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COVID-19 2nd wave - Texas only - Stats and such


justhookit

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I am a nursing home pharmacist in Austin that serves a wide area around central Texas (I don’t actually work in the homes, thank god).  Over the past week or so, a few of our homes have had big COVID outbreaks. Honestly, I am surprised it took this long. 
 

Oh yeah, we are also starting to run out of dexamethasone and it is now back ordered.  I am guessing this won’t help our hospitalization numbers in Austin if the trend continues. 

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1 hour ago, Newdoc said:

Nothing for Covid itself but we are getting a good rate of secondary bacterial pneumonia after Covid screws with the lungs.  Secondary pneumonia is what killed a lot of people in the 1918 flu pandemic.

I think it was well over 50% of the 1918 - 1921 deaths were due to pneumonia and other associated illnesses that could have been treated these days.

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1 hour ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

Our economy can’t withstand that type of prolonged uncertainty. 

I kinda wonder if that's partly why the Senate is considering another round of stimulus funding - I was thinking we would have no more shutdowns without that funding.  Right now, there is nothing in the pipeline, and they were sounding like it wouldn't happen, but with the numbers being what they are, they are realizing that some areas are going to close back down with or without funding.  If they close down without the funding, it will be devastating, but there's areas that are closing in on that line in the sand where they don't care if it wipes out a lot of businesses/jobs.

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Scientists hail 'stunning' results that show areas of New York may have reached 68 per cent immunity

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-hail-stunning-results-show-180918348.html
 
If Covid 19 has an r0 of 3 then NY probably did hit that number.  It's time to take it on the chin boys and get this ish over with.

The virologist quoted as noting the data as “stunning also says that it would be a mistake to base public health decisions off antibody rates across a population
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9 hours ago, Armybrat said:

Well, goddamn the idiots who can’t follow the recommended protocols.

Mrs. Brat just got her toe (foot) surgery scheduled for the 20th, and after being delayed 4 months she is having trouble off & on walking. Shit.

This so much.  I've gotten to the age in life where I'm pretty calm and nonconfrontational, but the assholes that don't follow the protocols are starting to trigger some pretty hostile thoughts.  It shows how selfish and stupid humanity has become when they would jeopardize the health and even lives of others because of their "freedom".  Bastards.

Edited by SHOOTER12
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16 minutes ago, SHOOTER12 said:

This so much.  I've gotten the age in life where I'm pretty calm and nonconfrontational, but the assholes that don't follow the protocols are starting to trigger some pretty hostile thoughts.  It shows how selfish and stupid humanity has become when they would jeopardize the health and even lives of others because of their "freedom".  Bastards.

shooter pistol GIF

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8 hours ago, Druggist said:

I am a nursing home pharmacist in Austin that serves a wide area around central Texas (I don’t actually work in the homes, thank god).  Over the past week or so, a few of our homes have had big COVID outbreaks. Honestly, I am surprised it took this long. 
 

Oh yeah, we are also starting to run out of dexamethasone and it is now back ordered.  I am guessing this won’t help our hospitalization numbers in Austin if the trend continues. 

Username certainly checks out.

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11 hours ago, Message Board User said:

Yeah Hidalgo had more cases today than Dallas County despite 1/3 the population.  😬

 

This really is terrible.  In the early days of the pandemic, the RGV counties had it under control with strict orders.  They were actually pulling people over for violations, ticketing etc.  My family down there was taking it very seriously and everything was very strict, even compared to Dallas.     Then, the state government intervened.

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On 7/8/2020 at 8:58 PM, Anastasis said:

This suggests to me that length of stay appears to be increasing.  Rate of new admissions flattening, but total census still rising, which may be a good thing. Maybe @trauma babe or another front line health care professional can provide their insight. Better to be in a bed than dead, or something. At least until we run out of beds. 

This should be concerning to all of us though.  This is the age distribution for (newly?) hospitalized pts week ending 07/05.

TC-hospitalizations-070820.jpg

 

No up-to-date information or trends right now, but I'm in the COVID ICU tonight, so I'm sure I'll learn something. 

Edited by trauma babe
I shouldn't slur myself :(
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2 hours ago, Enchubben said:

 

Of course, their point isn't to just open schools without precautions. Their point is that we need to spend the resources and make policy decisions so that having butts in seats is possible and reasonably safe. 

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12 hours ago, BradInATX said:

austin7-9.jpg

Star Trek Ok GIF

 

Looking better. I'm starting to think we're just going to ping pong up as we get lax and tired of being inside and down as the shit hits the fan every few months, until we get a vaccine.

So be it. As long as we have the societal will and the mechanisms in place to close the floodgates every so often as necessary, that's probably not a bad scenario.

 

Yep. This seems spot on to me. 
there is legitimately no compelling reason to shut down society other than to save overcrowding/hospitals being overrun. If you want to shelter you can shelter- but you shouldn’t have the right to make me shelter. If I want to roll the dice and not shelter I should get to do that- anyone else I contact is making that same decision. 
That calculation changes if hospitals are overrun and can’t provide services. As long as its kept in check by tamping down when it flares without overrunning the hospitals than all is good. 
I say this, thinking that there’s no real way to end this other than everyone sheltering in place, and saying we don’t have the ability, wherewithal/cure is worse than the disease, to be able to stop spread.  Or vaccine, obviously. 
But, if the only way this thing can be kept under wraps is to shut down, well, sign me up for what you described as best case scenario. People got to work, people got to eat, people got to have something worth living for or looking forward to. 

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9 hours ago, Pimphand said:

Scientists hail 'stunning' results that show areas of New York may have reached 68 per cent immunity

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-hail-stunning-results-show-180918348.html

 

If Covid 19 has an r0 of 3 then NY probably did hit that number.  It's time to take it on the chin boys and get this ish over with.

That’s also been my argument from March 1 or 15 or whenever it became apparent that this thing is probably killing at a rate around 0.25 to 0.5%. Not saying I’m correct as I truly believe there is no good answer to this, but yeah, these shit downs shave never seems like anything other than kicking the can down the road and delaying the inevitable. I’m a rip the band aid off kind of guy though. 

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1 minute ago, Grade of D as in David said:

It's not just the risk you are talking it's potentially passing the infection to others. I see where you said that people you come in contact with are making the same choice, but some are forced to make that choice because they are essential personnel.

Look at how dumb this argument looks.

If you want to call an Uber you can call an Uber- but you shouldn’t have the right to make me call an Uber. If I want to roll the dice and drive drunk I should get to do that- anyone else I contact is making that same decision. 

It's about personal responsibility, and that right ends when it impacts the rest of society. The shelter solution sucks, full stop. We needed to ramp up testing and contact tracing when we had our first lockdown, but we fucked around hoping it would magically go away when the summer heat came. It didn't and we are now reaping what we've sown.

I suppose it depends on whether you believe this problem is solveable or if the solution is better than what this version of the status quo presents. I don’t. Hopefully I’m wrong. I strongly suspect, if this thing is as contagious as everyone believes it to be, that the areas declining now will just get ramped up and inundated when they open back up again, and it’s all one gigantic game of kick the can down the road. Or, they already have herd immunity and the only way out of this is to let it run it’s course through your particular area and let it get who or what it’s going to get. 
I think there’s likely no way to manage this other than draconian shut everything down for long periods of time until a vaccine is found. And if that’s the solution it’s worse than what we are doing now imo. 

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11 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

That’s also been my argument from March 1 or 15 or whenever it became apparent that this thing is probably killing at a rate around 0.25 to 0.5%. Not saying I’m correct as I truly believe there is no good answer to this, but yeah, these shit downs shave never seems like anything other than kicking the can down the road and delaying the inevitable. I’m a rip the band aid off kind of guy though. 

Then how has literally every single other developed country (not to mention some of the poor countries in Asia) managed to start reopening without "delaying the inevitable"?  There are ways to open back up safely.  Hell, the CDC developed a plan to do just that.  But instead we decided to go "Murica fuck yeah" and barge ahead.   So we certainly ripped the band aid off, and if you are that kind of guy, great.  But it will almost certainly delay economic recovery in the 3rd and 4th quarter, prevent kids from going back to school and result in no college football.   So congrats?

Edited by Skipper
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2 minutes ago, Skipper said:

Then how has literally every single other developed country managed to start reopening without "delaying the inevitable"?  There are ways to open back up safely.  Hell, the CDC developed a plan to do just that.  But instead we decided to go "Murica fuck yeah" and barge ahead.   So we certainly ripped the band aid off, and if you are that kind of guy, great.  But it will almost certainly delay economic recovery in the 3rd and 4th quarter, prevent kids from going back to school and result in no college football.   So congrats?

We will see if that all works. The reopening in Texas and Florida and Georgia looked pretty fucking awesome for about a month until it didn’t.

like I said, I hope I’m wrong. Nothing would make me happier. Me and mine are social distancing and masking up and not around others etc and so forth. I hope this is an adequate way out. I suspect it isn’t. 

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2 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

I suppose it depends on whether you believe this problem is solveable or if the solution is better than what this version of the status quo presents. I don’t. Hopefully I’m wrong. I strongly suspect, if this thing is as contagious as everyone believes it to be, that the areas declining now will just get ramped up and inundated when they open back up again, and it’s all one gigantic game of kick the can down the road. Or, they already have herd immunity and the only way out of this is to let it run it’s course through your particular area and let it get who or what it’s going to get. 
I think there’s likely no way to manage this other than draconian shut everything down for long periods of time until a vaccine is found. And if that’s the solution it’s worse than what we are doing now imo. 

I agree that it's at a point where we cannot manage it other than a shutdown. It's like a forest fire and a shutdown would slow the transmission and starve it of the fuel needed to spread. Other countries have shown us that it can be slowed or stopped, but we have to decide if we really want to take the steps needed to make that happen. It is going to take sacrifice either way. Human lives or economic losses. Unfortunately if we choose the former we don't eliminate the latter. Sweden's economy is doing as poorly as their neighbors and the had a let it rip philosophy. People are afraid of dying, and of infecting their loved ones, that won't stop until we have the virus under control or there is a vaccine. Until then economic stability and a return to normal just won't happen.

I also understand there will be loss of life due to increased suicides due to isolation and economic hardship. Unfortunately the economic hardship suicides are going to happen regardless, I would assume that the number of suicides due to isolation are fewer that the number of deaths due to the unchecked spread of covid.

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14 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

We will see if that all works. The reopening in Texas and Florida and Georgia looked pretty fucking awesome for about a month until it didn’t.

like I said, I hope I’m wrong. Nothing would make me happier. Me and mine are social distancing and masking up and not around others etc and so forth. I hope this is an adequate way out. I suspect it isn’t. 

It looked awesome for a month because of the asymptomatic spread of this disease and the time to show symptoms/cause hospitalization. It usually takes a few weeks for the cases to propagate through the population. It's like saying, well she got pregnant but there was no baby born for 9 months. That's just how this virus works. Anyone claiming otherwise or doing victory laps one or two weeks in was being foolish at best and disingenuous at worst.

Everyone was predicting a spike when we opened up, we were hoping it wasn't going to be as large or as quick, but Americans are going to America.

Edited by Grade of D as in David
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11 minutes ago, Js1 said:

You’re wrong, per usual. 

Maybe. Really hope so. Per usual, I’m going to cheerfully try to make the best of a shitty situation while complying with what I owe to my fellow man. You can continue to choose to be miserable and terrible throughout this ordeal (and really every ordeal) in life as is your right. I won’t get in your way of that. 

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2 hours ago, DFWTexEx said:

This really is terrible.  In the early days of the pandemic, the RGV counties had it under control with strict orders.  They were actually pulling people over for violations, ticketing etc.  My family down there was taking it very seriously and everything was very strict, even compared to Dallas.     Then, the state government intervened.

I think a lot of traveling across the border intervened as well.  

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11 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

The most important thing that needs to be communicated to @Wulaw Horn in any response to his posts is that using deliberately using the term "shit down" really helps you come off aggy as fuck.

That wasn’t on purpose. I meant shut down. The I and U are right next to each other on my iPhone key pad and my fingers are fat. 

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4 minutes ago, Grade of D as in David said:

It looked awesome for a month because of the asymptomatic spread of this disease and the time to show symptoms/cause hospitalization. It usually takes a few weeks for the cases to propagate through the population.

Everyone was predicting a spike when we opened up, we were hoping it wasn't going to be as large or as quick, but Americans are going to America.

And we don’t have enough data from “the rest of the world starting to open back up” yet to see if it’s manageable for them. If it is than we fucked in big time. If they end up playing whack a mole and have flares up and down then none of it fucking matters. 
 

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18 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

The most important thing that needs to be communicated to @Wulaw Horn in any response to his posts is that using deliberately using the term "shit down" really helps you come off aggy as fuck.

Also fuck dude- I said shut down 8 times and shit down once, and followed shit down with “shave” when I clearly meant save. I can’t fucking get a benefit of the doubt before you call me an aggy on a pretty common typo (u/I/o transposed  on an iPhone?) in that scenario?  

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4 hours ago, Enchubben said:

 

 

This is very much taking that quote by Redfield WAY out of context. It's part of a larger discussion about having a plan to be open and protect students and anyone they would have contact with outside of school. He isn't at all saying that schools being open is more important than containing COVID, but that there needs to be a plan that will contain COVID and hopefully allow schools to reopen safely.

This quote is specifically talking about how we are damaging the education of our children by not having schools open.

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1 minute ago, Wulaw Horn said:

And we don’t have enough data from “the rest of the world starting to open back up” yet to see if it’s manageable for them. If it is than we fucked in big time. If they end up playing whack a mole and have flares up and down then none of it fucking matters. 
 

How much data do you need to make your decision? This isn't some marketing a/b test on buy button conversion. We are in a situation where we have to make decisions based on incomplete data.

Sadly, I already have 136,022 data points that show we fucked up.

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5 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

And we don’t have enough data from “the rest of the world starting to open back up” yet to see if it’s manageable for them. If it is than we fucked in big time. If they end up playing whack a mole and have flares up and down then none of it fucking matters. 
 

Whack a mole isn't actually a  bad strategy. In fact, it is one promoted by the experts (it was right upfront as a recommended action in the initial Imperial College Report). Open up (with restrictions and precautions). Use data to determine when re-shutting down would be appropriate (e.g., tracking # of cases, tracking hospitalizations, or just tracking sewage as Harvard study indicated). The goal of course is that if your precautions/restrictions are good enough, you won't need to shut down again. But, it is also possible that they just extend the period between shutdowns. That is still beneficial: (1) it buys time to learn more about the virus and development vaccines/treatments/strategies for reducing spread and (2) allows economic activity to continue with greater confidence than either a complete shut down or complete reopening with no particular plan for handling the rise in cases. 

Your choice of doing nothing and just going with it is lazy and, frankly, stupid. We don't need to be in a binary situation. We have more options and enough smart people to come up with and implement them. Avoiding action because the problem is difficult is irresponsible. 

Also, pretty confident that we do have enough information from South Korea at this point to conclude that there are good strategies that actually make this livable. 

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15 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Maybe. Really hope so. Per usual, I’m going to cheerfully try to make the best of a shitty situation while complying with what I owe to my fellow man. You can continue to choose to be miserable and terrible throughout this ordeal (and really every ordeal) in life as is your right. I won’t get in your way of that. 

Btw I appreciate you trying to make the best out of this situation, and really enjoy your thread on your family adventure. 

That said, I don't think it's fair to say that people who want to stop the spread (with shutdowns if needed) are choosing to be miserable. Fuck man we're all miserable. There's no way to avoid it. Summer travel plans have been scrapped, there's probably not going to be college football in the fall, there aren't going to be any new tv shows or movies coming out for a while. People are losing jobs, their insurance, businesses, and in some cases their loved ones. It fucking sucks. 

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12 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Also fuck dude- I said shut down 8 times and shit down once, and followed shit down with “shave” when I clearly meant save. I can’t fucking get a benefit of the doubt before you call me an aggy on a pretty common typo (u/I/o transposed  on an iPhone?) in that scenario?  

You said it in two separate posts, back-to-back. Neither post contained any other formulation for the words "shut down." It did appear intentional. 

P.S. Pretty sure "shave" was supposed to be "have," not "save."  

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27 minutes ago, Skipper said:

I guess I don't understand how you arrived at your opinion   Are you 100% focusing on America (or Texas?) to form your opinion that 'it is what it is'.  Because if you haven't noticed we literally are the laughing stock of the rest of the developed world.    How much better would we be off with early/consistent messaging on masking (and a population with fewer morons) combined with a WWII effort for N95 mask production so that private citizens actually had access.   That was feasible.  Instead, we completely wasted the shutdown and didn't fix testing, contact tracing, mask production, or adhere to any sort of a plan.   We opened up this summer pushing all of our chips in betting on this being highly seasonal and simply not spreading during the summer.  That's it.  That was the plan.   

Not only was it a crappy plan, but the motivation for it was disgusting.  I won't say more than that given what thread we're in.

There's a fine line to walk between keeping the economy going and minimizing the effects of this pandemic.  At some point, continued "duty cycling" of the economy and avoidable extension of the effects of the pandemic are going to economically override any benefit gained from "reopening."

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  • immamac changed the title to COVID-19 2nd wave - Texas only - Stats and such

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