outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

Won't anyone think about the numbers?

Here is where linguistic nuance comes to the rescue. Gov. Brian Kemp was told that coronavirus can be spread before people show symptoms repeatedly in the past several weeks, but he only learned this in the past 24 hours.

― A is for (Aimless)

Kemp complained, "How could I have known?! Why didn't anybody tell m....I mean, make me learn?!"

i tell you, we will get to the bottom of who refused to make me learn

Weren't there viral (oh that poor word) photos from January of people dying on the streets of Wuhan? I remember some shot of a man on the floor of a subway car and the other riders all backed up away from him.

At the time, it seemed so much more instantaneous than two weeks, but maybe I've been fooled by the internet again.

This is stunning. It appears deaths are being dramatically undercounted in Spain and Italy. pic.twitter.com/O6R4gOhu4M

— Ben Judah (@b_judah) April 2, 2020

Maybe, maybe not...but if debate in the comments. The methodology will be debated for a long time

I'm starting to settle into a resigned pessimism about this. The US is dysfunctional and incapable of doing the things that experts say would make the most difference -- universal lockdown, widespread testing, etc. A vaccine will take a long time, and in the meantime any treatment improvements will be piecemeal/patchwork. Jared Fucking Kushner is "coordinating" our federal effort, i.e. there is no coordination. New York is doing at least a serviceable job, but it started far too late and meanwhile there are still 10 or so states that aren't doing shit. I think this is going to be longer and more deadly than we are being told right now. And the potential economic contagion just boggles my mind.

I agree with all that, about the USA. And it's not the deadliness of this disease that's most on my mind; it's its consequences for the American economy, by which I don't mean GDP or really anything particularly quantitative, but rather, how the way Americans have to live, the way Americans lives are structured (housing, health care, education): that's "the economy", and the depth of the disruption to that has hardly begun to sink in.

The problem in the US is not just that there never was a plan but that there still is no plan, as such, and no indication the government is competent enough to come up with a plan. But I really doubt most if any countries have a real plan, either, and that's sort of what's both frightening and disheartening about the whole ordeal. Whenever this is done it will be far from done, and when it gets to the economic recovery stage, whenever that happens, we're going to see some real bullshit on a monumental scale, and I have no idea what the world will look like when the bullshit dries.

The USA has almost no national solidarity (the emptiness of troop worship is as close as it gets), and that deprives the nation of even conceiving of "a plan", by which, how to move past this crisis. The American plan will be "how things were before", and for the millions whose jobs will never be the same (if they have jobs at all), what was before will never be again. And what for them? We know the answer.

Hey America, fuck you x2:

https://globalnews.ca/news/6772979/coronavirus-3m-n95-respirators-trump-canada/

Sweden now has 6x the deaths that Norway does (308 vs 50). Both had their first case the same day. Norway locked down early + Sweden still hasn't. Sweden tracking Italy at the moment. https://t.co/7QMYtrua0P

— Sam Freedman (@Samfr) April 3, 2020

I dunno, I'm just a lowly layman, but I've read enough history to know how disruptive/catastrophic outbreaks and pandemics have been in the past, kinda feels like this should just be part and parcel of national disaster preparedness. Incompetence is definitely playing a role in the limpid response, but there's definitely an element of anencephalic hubris, as well. Like, something like this could never happen to us. Even though it totally has.

It's a prelude to the time when climate change starts to well and truly kick our ass, I guess. Just keep kicking that can down the road and react with shock and amazement when you find that you've run out of road.

it's not the deadliness of this disease that's most on my mind; it's its consequences for the American economy, by which I don't mean GDP or really anything particularly quantitative, but rather, how the way Americans have to live, the way Americans lives are structured (housing, health care, education): that's "the economy", and the depth of the disruption to that has hardly begun to sink in.

This may be a better topic for the "how we live now" thread but we are definitely reinforcing that there are about three broad groups of workers:

- Service-sector workers and essential-industry workers who have been "lucky" enough to keep working, but at the risk of their lives (and significant psychic wear and tear).
- Workers whose jobs have simply vanished. The financial consequences of losing months/years of income will continue to dog them; some will never recover even when demand returns.
- White-collar knowledge workers who can work from home, and whose salaries continue to arrive. Their problems are real but may seem trivial to the other groups.

started wearing a mask during my daily walk to central park.

can hardly breathe in this and my glasses fog up.

This will require a level of financial intervention and economic reconstruction the likes of which none of us have seen before. I'm not sure our current financial system is well-equipped to do that at all.

i disagree w/ the "risk of their lives" argument. they're taking precautions and most essential workers are not at-risk groups. most wfh are staying home to protect vulnerable people, not to protect their own lives.

Jared Fucking Kushner is "coordinating" our federal effort, i.e. there is no coordination.

i agree with a lot of man alive's pessimism, and it is depressing that jared fucking kushner is involved at all. i thought he was working on wrapping up that middle east peace deal that was so promising??

but he's not "coordinating" the federal effort. deborax birx is. Kushner gets to stand nearby and try to take the credit for being the dealmaker and the person behind the scenes who makes things happen, but that doesn't mean that everyone is _actually_ expecting him to do anything or lead anything. he's just another rich guy/member of the trump family who will try to leap in at various moments, when he feels it's advantageous to himself. if birx and fauci and others manage to convince dipshit republican governors to save the lives of their own people (didn't work with medicaid expansion, which is still sitting there on the table for dozens of states, iirc), then trump and family will of course take full credit in the end. and if the response continues to fail, eventually trump and family will blame everyone else except for themselves, while claiming that if things were done their way it would have been the best response in the world, and vowing to never again cede leadership to "experts". they've done this stuff since day one

This will require a level of financial intervention and economic reconstruction the likes of which none of us have seen before. I'm not sure our current financial system is well-equipped to do that at all.

― Matt DC, Friday, April 3, 2020 10:52 AM (forty-nine seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

not to be a starry-eyed idiot, but maybe this is a good thing. the system wasn't working. this is proof that it doesn't work -- it ran up against a hard limit. but this is the type of crisis that will pass -- unlike climate. maybe we will wake up to the fact that serious changes are needed, that tomorrow won't be like yesterday and we need to prepare for it.

Cases in Austin seemed to be coming in at a stable daily level for about a week, which made me think we were successfully flattening the curve, but last few days, the daily numbers have started to jump up. Not sure if that means actual cases are accelerating or if we are just getting a bit better at testing. I wish there were clearer indications of what's happening at hospitals, how many people are calling in with symptoms, and how many tests are being done, instead of just a daily official number.

i disagree w/ the "risk of their lives" argument. they're taking precautions and most essential workers are not at-risk groups. most wfh are staying home to protect vulnerable people, not to protect their own lives.

i disagree with your disagreement, heh. i do think think they're risking their lives. their risk is certainly much higher than my own right now. i am a white collar derp worker, working from home. grocery store check-out people are standing there 2 feet away from people, all day, including customers who think the whole thing is a hoax and aren't taking any personal protections of their own. they can wear a mask and gloves, but they are significantly more at risk than me, while also getting paid much less. it's total bullshit

also i'd disagree that "most wfh are staying home to protect vulnerable people, not to protect their own lives."

but there's no way to settle that one

the virus obviously was not a "good thing" -- the loss of life is tragic and catastrophic. but the changes it may force us to make might be.

it's already forced the US to institute a form of temporary UBI. who would have thought that was possible? xp

sry just clarifying

i saw two city workers, today, hanging up a police line "DO NOT CROSS" over the gates to a basketball court. they were both like, right next to each other, no PPE at all, physically exerting themselves. and since they were workers, i kind of doubt they've been sheltering in place together, unless they're worker roommates.

Right now there are people literally risking their lives to sell us food, or deliver it to us or whatever, not to mention the people working in Amazon fulfillment centres and, on an entirely different level, hospitals and care homes. The level of risk might depend on age, exposure, underlying health etc, but it is complete bollocks to claim they aren't risking their lives. The virus just isn't predictable enough to make that claim.

Cleaners also.

otm -- young healthy healthcare workers are dying merely because they have greater level of exposure to the virus. It seems callous at best to say they "aren't at risk" -- the risk of death for this for a "young healthy" person who is constantly at risk of exposure is still way higher than for something like the flu, and will only grow as ventilators become wholly unavailable.

"they" = any essential worker forced to have a lot of contact with a lot of people right now, not just healthcare workers.

Yes, but what about cleaners in America? Don't lose track of the purpose of this thread.

Wait, so you’re saying that letting 250,000 people gather in close proximity before letting them go back home to every corner of the country, coming into contact with millions.....wasn’t the smartest idea?

huh pic.twitter.com/5ecvxZJ1hf

— Pointless Letters (@pointlesslettrs) April 3, 2020

Cheltenham festival going ahead will go down as a colossally reckless move when someone writes an epidemiological study of the UK response.

wow and they did it even after everyone saw that spanish flu philly parade graph

this too

Liverpool city council's new public health director says it was wrong to stage the Liverpool v Atletico Madrid match on 11 March: 54,000 people, with 3,000 from Madrid, as Covid 19 was already spreading in the UK. https://t.co/WQ6VyJ6PXs

— David Conn (@david_conn) April 2, 2020

I've been called back to work as a church singer to help with the funerals - because apparently it's pretty essential to avoid having to sing along with a cd - so I now have to get back on the subway. Happy days.

:(

That's ridiculous. What would happen if you declined?

If I in any way feel unwell, they want me to stay away. So I could just say that I didn't feel okay. The problem is that they've paid us singers for every funeral, even though they were done without music, but now they won't. They really are trying to make it as safe as possible, and I am honestly more concerned for the mourners, who might be elderly, and whom I might infect. But it can't be 100% safe. I'll be very careful to keep my s'es as dry as possible, though :)

Fred, no doubt you've read this but in case not

https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2020/03/30/u-s-choir-ravaged-by-coronavirus-after-continuing-rehearsal/

I don't know if the event is entirely outside or how many people or what measures are being taken but if I were you I'd phone in the "feeling unwell"

Spain is to release everyone held in its seven immigration detention centres.

Grounds include health (difficulty in maintaining social distancing) and difficulty in deporting people due to the closure of borders (there's a 60-day time limit on detention). https://t.co/FbvWh5OSL1

— Luke Butterly (@lukejbutterly) April 3, 2020

Fred, no doubt you've read this but in case not

https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2020/03/30/u-s-choir-ravaged-by-coronavirus-after-continuing-rehearsal/

I don't know if the event is entirely outside or how many people or what measures are being taken but if I were you I'd phone in the "feeling unwell"

― Yanni Xenakis (Hadrian VIII), 3. april 2020 20:52 (thirty-one minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Right, but there's only going to be one prof singer per funeral, so that'll be me spitting on everyone else. Though in the small chapel, they are trying to place me so that I'll basically be singing into a wall...

dude, don't do it.

yeah that is not a good idea

Seriously man, this is one of those situations where it's best to err on the side of caution.

UK CV funerals are currently four guys in hazmat suits yeeting your coffin into a hole while your nearest and dearest watch via Zoom. I think they’ll manage with a CD.

Right, but it's not going to be a cd. It's going to be a singer, either me, or a colleague, or someone called in.

I am told that people have been singing along to records for (checks notes) like 100 years.

Helps if you have a hairbrush and you are a tweenager jumping on a bed, but I imagine the same skills can be applied to people standing in a church.

The whole thing is a clusterfuck. The minister was even talking about doing some kind of Easter service, not the usual one, but of course it could be adjusted, because it is so very important... At least that was dropped once anyone pointed out is was insane.

cop to a cough and let it go man. These are all very personal choices but there is much to lose and not much to gain with what you're describing.

if you jump out, they're almost certainly not going to find someone else and that will lead them to realize this won't work.

Anti-government extremist Ammon Bundy led a meeting last week where he agitated for Idahoans to physically defy the state’s stay-at-home order, which is meant to slow the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Bundy is perhaps best known for leading the armed, 10-day occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon in 2016. But these days he’s threatening to rise up against the public health measures to ward off COVID-19.

Bundy, who lives in Idaho, announced a “people’s meeting” on Facebook to respond to the state government’s COVID-19 “stay-home order,” which the governor signed on March 25. A few dozen people responded to the call the next day, crowding an otherwise empty building in Bundy’s hometown of Emmett, according to video of the gathering that an attendee subsequently posted on Facebook.

“The right to travel is not theirs to take,” Bundy announced to the crowd. “The right to assemble is not theirs to take. The right to worship how and when and where we want is not theirs to take.”

If a business owner decides to keep their business open in violation of the state order, Bundy said, he would organize a group to “surround them and protect them.”

In addition to legal and political advocacy, he said, “we will also, if necessary, provide a physical defense for you so that you can continue in your rights.”

At the end of the meeting, he had attendees sign their names to an agreement to “unite each other” in the common defense pledge. The Associated Press reported Bundy’s remarks Wednesday.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/ammon-bundy-pledges-physical-defense-for-those-who-defy-idahos-covid-19-order

oh please oh please oh please gather up at the bundy ranch, true believers