO...! (or is it speaking of WHOM??...LoL...)

all from the same source, cited below:

Coronavirus cases top 100,000 as China exports dip: Live updates

More countries report first cases of disease that has killed almost 3,500 people in more than 90 countries.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/03/coronavirus-cases-surpass-100000-globally-live-updates-200306231605898.html

The number of cases from the new coronavirus has topped 100,000 worldwide as official Chinese data showed a significant hit to the country's exports after the outbreak caused massive disruptions to business operations and economic activity.

The World Health Organization (WHO) called the spread of the virus "deeply concerning" as a wave of countries reported on Saturday their first cases of the COVID-19 disease, which has now killed nearly 3,500 people and infected more than 100,000 across 92 nations and territories.

07:34 GMT - China trade takes major hit

China's exports fell by double digits in the first two months of the year as anti-virus controls closed factories, while imports sank by a smaller margin.

Overseas shipments tumbled 17.2 percent from a year earlier to $292.4bn, a sharp reverse from December's 7.8 percent rise, customs data showed. Imports declined 4 percent to $299.5bn, down from the previous month's 16.3 percent gain.

Trade was poised for a boost after Beijing and Washington removed punitive tariffs on some of each other’s goods in a trade truce signed in January. But that was offset by Chinese anti-virus controls that shut down much of the world’s second-largest economy in late January.

Exports to the US plunged 27.7 percent in January and February to $43bn, worsening from December's 12.5 percent decline. Imports of US goods crept up 2.5 percent to $17.6bn, but China still recorded a $25.4bn trade surplus with the US.

China’s global trade balance fell to a $7.1bn deficit for the first two months of the year.

[jusplay4fun]

sources cited:

THE CORONAVIRUS CRISIS

Critics Say China Has Suppressed And Censored Information In Coronavirus Outbreak
February 8, 20209:00 AM ET

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/02/08/803766743/critics-say-china-has-suppressed-and-censored-information-in-coronavirus-outbrea

China's state censors have clamped down this week on digital items related to the outbreak of a new coronavirus, removing local news reports that expose the dire circumstances in the city of Wuhan, epicenter of the outbreak, and scrubbing social media platforms of posts from Wuhan residents who say they are ill and desperate for medical care and supplies.

Those restrictions were put to the test on Friday after the death of Dr. Li Wenliang, one of the eight whistleblowers reprimanded by police for warning others about a mysterious pneumonialike disease in December. Less than 90 minutes after his death on Friday morning, the hashtag "I want freedom of speech" was trending on Weibo, a popular Chinese blogging site, with nearly 2 million posts. The posts were gone by sunrise.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/04/business/china-coronavirus-government.html

China's state censors have clamped down this week on digital items related to the outbreak of a new coronavirus, removing local news reports that expose the dire circumstances in the city of Wuhan, epicenter of the outbreak, and scrubbing social media platforms of posts from Wuhan residents who say they are ill and desperate for medical care and supplies.

Those restrictions were put to the test on Friday after the death of Dr. Li Wenliang, one of the eight whistleblowers reprimanded by police for warning others about a mysterious pneumonialike disease in December. Less than 90 minutes after his death on Friday morning, the hashtag "I want freedom of speech" was trending on Weibo, a popular Chinese blogging site, with nearly 2 million posts. The posts were gone by sunrise.

Wuhan’s mayor blamed higher-ups. A senior disease control official blamed layers of bureaucracy. A top government expert blamed the public: The people, he said, simply didn’t understand what he told them.

As China grapples with a mysterious coronavirus outbreak that has killed at least 490 people and sickened thousands, the country’s 1.4 billion people are asking what went wrong. Senior officials are engaging in an unusually blunt display of finger pointing.

So many officials have denied responsibility that some online users joke that they are watching a passing-the-buck competition. (It’s “tossing the wok” in Chinese.)

The Chinese people are getting a rare glimpse of how China’s giant, opaque bureaucratic system works — or, rather, how it fails to work. Too many of its officials have become political apparatchiks, fearful of making decisions that anger their superiors and too removed and haughty when dealing with the public to admit mistakes and learn from them.

[mrswdk]

Part of the problem is the lack of transparency of the Chinese national government. The disease may not have spread so fast if the local health and government had not had to wait for the Central (National) government under Xi Jinping make decisions.

Did you know that everything that happens in China is personally decided on by Xi Jinping? It's like that scene in Bruce Almighty where he sits down at his computer and responds to all the prayers, only less funny and with way more sinister music playing in the background.

[Dukasaur]

I haven't seen Bruce Almighty yet.

[jusplay4fun]

suspicion confirmed; thx 4 that, mrswdk.

Part of the problem is the lack of transparency of the Chinese national government. The disease may not have spread so fast if the local health and government had not had to wait for the Central (National) government under Xi Jinping make decisions.

Did you know that everything that happens in China is personally decided on by Xi Jinping? It's like that scene in Bruce Almighty where he sits down at his computer and responds to all the prayers, only less funny and with way more sinister music playing in the background.

[Dukasaur]

Part of the problem is the lack of transparency of the Chinese national government. The disease may not have spread so fast if the local health and government had not had to wait for the Central (National) government under Xi Jinping make decisions.

The national government doesn't seem to be a uniquely Chinese problem, does it?

https://www.vox.com/2020/3/2/21161193/pence-azar-coronavirus-response-meet-the-press-state-of-the-union

There’s really no defending the attempts President Donald Trump and his eldest son made over the weekend to weaponize a pandemic outbreak against their political opponents, including the president dismissing Democratic concerns about the administration’s coronavirus response as “their new hoax.” Nonetheless, on Sunday, both Vice President Mike Pence and Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar gave it their best shot.

Three-plus years into the Trump presidency, there’s a long tradition of administration officials defending everything from Trump’s absurd misinformation about how wind energy works to his juvenile attacks on political opponents. But that Pence and Azar — the top administration officials overseeing the coronavirus response — wouldn’t even disavow Trump’s use of the word “hoax” amid a possible pandemic is perhaps the strongest illustration yet that there’s nothing Trump’s top officials won’t defend.

Trump has systematically dismantled America’s pandemic response capabilities since taking office, including getting rid of the National Security Council’s Director of Global Health Security position in 2018 and proposing massive cuts to both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health as recently as last month. So it’s not surprising that the administration’s response to the coronavirus has been dysfunctional at best.

On Sunday, Axios broke news about problems with government-made test kits for the coronavirus that have resulted in the US being far behind nations like China and South Korea when it comes to conducting large-scale testing. Those problems make the Trump administration’s refusal to take the World Health Organization (WHO) up on its offer to provide testing kits look extremely questionable.

Axios reported that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) now says it has full confidence in the testing kids, but the delay in rolling them out has already had consequences, as “a slew of new cases announced over the weekend suggest the virus has spread throughout the country while the US government tested only a narrow subset of the population for it.”

As Dr. Matt McCarthy alluded to during a Monday morning appearance on CNBC, the Trump administration responded to the coronavirus threat by closing borders but was derelict about testing people within the country.

“In New York state, the person who tested positive was only the 32nd test we’ve done in this state. That is a national scandal,” McCarthy said. “They’re testing 10,000 a day in some countries, and we can’t get this off the ground. I’m a practitioner on the firing line, and I don’t have the tools to properly care for patients today.”

[Keefie]

The average age of the dead in Italy is 81.

[jusplay4fun]

From what I have read, that seems to be true for most who have died: they are elderly and/or in poor health, BEFORE they get infected. Many who are infected fight it off and no real consequence. This reminds me of the flu: most who are infected survive. I read or heard that up to 80% of those infected do not need to be hospitalized, at least in in the USA.

Bad news, and bad news of the uknown, get people to read more and investigate. And BAD NEWS sells

The average age of the dead in Italy is 81.

[2dimes]

Click image to enlarge.

[mookiemcgee]

The WHO said COVID-19 is killing 3.4% of people infected. Given that's 3.4% across all age groups, the stats in Duk's picture sound perfectly plausible.

They did say this, however since most people who are sick (but not dying sick) aren't being tested there is no accurate denomonator to use in the equation. The real number is more likely .5-1% mortality rate

Yeah, your sweeping assumption and finger-in-the-air guess are probably a more credible source of evidence than the WHO's official statistics.

No, first you have to put the finger in your bum, and then put it in the air...I really hate having to use sources, but you are worth it

WHO's 'estimate' is based on a CFR calculus, and here is the problem with that:

The case fatality rate (CFR) represents the proportion of cases who eventually die from a disease.

Once an epidemic has ended, it is calculated with the formula: deaths / cases.

But while an epidemic is still ongoing, as it is the case with the current novel coronavirus outbreak, this formula is, at the very least, "naïve" and can be "misleading if, at the time of analysis, the outcome is unknown for a non negligible proportion of patients."
https://academic.oup.com/aje/article/162/5/479/82647

The real issue is the WHO's number are based on Lab confirmed cases, all of which are the most serious cases and largely ignore the minor cases

The Report of the WHO-China Joint Mission published on Feb. 28 by WHO is based on 55,924 laboratory confirmed cases. The report notes that "The Joint Mission acknowledges the known challenges and biases of reporting crude CFR early in an epidemic" (see also our discussion on: How to calculate the mortality rate during an outbreak). Here are its findings on Case Fatality Ratio, or CFR (the mortality rate):

"As of 20 February, 2,114 of the 55,924 laboratory confirmed cases have died (crude fatality ratio [CFR: 3.8%) (note: at least some of whom were identified using a case definition that included pulmonary disease).

The overall CFR varies by location and intensity of transmission (i.e. 5.8% in Wuhan vs. 0.7% in other areas in China).

In China, the overall CFR was higher in the early stages of the outbreak (17.3% for cases with symptom onset from 1-10 January) and has reduced over time to 0.7% for patients with symptom onset after 1 February. "

While only time will tell, the .07% number covering the rest of China where there are 'enough tests' for those actually showing symptoms is likely to be a far more accurate number

The higher case fatality rate reported from Wuhan may be overestimated

The true number of exposed cases affected in Wuhan may be vastly underestimated. With a focus on thousands of serious cases, mild or asymptomatic courses that possibly account for the bulk of the 2019-nCoV infections might remain largely unrecognized, in particular during the influenza season.
Under-detection of mild or asymptomatic cases may be further fueled after further growth of the outbreak, as healthcare-facilities and testing capacities in Wuhan have reached their limits.

https://smw.ch/article/doi/smw.2020.20203

maybe you can help next time?

[saxitoxin]

I find it interesting that the hardest hit American.states all didn't vote Trump in 2016.

Coincidence?

Incompetent voters manifest incompetent governments.

If Iowa and.North Dakota were hardest hit you can bet CNN would lead with "TRUMP VOTING STATES MOST IMPACTED BY CORONAVIRUS."

[spurgistan]

I find it interesting that the hardest hit American.states all didn't vote Trump in 2016.

Coincidence?

Incompetent voters manifest incompetent governments.

If Iowa and.North Dakota were hardest hit you can bet CNN would lead with "TRUMP VOTING STATES MOST IMPACTED BY CORONAVIRUS."

Yes, the fact that the Trump admin's totally incompetent control measures led to outbreaks in states that largely didn't vote for him is very convenient. I wonder if Alabama is getting all the test kits we're not getting.

[saxitoxin]

I find it interesting that the hardest hit American.states all didn't vote Trump in 2016.

Coincidence?

Incompetent voters manifest incompetent governments.

If Iowa and.North Dakota were hardest hit you can bet CNN would lead with "TRUMP VOTING STATES MOST IMPACTED BY CORONAVIRUS."

Yes, the fact that the Trump admin's totally incompetent control measures led to outbreaks in states that largely didn't vote for him is very convenient. I wonder if Alabama is getting all the test kits we're not getting.

Public health is a state responsibility.

Some states operate in a professional, efficient, forward-thinking way and don't have piles of dead bodies from COVID-19.

Then there's amateur hour Washington and New York and their rulers Jay "The Snake" Inslee and Andrew "Fredo II" Cuomo.

[saxitoxin]

When Krugman writes this ...

Americans living in blue-voting counties are living healthier, longer lives than those in red counties.

https://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/2 ... death-trip

... the liberal elite nod solemnly and knowingly, certain that they have read a sober piece of cogent analysis.

When saxi writes this ...

Americans living in red-voting counties have seen fewer COVID-19 fatalities than those living in blue-voting counties.

... the liberal elite go apeshit and start screeching "CORRELATION DOESN'T IMPLY CAUSATION, FASCIST DUMBASS!"

[mrswdk]

tbf you are a bit of a fascist dumbass.

show

[jusplay4fun]

It is a decent movie. Jim Carey was good in the God role. It was Fun and had some profound ideas that were hinted at. I enjoyed it; it is NOT a GREAT movie, imo.

I haven't seen Bruce Almighty yet.

[HitRed]

Boon for Net Flicks

[Keefie]

If anyone had any doubt that this is serious. From tonight all pubs and bars in Ireland will be closed until at least 29th March.

[jimboston]

If anyone had any doubt that this is serious. From tonight all pubs and bars in Ireland will be closed until at least 29th March.

Armageddon!

[saxitoxin]

NEW THREAT OF RAMPAGING BEARS SET TO EXACERBATE CORONAVIRUS CRISIS

Bears all over the world are coming out of hibernation more than a month ahead of schedule after one of the hottest winters in human history.

In New Hampshire, bear researchers said there had been multiple bear sightings as early as February.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech ... inter.html

[saxitoxin]

ASTEROID SET TO WIPE OUT WHATEVER HUMANS SURVIVE BEARS, CORONAVIRUS

One of the biggest asteroids that could ever pass outside planet Earth is about to be seen on April 29 at 09:56 GMT. According to NASA, this asteroid named 52768 (1998 OR2) is expected to have the size as large as the highest mountain on Earth, Mount Everest. The estimated size of this space rock will be around 1.8 to 4.1 kilometers in diameter.

https://www.techtimes.com/articles/2480 ... -april.htm