Remember, six feet away...
Famous virologist, on national news program this morning said "vaccines cause autism". So, there you have it, no more to that quote, no context needed, put it in a headline.
sorry, just showing how you can work these thing. In context (shocking concept I know) he said "anti-Vaxers say..."
Anyway. Even CA is opening up (which has been rather strict). I was a bit worried they would ignore the fact that some areas are effectively unaffected. Hot spot area (e.g. LA) are still heavily restricted.
I am cautiously optimistic. I think, if nothing else, based on what made it so bad in 1917, taking reasonable precautions, will have a huge effect.
Heck, I think if we can just keep symptomatic people from circulating, that will have a huge effect.
aircooled said:I am cautiously optimistic. I think, if nothing else, based on what made it so bad in 1917, taking reasonable precautions, will have a huge effect.
Apparently, reasonable precautions are anti-American and it's freedom to infect other people.
The second pic does not look super terrible (I think most of it is the low angle) but the first one is clearly not good. I am not super concerned in general about people outside, I think it greatly reduces transmissibility. That first pic though is pretty much a redo of the parade in 1918 that causes a huge spike in a city. Where is that? Florida? Are you sure that is current?
Clearly a lot of people pretending nothing has changed.
I already wouldn't be going anywhere that had a chance of looking like that. I do not like crowds really.
Someone's got some sweet Camaro shoes though.
Yeah, I kind of feel the same way. I have never liked crowds. The idea of being smashed into a mass of people is pretty abhorrent to me. In that way, the current situation is not much of a problem at all for me. Going to a crowded beach is a huge "why" for me.
There of course are a lot of people who have zero issue with that and seem to want to revert right back.
Today I saw a guy on a scooter wearing a backwards ball cap, sun glasses and face mask. Apparently, the virus is scarier than pavement at speed. It is officially time to panic.
On a different note, I did see a guy wearing a motorcycle helmet in the grocery store. He left in a car (Panamera)....
The beaches in LA are open, but only if you keep moving and you must keep a mask on at all times when not in the water. Needless to say, many people are not following these rules. I will submit though that those rules are unreasonable and irrational.
If it is actually so dangerous that you must have a mask on at all times, just keep the beaches closed.
The "keep moving" part MAY be to allow more people to use the beach, but that is not clear or stated, nor do I think it would have that much effect (you still need to park etc). If it is though. Say it!
If it's not really that dangerous, then why have such restrictive rules. Why not just say: Stay 6 feet away at all times, when you are unable to or unlikely to or are going indoors, wear a mask.
Creating unreasonable rules / laws simply invited people to break them. If they find one unreasonable, and break it, why not others. It also creates distrust in those who create the rules "clearly they don't know what they are talking about, why follow them"
In reply to aircooled :
Wearing a mask is supposed to be done in concert with, not instead of, staying away from people.
It sounds like the "keep moving" rule is meant to imply that you can go to the beach to do things, but not sunbathing.
I get it, but I think it also reasonable to assume on a hot beach you will get a lot who don't. So why even allow it?
They do state that with the moving rule but (as far as I know) don't give an actual reason. I can see not wanting group sports, but not allowing sitting isolated without a reason is silly.
In reply to aircooled :
I can't remember if this article has already been posted in this thread or not, but I found it interesting and it might explain the thinking behind banning stationary people:
The risks. Know them, avoid them
Basically, a person can encounter a virus and not get infected if they don't come into contact with enough of the virus. Just walking past somebody that's infected, or touching a surface that an infected person has touched, won't likely expose somebody to enough of the virus to be infected themselves. It takes time and typically close proximity or a confined space to spread. That's why you're most likely to contract COVID from the people and places that you spend most of your time around (home, work, sit down meals, gyms, concerts, etc).
Im not sure the CA rule for beaches really makes sense since its outdoors and not a confined space, but they're likely trying to roll back a little as a token gesture to keep people placated, while still keeping the transmission of the virus to a minimum. Being able to point to something and say "see, I did something!" is politician/ management 101.
Today should be 100,000 day ,
Yes its just a number , and probably not a true number but its still a milestone day .
I hope you all stay safe , its not over by a long shot , there is no vaccine and whatever they have developed still needs testing so the end of the year is a dream , but I like to dream !
Stay safe .....still
I am in the process of listening to Dan Carlin's book, The End is Always Near and I think it came out either late last year or very early this year. Either way, it was before Wuhan was a thing and he spends a fair amount of time in one of the chapters talking about how throughout history we have always had these plagues and things that crop up and wipe out large segments of the population. Granted, his focus is more on antiquity and all, but he writes about how it's actually kind of a historical oddity that we don't have that worry anymore and he speculates about how and if we would be able to handle a plague if one cropped up again.
One of two things are going to happen: It's either going to disappear suddenly like SARS The First did, or - more likely - we're in this for the long haul so we're going to have to accept it as a fact of life and figure out how to work around it as best we can. The same way humanity has dealt with this sort of thing for the last few millennia. It's kind of humbling to consider that as far as we like to think we have come and as technologically advanced as we like to think we are, we're still subject to the whims of disease and plague.
STM317 said:In reply to aircooled :
..Basically, a person can encounter a virus and not get infected if they don't come into contact with enough of the virus. Just walking past somebody that's infected, or touching a surface that an infected person has touched, won't likely expose somebody to enough of the virus to be infected themselves. It takes time and typically close proximity or a confined space to spread. ..
Now you see, THAT is a reasonable explanation of why! (I have ready about the viral load issue, so it ring true also)
It's not just justification, it allows people to use that information to inform their behavior. E.g. someone is stationary well away from people, don't be too concerned, but if you are moving but staying downwind from the same group of people, maybe change that up. Instead of "don't know why, government says so".
As someone I heard talk about this recently: The government needs to be as transparent and honest as possible. Not doing that erodes the public trust. If the trust goes away, there is almost no reason to obey laws you don't want to.
P.S. The beaches in LA seemed to be reasonably orderly this for the weekend (pretty crowded I heard). In the pics they showed, you could clearly see a number of umbrellas and people sitting in clear violation of the rules. Dangerous, probably not, but they where not informed as to why the rule is there, so there was little motiviation to follow it.
wae (Forum Supporter) said:One of two things are going to happen: It's either going to disappear suddenly like SARS The First did, or - more likely - we're in this for the long haul so we're going to have to accept it as a fact of life and figure out how to work around it as best we can. The same way humanity has dealt with this sort of thing for the last few millennia. It's kind of humbling to consider that as far as we like to think we have come and as technologically advanced as we like to think we are, we're still subject to the whims of disease and plague.
What is your definition of "the long haul?" If it is less than 2 years, I'll propose the third option: We figure out treatment (we've already figured out Remdesivir, convalescent plasma therapy is making promising headway, who knows what else we find out), develop vaccines (we have never had more instiutions working on a vaccine for a single virus than we have now), and after 2 years - and quite possibly a lot less - or so we go back to normal except with some folks wearing a mask.
Frankly, I think my summer will be more or less normal. I won't eat in restaurants. I won't go to Wrigley this year. I think my winter will suck, because I probably will be kept out of the ice rink (not a universal requirement, but probably necessary for me - I also anticipate a large second wave starting around October), and we may cancel the large Christmas get together. But by next May, I anticipate that things will be more or less back to normal.
Incidentally, and this is specifically directed to you, wae, next May is tentatively when my wife and I are planning to physically get back to the Church and baptize our daughter, with family around. We're really looking forward to that. We were robbed of it for our first daughter, because a virus (not Covid) attacked her heart. I baptized Angela myself with just my wife there because we weren't sure she'd make it out of the emergency surgery. The Priest came by later - he was attending to Last Rites for someone - but said I did it right and there was no need for him to do it again.
Our doctor had me get an antibody test on Friday and it came back positive. I'm thinking I had it the beginning of April, I had no fever or cough but had several other symptoms that weren't listed as symptoms at the time. He hoped it would give me peace of mind but it hasn't, I just keep thinking as hard as I tried to bring it home I still did.
a vaccine will come , the news keeps throwing the "latest and greatest" idea , but I assume most of the worlds researchers are working on it.....
Then comes the numbers problem again , just in the USA lets say 300 million doses are needed ( many vaccines need a series of doses) but lets say its just a single shot ,
Can they do 30 million a month ? thats 10 months if things go right ,
Who is first in line ? a double edge sword as you want doctors , nurses , police and fire to be first BUT if there is a reaction it could take all of them out , After that who ?????
Plus will you have to pay ? If you have enough money can you cut the line ? So many questions......
And then we have the Billions of other people in the world , should they get "our" shots before we are all done.....
I wish for the best , but seeing how things always end up , politics on both sides will push for what works for their side and not really for the public good......
Its going to be a long ride , there are going to be Hotspots all over the country , try not to be the one that starts a Hotspot and stay safe.....
Good Luck to all of us......
Co-worker is positive but it seems to be a mild case. We've been WFH for 2+ months. He's one of the few who would got to one of our sites periodically to kick the computers or whatever. I'm wondering if his spouse is a health care provider.
In reply to mtn (Forum Supporter) :
I think the way society moves, 2 more months is the long haul, realistically. I know that they're working on the vaccine and apparently the US has put down something like 1.2 billion space bucks to secure 300 million doses (which, really, $4/dose doesn't seem like a bad price at all!), But there's no way that society as a whole is going to remain disrupted and short of boarding people into their homes, there's not much that anybody's really going to be able to do about it. So it's going to keep circulating and it's going to ramp up, and it's just something that we're going to need to figure out how to live with. And even with a vaccine, you're going to have the segment of the population that won't get it, so it'll still be around just like influenza.
They are starting to talk about planning for sacraments again, so I think by this time next year they'll have it figured out. That's a long time to wait, though, so I'm envious of your patience! I'm sure that after everything that's happened for you and all this, it will seem like a miracle when you can finally have that celebration with your whole family!
aircooled said:
Anyway. Even CA is opening up (which has been rather strict). I was a bit worried they would ignore the fact that some areas are effectively unaffected. Hot spot area (e.g. LA) are still heavily restricted.
Since we got home from our trip March 11, we have been strictly home. 100% grocery online, everything else needed online. Just walks around the neighborhood daily.
Saturday, first time, I took my sports car for a drive up to Faria Beach and Ojai. There were a million Harley riders out, it felt like, and Jeep Wrangler guys. Ojai restaurants were jam packed. No one wearing masks. I wore my mask, when I took a walk through a park there, while looking at some books at the outdoor book store. People looked at me strange, as I was the only one wearring a mask.
californiamilleghia said:a vaccine will come , the news keeps throwing the "latest and greatest" idea , but I assume most of the worlds researchers are working on it.....
Then comes the numbers problem again , just in the USA lets say 300 million doses are needed ( many vaccines need a series of doses) but lets say its just a single shot ,
Can they do 30 million a month ? thats 10 months if things go right ,
Who is first in line ? a double edge sword as you want doctors , nurses , police and fire to be first BUT if there is a reaction it could take all of them out , After that who ?????
Plus will you have to pay ? If you have enough money can you cut the line ? So many questions......
And then we have the Billions of other people in the world , should they get "our" shots before we are all done.....
I wish for the best , but seeing how things always end up , politics on both sides will push for what works for their side and not really for the public good......
Its going to be a long ride , there are going to be Hotspots all over the country , try not to be the one that starts a Hotspot and stay safe.....
Good Luck to all of us......
Will we even need a vaccine in another 12-18 months? There are currently 1.7 million "confirmed cases" in the US. Studies based on antibody tests show that the number of actual infections could easily be 10x that amount. 17 million infections would represent 5.1% of the US population infected in just 3 months, most of which has been spent under lockdowns. As restrictions loosen (and people get bored/lazy with PPE and social distancing), infections will grow. Lots of ideas about just what percentage of the population would need to have immunity for "herd immunity" to kick in and the R0 to be brought below 1, but most of the estimates that I've read are in the 65-75% ballpark. So it's a race between a viable vaccine being available and another 190-200 million Americans being exposed through natural activity. I'm not going to try and plot the curve that it would require to get 200 million more Americans exposed, but the timeline might not be much different than the rushed vaccine.
If the tests that we're using are problematic because they were rushed to market, then how much confidence should we have in the first ever vaccine for a coronavirus that's been rushed to market? I'm a pretty healthy 34 year old that doesn't work in the medical or public service field so I'm probably low priority for a vaccine, but I'm totally ok with that.
californiamilleghia said:...Who is first in line ? a double edge sword as you want doctors , nurses , police and fire to be first BUT if there is a reaction it could take all of them out , After that who ?????...
One aspect that "should" help is that those that have had it (have anti-bodies), and there are a lot of those, should be immune, not sure how long at this point, so you can put them towards the back.
And Wally, good news... I think. I know how you feel (a bit) in that I want to get the test myself and see if I had it (likely did) and test the other two in the house and see if I spread it to them (we where careful, and they showed no symptoms). No way of really knowing if it was me that spread it to them if they do though.
Pete. (l33t FS) saidApparently, reasonable precautions are anti-American and it's freedom to infect other people.
This. It's extremely frustrating. My son has an auto-immune disease (type1 diabetes) and any sickness and he is likely hospital bound. Add to that that it seems that diabetics (t1 and t2) have some of the highest death rates makes all of this extremely scary. Add to that many people aren't taking the continued precautions seriously, and we're pretty much locked in the house all summer. 
Had to go in yesterday to be tested before I go in for my colonoscopy tomorrow- only did a swab-the-back-of-the-throat test which kind of surprised me- I would have figured that they would just have knocked out an antibody test at the same time to get a better idea of things. When the Dancer had to have blood drawn last week she asked about antibody testing and was told they did it- but the doctor had to make the request and they couldn't just add it on. They said they'd call this morning with the results of my test- but that if they didn't call then it had come back negative. I'll have to have a blood draw done in a month or so (have testing twice a year), and will likely ask the doctor about adding the antibody test to the panel to see what comes of it.
Wally (Forum Supporter) said:Our doctor had me get an antibody test on Friday and it came back positive. I'm thinking I had it the beginning of April, I had no fever or cough but had several other symptoms that weren't listed as symptoms at the time. He hoped it would give me peace of mind but it hasn't, I just keep thinking as hard as I tried to bring it home I still did.
My employer (big hospital in NYC) is starting testing on all our staff for antibodies. So far we're about 20% of employees testing positive. So there's that. I'll bet it's pretty representative of front line workers in NYC.
Also re everyone and "return to normal". I heard today from a very smart person: remember that we can never really know what to expect. So when you feel stressed that covid means you don't know what to expect, remember that knowing what to expect is really just an illusion.
The point is that this is still normal in the sense of not knowing the future.
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