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Formerly DT: COVID-19 - Featuring Lots of Politics, now CR because political talk not going away


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I don't know if I posted this earlier because I got blind drunk for a bit,  but there were a line of cars going from Cameron to St Johns. Food line I guess.
I blasted "The Weekend" out of my windows for a bit which I hope brought some light.
Fuck.
Austin food bank's pickup location is at Reagan high school. That line of cars was for their pickup. I saw a video from this past Saturday where the line was over a mile long. Just really sad. If you can, every $1 you donate provides 4 meals for someone
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10 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

You're so weird. I would love to test everyone. We dont have enough tests for that. We dont want to significantly under count because it is important for us to have accurate information in order to make sound policy decision. We also dont want to over count. The hospitals policy is an attempt to balance those concerns given the limited availability of testing. You can't just order a test that isnt available. 

you're so weird.  I'm saying mark the death what it is pneumonia. easy, why is this so hard? we aren't going to "significantly under count".

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Just now, gsoda3 said:
2 hours ago, MissingInAction said:
I don't know if I posted this earlier because I got blind drunk for a bit,  but there were a line of cars going from Cameron to St Johns. Food line I guess.
I blasted "The Weekend" out of my windows for a bit which I hope brought some light.
Fuck.

Austin food bank's pickup location is at Reagan high school. That line of cars was for their pickup. I saw a video from this past Saturday where the line was over a mile long. Just really sad. If you can, every $1 you donate provides 4 meals for someone

To these points, does anyone know how the Houston Food Bank is faring?

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Just now, gsoda3 said:
2 hours ago, MissingInAction said:
I don't know if I posted this earlier because I got blind drunk for a bit,  but there were a line of cars going from Cameron to St Johns. Food line I guess.
I blasted "The Weekend" out of my windows for a bit which I hope brought some light.
Fuck.

Austin food bank's pickup location is at Reagan high school. That line of cars was for their pickup. I saw a video from this past Saturday where the line was over a mile long. Just really sad. If you can, every $1 you donate provides 4 meals for someone

I donated cash once already and some food as well. I think I'm going to donate again. A line that long is heart breaking.

 

The school near my house is serving food to go during the week. Seems the line gets longer there everyday as well

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3 minutes ago, DDD Dad said:


More importantly, what is the latest news on the rodeo?

I get the joke, so no sweat. I only asked because I’d be happy to donate some money. My experience with working with them over the years is that the Houston FB is always in great freaking shape and monetary contributions are better directed to people and charities that are more in need. I can’t speak to other food banks, but the Houston FB, to their credit, seems well run and the corporate entities in Houston do a good job of working with them. It struck me reading gsoda3’s post that this might not be true right now, so maybe they need some help. That’s all. 

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7 hours ago, JOSEYWALES66 said:

According to Worldometer, Nevada has over 20,000 for today with only 2000 coming into today.   I assume they had some sort of data dump issue or a bunch of tests results came back. 

At least they beat the spread 

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6 hours ago, closetojumping said:

I get the joke, so no sweat. I only asked because I’d be happy to donate some money. My experience with working with them over the years is that the Houston FB is always in great freaking shape and monetary contributions are better directed to people and charities that are more in need. I can’t speak to other food banks, but the Houston FB, to their credit, seems well run and the corporate entities in Houston do a good job of working with them. It struck me reading gsoda3’s post that this might not be true right now, so maybe they need some help. That’s all. 

They had an ammonia leak which resulted in loss of potentially spoiled/contaminated food back in November, not sure if you caught it in the news. Thanks to donations and a promo with united airlines they were able to recover both food stock and money just in time for the Chinese coronavirus.  They still need lots of volunteers but they are business as usual from what I can tell of coworkers that are donating time.

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Another update:

This is for those sites that see 250 samples / day...

Quote

A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services tells NPR, "Many of the Community-Based Testing Sites (CBTS) are not closing, but rather transitioning to state-managed sites on or about April 10."

The agency and a spokesperson for FEMA say the CBTS program originally included 41 sites. It was intended as a stop-gap to bring testing to critical locations, especially for health care facility workers and first responders.

NPR: Federal Support Ends For Coronavirus Testing Sites As Pandemic Peak Nears

Full Text: 

Spoiler

 

Federal Support Ends For Coronavirus Testing Sites As Pandemic Peak Nears
April 8, 20201:38 PM ET
 Jeff Brady 2010
JEFF BRADY

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A health care worker talks with a patient at a COVID-19 testing site in Philadelphia. The site will close Friday when the federal government ends support for this site and others around the country.
Matt Slocum/AP
Updated at 3:30 p.m. ET

Some local officials are disappointed the federal government will end funding for coronavirus testing sites this Friday. In a few places those sites will close as a result. This as criticism continues that not enough testing is available.

In the Philadelphia suburbs, Montgomery County has a drive-through site that has tested 250 people a day since March 21.

"It has been a very successful site. We are hoping by the time it closes Friday afternoon that we will have tested a little over 5,000 individuals," says Dr. Valerie Arkoosh, who chairs the commission in the county of more than 825,000 people.

Montgomery County has been hit hard by the pandemic. By Tuesday the county identified 1,294 positive cases and reported 32 COVID-19-related deaths.

Coronavirus State-By-State Projections: When Will Each State Peak?
SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS
Coronavirus State-By-State Projections: When Will Each State Peak?
Arkoosh says local officials staffed the site and the federal government provided much-needed testing supplies and access to a lab. "This site came with a contract with LabCorp, who accepted 250 samples from this site every day," and she says the county is not able to secure the supplies and tests on its own.

Arkoosh says the site, located on a local college campus, will shut down Friday. Similar announcements have been made in Colorado Springs, Colo., and nearby Philadelphia.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services tells NPR, "Many of the Community-Based Testing Sites (CBTS) are not closing, but rather transitioning to state-managed sites on or about April 10."

The agency and a spokesperson for FEMA say the CBTS program originally included 41 sites. It was intended as a stop-gap to bring testing to critical locations, especially for health care facility workers and first responders.

"The transition will ensure each state has the flexibility and autonomy to manage and operate testing sites within the needs of their specific community and to prioritize resources where they are needed the most," the HHS spokesperson said.

But that doesn't satisfy Arkoosh in Montgomery County, who says, "I am understandably disappointed that the supplies and federal contract for lab testing is ending just as we are heading into the surge here in southeastern Pennsylvania."

Arkoosh says local hospitals do have their own testing sites set up now, but it's not yet clear if they will be able to handle the extra testing now that the federal help is being withdrawn.

 

 

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In addition to the sad stories of how covid ravages senior care facilities, it's also hit the disability centers hard as well:  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/nyregion/coronavirus-disabilities-group-homes.html

Might be behind their paywall but basically a home for developmentally disabled home in NYC has seen 37 of the 46 residents have tested positive, with 2 already dying and 9 in the hospital.  I'm sure one of the big challenges for that staff can be to isolate the residents who may have zero understanding of what is happening. Tough story.

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I'm curious if anyone has an outlook on what this means, if anything, beyond the facts/quotes in the story:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/08/politics/military-doctor-surge-nyc/index.html

I guess I'm reluctant to believe that there is real hospital space inventory in NYC, given the prior tweest and articles posted and discussed here in recent days, but I don't watch the Cuomo or DeBlasio updates. Have hospitalization rates gone down and there is now space? Or is this purely a bureaucratic issue? I'd find it encouraging if things were lightening up. 

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1 hour ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

In addition to the sad stories of how covid ravages senior care facilities, it's also hit the disability centers hard as well

Then there is the over-correction of when an incapacitated individual is taught to maintain a safe distance from others and to keep people out of your "safe zone."  Hospital Officials are Struggling  Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

 

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1 minute ago, closetojumping said:

I'm curious if anyone has an outlook on what this means, if anything, beyond the facts/quotes in the story:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/08/politics/military-doctor-surge-nyc/index.html

I guess I'm reluctant to believe that there is real hospital space inventory in NYC, given the prior tweest and articles posted and discussed here in recent days, but I don't watch the Cuomo or DeBlasio updates. Have hospitalization rates gone down and there is now space? Or is this purely a bureaucratic issue? I'd find it encouraging if things were lightening up. 

Fauci is revising projections down to 60k on our current trajectory, seems to be a lull in new cases which is great. With that said, I have a feeling we're going to be seeing a series of regional flare-ups, assuming we continue our travel and social distancing. If we go back to normal with the virus still kicking around and no known-good vaccine, we're liable to have another wave of infections.

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5 minutes ago, Captainant said:

Fauci is revising projections down to 60k on our current trajectory, seems to be a lull in new cases which is great. With that said, I have a feeling we're going to be seeing a series of regional flare-ups, assuming we continue our travel and social distancing. If we go back to normal with the virus still kicking around and no known-good vaccine, we're liable to have another wave of infections.

We will definitely be in a new normal until the Vaccine is made. How could you go to a sports event during this when it takes one person coughing to infect a ton of people?

That being said, higher testing and antibody testing, wearing masks, maintaining social distancing with the most at risk groups, banning large gatherings, and somewhat developing herd immunity with more people that had it will help. These measures weren’t put in to eradicate the virus but to give us enough time to build up our strategy and to not overwhelm our hospital system during the first wave where we are at our most vulnerable. 

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11 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

given the prior tweest and articles posted

Keep one thing in mind, the loudest voice is not necessarily the most accurate voice. Social media/News media are always going to pick the worst areas with the worst problems to highlight. I'm not saying it's fake, but it's not indicative of what is going on everywhere.

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3 minutes ago, Captainant said:

Fauci is revising projections down to 60k on our current trajectory, seems to be a lull in new cases which is great. With that said, I have a feeling we're going to be seeing a series of regional flare-ups, assuming we continue our travel and social distancing. If we go back to normal with the virus still kicking around and no known-good vaccine, we're liable to have another wave of infections.

Thanks. I think I've watched or listened to one PC with Cuomo and one with the president this whole time, so unless I read it here or on a newsfeed, I don't know the latest from any level of admin while still watching the daily trends.

I don't see how "normal" will be normal at all anytime soon. I think people are craving the ability to guilt-free be able to get together with friends and family in smaller groups as long as no one is showing signs, whether that's at a house or park, and take their chances. Beyond that, seems like congregating en masse anywhere seems doubtful for like a year unless a miracle treatment makes an appearance. They're going to have to provide some clear guidelines that can actually be enforced and then start enforcing them when they open some stuff back up, which I presume would be writing expensive tickets to people or businesses that don't align with the requirements. That would probably be socially approved for a time, although what that means to sports, entertainment, amusement, religion, business conferences, I don't want to think about right now.

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I question any lull in new cases narrative.  22 states had highs in new cases either yesterday or the day before.  MA, MD, IL are trending much worse.  I also worry that the US military is now reporting large number of cases. If counted along state or territories, the US military now has the 22nd most cases.

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1 minute ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

I question any lull in new cases narrative.  22 states had highs in new cases either yesterday or the day before.  MA, MD, IL are trending much worse.  I also worry that the US military is now reporting large number of cases. If counted along state or territories, the US military now has the 22nd most cases.

Are they already included in case #'s for the states where they are stationed?

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7 minutes ago, Captainant said:

Fauci is revising projections down to 60k on our current trajectory, seems to be a lull in new cases which is great. With that said, I have a feeling we're going to be seeing a series of regional flare-ups, assuming we continue our travel and social distancing. If we go back to normal with the virus still kicking around and no known-good vaccine, we're liable to have another wave of infections.

The ABSOLUTE most important thing to do to get us on the right path is to make available -- on a widespread basis - instant testing.  That has to be the first step.  After that, then you can isolate, do contact tracing, etc.  Tamp down every flare up before it turns into a wildfire.  In fact, the firefighting analogy works pretty well. 

During wildfire season, the approach is to manage the places that fire could catch (trim back your brush, that sort of thing), and when a fire flares up, hit it quickly to keep it from spreading.  You do that all season, until the rains come, and the danger goes away.

Same here.  We had the fire rage out of control, so we had to take drastic firefighting measures.  Once we get the big fire under control, then we need to follow the strategy of tamping down flare-ups of the disease until the rainy season -- a vaccine -- comes.  It's stressful, it will take LOTS of work and information.  But it's what we need to do in order to relax some of the restrictions in place right now.

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2 minutes ago, Scary Stranger said:

Are they already included in case #'s for the states where they are stationed?

I don't think so.  Reports are that the military didn't want the numbers to be know but who knows.  Now if the personnel were tested or hospitalized off-base, I'm sure they are counted.

https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-first-public-map-reveals-military-bases-coronavirus-cases-pentagon-secrecy-draws-1496951

Like other aspects of Covid, there are unknowns about data.

 

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I don’t see a full return to normal until there is a vaccine or at least a simple treatment that can be prescribed to get rid of the infection. It need to be something similar to a strep test done at a doctor’s office and then a 10 day prescription of “whatever” medicine there is to “cure” it. I have no idea what the partial roll out of normal will be, but it’s going to cause flare ups frequently.

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3 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

The ABSOLUTE most important thing to do to get us on the right path is to make available -- on a widespread basis - instant testing.  That has to be the first step.  After that, then you can isolate, do contact tracing, etc.  Tamp down every flare up before it turns into a wildfire.  In fact, the firefighting analogy works pretty well. 

During wildfire season, the approach is to manage the places that fire could catch (trim back your brush, that sort of thing), and when a fire flares up, hit it quickly to keep it from spreading.  You do that all season, until the rains come, and the danger goes away.

Same here.  We had the fire rage out of control, so we had to take drastic firefighting measures.  Once we get the big fire under control, then we need to follow the strategy of tamping down flare-ups of the disease until the rainy season -- a vaccine -- comes.  It's stressful, it will take LOTS of work and information.  But it's what we need to do in order to relax some of the restrictions in place right now.

Can someone explain in a non-CR way how SK had the ability to do widespread drive-up testing nearly immediately but we're still in the "development" stage of tests that don't take many days (or even weeks)?  Did they use the Chinese test that supposedly does so many false negatives?  If so, seems to work well enough.  And how were they able to give and process so many tests so quickly?  I get the idea that they were "weeks ahead," but those weeks have gone by and we're still not testing they way they were several weeks ago.  We've done a lot of tests in specific geographic "hot spot" areas, but are still around 0.3% in big pop states like Texas.  And we have these enormous delays and backlogs on reading the tests.

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The good news from what I have read is that Covid won't be able to mutate anywhere close to as much as the flu does from year to year so that once their is a vaccine it should be effective long term.  The virologist in the article was also confident there would be a vaccine.

Edited by kevwun
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5 minutes ago, Liquor and Poker said:

Can someone explain in a non-CR way how SK had the ability to do widespread drive-up testing nearly immediately but we're still in the "development" stage of tests that don't take many days (or even weeks)?  Did they use the Chinese test that supposedly does so many false negatives?  If so, seems to work well enough.  And how were they able to give and process so many tests so quickly?  I get the idea that they were "weeks ahead," but those weeks have gone by and we're still not testing they way they were several weeks ago.  We've done a lot of tests in specific geographic "hot spot" areas, but are still around 0.3% in big pop states like Texas.  And we have these enormous delays and backlogs on reading the tests.

As non-CR as possible, the federal government just hasn't been giving testing the same attention that it has the economic concerns. The federal government is currently defunding COVID-19 testing right now while doling out another 2.3 trillion in loans to businesses. It's just not been a priority from the decision makers to work on testing and data collection.

Edited by Captainant
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1 minute ago, kevwun said:

The good news from what I have read is that Covid won't be able to mutate anywhere close to as much as the flu does from year to year so that once their is a vaccine it should be effective long term.  The virologist in the article was also confident there would be a vaccine.

It seems that there's pretty widespread confidence that a vaccine will be developed and should work.  The  question is all in 1) the timing, and 2) how many doses can be produced quickly.

In a dream world, something available sometime this fall would be absolutely fantastic.  But the consensus seems to be pointing to -- at best -- early next year.  I sure hope that's a conservative consensus.  But I sure as hell don't know.

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3 minutes ago, Liquor and Poker said:

Can someone explain in a non-CR way how SK had the ability to do widespread drive-up testing nearly immediately but we're still in the "development" stage of tests that don't take many days (or even weeks)?  Did they use the Chinese test that supposedly does so many false negatives?  If so, seems to work well enough.  And how were they able to give and process so many tests so quickly?  I get the idea that they were "weeks ahead," but those weeks have gone by and we're still not testing they way they were several weeks ago.  We've done a lot of tests in specific geographic "hot spot" areas, but are still around 0.3% in big pop states like Texas.  And we have these enormous delays and backlogs on reading the tests.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/12/asia/coronavirus-south-korea-testing-intl-hnk/index.html

Basically the SK company already had the infrastructure, saw the need earlier than others and rapidly came up with an automated testing solution, accounting for around 80% of all SK testing.

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Just now, MonkeyDoughnut said:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/12/asia/coronavirus-south-korea-testing-intl-hnk/index.html

Basically the SK company already had the infrastructure, saw the need earlier than others and rapidly came up with an automated testing solution, accounting for around 80% of all SK testing.

Why didn't we just buy/license that?

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4 minutes ago, Captainant said:

As non-CR as possible, the federal government just hasn't been giving testing the same attention that it has the economic concerns. The federal government is currently defunding COVID-19 testing right now while doling out another 2.3 trillion in loans to businesses. It's just not been a priority from the decision makers to work on testing and data collection.

I think this is more of an indication that the Federal Government sees the need for local governments to handle local testing and for the Feds to focus on the country-wide need to get the economy going/save jobs. And I hate the word "defunding". 

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  • hayden_horn changed the title to Formerly DT: COVID-19 - Featuring Lots of Politics, now CR because political talk not going away


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