COVID-19/Coronavirus Information and Support Thread (see OP for useful links)

[Danoff]

I'm not sure what you're going to do without your hands

Well played.

but presumably this is how Obama justified the program to Congress in the first place (unless he forced it through via executive order). We're all on the same side here but it's hard to see why Trump yanked the programme in the first place. I'm guessing it was tainted in his mind by association with his hated predecessor.

His efforts to discredit the WHO (alongside the WHO's own, to be fair) wouldn't help with their setting such a programme up in other countries, I feel.

Yea I agree. The pandemic has been rough on all counts, including politically in the US and the WHO. But... it also really clearly points out the value of being good at developing vaccines, and the value of stamping out something seemingly benign like coronavirus. it seems like an international coopoerative effort if ever there was one, and could help to preserve peace among nations. It could also help prevent cover-ups like we saw with COVID in the early days when it first emerged in China.

Edit:

*Gets up on grandstand, grabs mic*

COVID affected all of us as a species. The entire planet has uniformly been damaged by its existence. Let us use this event as an opportunity to unite and combat a common foe for the good of all of the people of the Earth!

*massive applause*

 

[GBO Possum]

This is what I mean by over View attachment 957245

Just remember that "death" is not the only negative impact of Covid-19

 

[MatskiMonk]

*massive applause*

... And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day when the world declared in one voice: We will not go quietly into the night! We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!

 

[Touring Mars]

My colleague is still off sick, but apart from a slight fever, it doesn't sound a lot like COVID-19. He is self-isolating for two weeks anyway, because he can't get a test... not even a home test.

While a lack of testing is not likely to impact my work too badly (most of it is going to be online/remote anyway), it could/will be devastating elsewhere, esp. to schools. How are teachers supposed to work safely when they can't test either themselves or their students? Do classrooms/entire schools get shut down because a few people are ill?

 

[Famine]

Do classrooms/entire schools get shut down because a few people are ill?

Yep.

They're keeping year groups and their teachers in a bubble. If one falls ill with COVIDy symptoms, they're all out for two weeks, but the rest of the school carries on. They're basically like the compartments in the Titanic's hull...

 

[GBO Possum]

They're basically like the compartments in the Titanic's hull...

Nothing could possibly go wrong then.

 

[Touring Mars]

Yep.

They're keeping year groups and their teachers in a bubble. If one falls ill with COVIDy symptoms, they're all out for two weeks, but the rest of the school carries on. They're basically like the compartments in the Titanic's hull...

My old boss (and Director of the Centre for Virus Research) is on the warpath about the handling of schools going back... he's not happy at all.

-

My workmate has been diagnosed with a bacterial throat infection, and hence he suspects it is not COVID-19, which is good news...

 

[strela]

How we are practicing social distancing in Schools. Italy 2020...

 

[Danoff]

Do classrooms/entire schools get shut down because a few people are ill?

The way it has been working here (in some places) is to use small groups, so that when a quarantine occurs, it affects only a small footprint of the school.

 

[Barra333]

The way it has been working here (in some places) is to use small groups, so that when a quarantine occurs, it affects only a small footprint of the school.

In our school board (and I think all of Ontario), the rule is the kid is out until they return a negative test and are symptom free for 24h. Difference here is that we have testing centres (2 in a city of ~400,000 for me) where anyone can roll up and ask for a test under any circumstances. Results are generally next day, but no more than 48h. Fingers crossed - my kid is back tomorrow.

 

[TheCracker]

22 of the schools in my city currently have a single whole year/bubble, or more, in two week home isolation. This is just two weeks into term.

 

[Barra333]

22 of the schools in my city currently have a single whole year/bubble, or more, in two week home isolation. This is just two weeks into term.

Precautionary, or due a positive case? Here, they only plan on shutting down a class if there is a positive case.

 

[Touring Mars]

Given how shambolic the testing is the UK at the moment, I would imagine that merely having symptoms of Covid-19 is enough to earn a child (and the rest of their class) a 10-day holiday.

 

[TheCracker]

Precautionary, or due a positive case? Here, they only plan on shutting down a class if there is a positive case.

Positive, or assumed case. Not always the pupils, sometimes the teachers, in one case a dinner lady.

 

[x3ra]

That article is quite staggering in several ways.

Firstly, it is not peer-reviewed. It is not even a pre-print - it's a self-published opinion piece with no review whatsoever. Alarm bells.

Secondly, it's already out of date. Although this version is dated last week, the text states it was written in mid-August.. but it also looks like it has been updated before that too (see references), suggesting the original text was written at least a few months ago. And while the text may have been updated, the data shown only goes up to August 23rd.

The key contention of the article is that the rise in cases observed in Europe since the 'first wave' are artefacts caused by increased testing. And as of August 23rd, in the UK at least, that was probably true... testing in the UK has increased linearly since the beginning of April, and the increase in cases in the UK since the beginning of July is consistent with that.

Unfortunately, the data from the last three weeks destroys that narrative completely. Pity, then, that the article and the data shown therein doesn't show this, even though it was supposedly updated a few days ago...

As such, it already has a touch of the Murray Walker's about it - ("I don't make mistakes, I just make predictions that immediately turn out to be wrong...").

Lastly, they are looking for donations - really?!

Sorry but you're not peer reviewed so anything you say is ********. Is that way it works? So show me the new data, which I assume you have since you say it destroys the narrative.

 

[RacingGrandpa]

Sorry but you're not peer reviewed so anything you say is ********. Is that way it works?

There is a difference between a opinion article and a scientific paper. The scientific paper should be peer reviewed to assure the way the science is done.
An opinion doesn't have to be but then it's an opinion so it doesn't carry much weight in it self.

 

[Barra333]

Sorry but you're not peer reviewed

But, he is. Getting a PhD is a pretty exhaustive peer review process. Very few qualifications require the approval of your peers to obtain. @Touring Mars's PhD might not be in epidemiology, but his background in a fairly closely related field make him more than qualified enough to point out the flaws in what you posted.

the narrative

Says the guy who used lockdownskeptics.org as a source. Excuse me while I go erase that link from my browser history.

 

[Touring Mars]

Sorry but you're not peer reviewed so anything you say is ********. Is that way it works? So show me the new data, which I assume you have since you say it destroys the narrative.

The data is readily available in various links I've posted in the OP (including Worldometers.info, which your article uses screengrabs from...), but up to date testing data from the UK government can be found here: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/testing

There's a few big questions to be answered regarding the (evidently) false claims being made in your article and the others posted on the Lockdown sceptics site, but some of the most glaring are:

1) If the False Positive Rate of SARS-CoV-2 tests is 2% (or higher), then how come the number of positive cases reported in, for example, July 2020 in the UK, is substantially lower than 2% of the number of tests that have been done? For example, even if 100% of all tests were falsely positive in July, then there ought to have been at least 2500 positive tests given that there was, on average, around 130000 tests done daily in that time period. The same holds true until late August... where, oddly enough, the data in your article stops. Yet the reported cases in these time periods is way lower than that. This suggests that the FPR can only be around 0.5%, and, by extension, that the large majority of new cases in the last month are real and not 'artefacts'.

2) More tests equals more positive results only holds true if the actual number of infections remains constant. But if the rate of increase of new positive results outstrips the rate of increase of new tests, then this strongly implies that the increase is positive cases cannot be explained by more testing alone and indicates a real increase in new cases i.e. a real outbreak.

The data cited in your article shows a linear increase through July and August that is consistent with this, but then at the end of August and up to today, there is a large new peak appearing that cannot be explained solely by the increase in testing, even with the FPR taken into account. Ironically, the higher the FPR is supposed to be (according to the 'lockdown sceptics'), the more difficult it becomes to explain the observed increase in cases relative to the number of tests being done. Explain that.

 

[Danoff]

I'm predicting no response.

 

[Pigems]

I'm predicting no response.

It’s funny how people don’t like to be proven wrong eh.

 

[Dotini]

The most interesting statistic to me is the persistently declining percentage of positive tests in my state. It's at 5.0% now, and 2% is the goal.

 

[Blitz24]

I'm predicting no response.

I'm predicting a response with another article that is either misused/misquoted to prove his non-existent point.

Oh, you mean to answer the arguments? Yeah, that won't happen.

 

[Pigems]

The most interesting statistic to me is the persistently declining percentage of positive tests in my state. It's at 5.0% now, and 2% is the goal.

Are they doing less testing to achieve those numbers though? I’ve seen a few videos of Trump calling for less testing, so less cases would be found. Not sure if it’s been put into action or not though.

 

[Dotini]

Are they doing less testing to achieve those numbers though? I’ve seen a few videos of Trump calling for less testing, so less cases would be found. Not sure if it’s been put into action or not though.

No, on the contrary, after a halting start with unavailable/unreliable test kits, Washington State is testing in ever greater numbers. So the steadily decreasing positive percentages are very encouraging indeed.

 

[Pigems]

No, on the contrary, after a halting start with unavailable/unreliable test kits, Washington State is testing in ever greater numbers. So the steadily decreasing positive percentages are very encouraging indeed.

That’s awesome! I’m very glad to hear that man, I hope you guys are able to get back to some sort or normal soon down there.

 

[huskeR32]

The most interesting statistic to me is the persistently declining percentage of positive tests in my state. It's at 5.0% now, and 2% is the goal.

I don't know anything about Washington's processes in particular, but many other states started relaxing their standards for who qualified to be tested once they were able to actually get a good supply of test kits. This would logically lead to more "lower-risk" people being tested, and therefore a lower positive rate.

I agree that a declining positive rate is indeed a good thing, but celebrations should probably be tempered until more is known about why that rate is going down.

 

[Dotini]

I don't know anything about Washington's processes in particular, but many other states started relaxing their standards for who qualified to be tested once they were able to actually get a good supply of test kits. This would logically lead to more "lower-risk" people being tested, and therefore a lower positive rate.

I agree that a declining positive rate is indeed a good thing, but celebrations should probably be tempered until more is known about why that rate is going down.

Another quite interesting stat we keep careful track of is confirmed cases per day.

Roughly, cases averaged 300 per day March to May, then steadily ramped up to 900 in July and August. The current 14 day average is 425.

 

[UKMikey]

Meanwhile in Utah... (apologies @Joey D)

 

[dlshearon]

https://fox17.com/news/local/covid-19-emails-from-nashville-mayors-office-show-disturbing-revelation

Well 🤬 is about to hit the fan in Nashville. Coming from a mayor who wants to raise property taxes to 34% due to Covid.

 

[Dotini]

Meanwhile in Utah... (apologies @Joey D)

If you're wearing a mask and cannot breathe well enough, particularly when exercising or working, the solution is to wear a sports mask with dual exhalation valves. True enough, they do not protect others, but they do protect you. It's up to the other guy to protect himself.