outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

It won't be critical mass - I think the estimate for nationwide infection rate is something like 3-5%. Possibly higher in London but not by much. I think it's more the outdoor thing - that the real risk is being next to someone, for an hour or more, indoors, who has it and who is talking to you. Restaurants, pubs, cinemas etc are all still closed and everyone who can work from home still is.

Looks like I'll be going back to work soon. Not bothered because I am bored out of my skull.

London's meant to be something like 17% exposed, i think?

I think it's estimated that 21% of NYC has antibodies. But a fraction of that upstate (for example). I think the vast, vast majority of people have not had it, and may never get it.

17% sounds about right? A lot of Londoners spent a lot of time in close quarters before everything shut down, including on public transport.

BREAKING: Beijing is to shut all schools on Wednesday following a new #coronavirus/#COVID19 outbreak. City officials are also reportedly advising people not to leave the area unless necessary.

— Nick Stylianou (@nmsonline) June 16, 2020

How big was the original outbreak in Beijing?

New Zealand has new cases. Via British citizens of course.

Yeah, just saw that ...

They were placed in an isolation hotel in Auckland upon arrival but were permitted to leave it on compassionate grounds.

I've been given a lot of dex, as a matter of fact

https://www.nydailynews.com/coronavirus/ny-coronavirus-dexamethasone-steroid-20200616-62xrf5uyendsve7v47ayk4d2ne-story.html

I'm glad to hear that!

oh no

Flushing a toilet can generate a cloud of aerosol droplets that rises nearly three feet. Those droplets -- which could be laden with coronavirus particles -- may linger in the air long enough to be inhaled by a shared toilet’s next user. https://t.co/nQDCSbVeWu

— NYT Science (@NYTScience) June 16, 2020

“don’t go in there. no i mean REALLY don’t go in there”

hoo boy

sorry man, sorry

Eh, that story itself has sort of lingered for months. But I don't think there's any indication that active Covid virus lingers that way, is there?

yeah that is a story i heard before it was even officially declared a pandemic

genuinely ready to read the word "droplets" way less than i do currently

otm

ploplets

Good name for a power pop band, The Droplets.

Spinal Tap's 2nd incarnation after the Originals

Flushing a toilet can generate a cloud of aerosol droplets that rises nearly three feet.

This is true at all times. The fact that active virus may appear in human feces has been known since February at least. Combine the two facts and this makes public bathrooms with flush toilets a known source of 'community spreading'. This not 'new' news, unless you didn't hear it sooner than this.

https://i.ibb.co/JCjL1QM/unnamed.jpg

There's a lot of "can," "may" and "could" in that Times piece, which also states that scientists have no idea whether it will actually be transmitted by aerosol droplets that way. There's enough shit we don't know about this that we should not need to add to the litany just for the sake of it. Could Covid be transmitted in space? Maybe! Could we get it from eating whales? Maybe! Does Covid prefer Pepsi or Coke? Scientists have no idea.

Scientists have no idea.

On the contrary, scientists have many ideas. Many of them are suggested by the known behavior of similar viruses. They are trained to qualify their educated speculations that have not yet been accurately tested, measured and verified, using words like "may" or "could". But when they say "can" it should mean they know for sure that it can happen.

biggest hotspots in the US. let's see if we can spot a pattern:

Marion Correctional Institution — Marion, Ohio 2,439
Pickaway Correctional Institution — Scioto Township, Ohio 1,791
Trousdale Turner Correctional Center — Hartsville, Tenn. 1,374
Harris County jail — Houston, Texas 1,283
Lompoc Prison Complex — Lompoc, Calif. 1,107
Smithfield Foods pork processing facility — Sioux Falls, S.D. 1,098
Cook County jail — Chicago, Ill. 1,065
Chuckawalla Valley State Prison — Blythe, Calif. 1,048
Tyson Foods meatpacking plant — Waterloo, Iowa 1,031
Cummins Unit prison — Grady, Ark. 1,028
Avenal State Prison — Avenal, Calif. 969
U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt — Guam 969
Lansing Correctional Facility — Lansing, Kan. 931
North County jail — Castaic, Calif. 930
Tyson Foods meatpacking plant — Logansport, Ind. 900
California Institution for Men — Chino, Calif. 876
Northwest Correctional Complex — Tiptonville, Tenn. 834
Lakeland Correctional Facility — Coldwater, Mich. 827
Tyson Foods beef processing plant — Dakota City, Neb. 786
Gus Harrison Correctional Facility — Adrian, Mich. 760
JBS USA pork production facility — Worthington, Minn. 749
G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility — Jackson, Mich. 748
Butner Prison Complex — Butner, N.C. 744
Tyson Foods meat processing plant — Perry, Iowa 730
Forrest City Prison Complex — Forrest City, Ark. 716
Elkton Prison Complex — Lisbon, Ohio 667
Seaboard Foods pork processing plant — Guymon, Okla. 654
Miami-Dade County jail — Miami, Fla. 623
Bledsoe County Correctional Complex — Pikeville, Tenn. 617
Sterling Correctional Facility — Sterling, Colo. 595
Tyson Foods pork processing plant — Storm Lake, Iowa 591
Parnall Correctional Facility — Jackson, Mich. 573
Tyson Foods meat processing facility — Wilkesboro, N.C. 570
South Woods State Prison — Cumberland County, N.J. 534

iirc that was foucault's thing, that meat processing plants are prisons

export I get that, but that story hinges on a simulation they ran, noting that "it remains unknown whether public or shared toilets are a common point of transmission of the virus." So ... they don't know. But maybe! The article elaborates later: "While Dr. Wang acknowledged that scientists had yet to look at toilet aerosols in real-world situations involving the new coronavirus, other research has shown that viral RNA was found in shared toilet areas at one hospital in Wuhan, China." Sure, but "viral RNA" has been found all over the place. Like when they found Covid virus on the surfaces of cruise ships 17 days after passengers disembarked, but have absolutely no idea if it was or even could be transmitted in that state. It reminds me of a story a friend posted some weeks back about a simulation that showed large amounts of aerosol droplets could be drafted up to 25 feet behind someone riding a bike. Maybe! But simulations aside, there is absolutely no reason to believe that is the case, which is why work-in-progress articles like this, imo, just add to the confusion, like when people were claiming Ibuprofen made Covid worse, based on iirc absolutely nothing.

Here is a Twitter thread about the city council of Montgomery, Alabama — where ICUs are at capacity and 90% of the COVID patients are black — considering a mandatory mask ordinance. TL;DR: it doesn't end well.

Montgomery City Council about to consider a mandatory mask ordinance. Mayor Steven Reed: Our ICUs are at capacity. Our hospitalizations are up. ... I don’t want to see any more deaths in this city.

Urges the council to take action. pic.twitter.com/rs6e58THLq

— Brad Harper (@BradMGM) June 16, 2020

Ugh

The Aimsplaining is strong tonight

Let him without sin cast the first stone.

nah

too late

haven't looked at this chart in a while. it's sobering and depressing af.

COVID Excess Mortalities

Florida, last 10 days.

for reference, the positives/test rate in NYC is now around 1%, and it's been hovering between 1-3% for the last week or so in Illinois/Chicago. The national average (excluding NY) has been around 5-7% for the last month or so.

forgot the image.

https://i.imgur.com/mHzljuP.png

read the WashPo "The rest of the world concludes that the US has given up on Coronavirus" article, and yes, that's true. not the "U.S.", exactly, but the administration's stance is very clear - they've moved on. this is in keeping with their stance on everything. karl rove was right, they make their own news, they make their own truth now. and half of our states have governors that have to demonstrate fealty by subscribing to the fantasy

I can't begin to say how frustrating and disheartening this all is, we completely wasted the last few months

it wasn't entirely a waste—those of us who *have* coooperated stemmed the hospitalization tide, stalled for vaccine research etc.

but yes fucking infuriating

obviously i think the current national administration has done about the worst job imaginable, and certainly any plausible democratic president would have done better...

but i do think the US is set up in a way that pretty much guaranteed this outcome. fractal federation, harmful incentives in the healthcare industry, extreme inequality, and a self-fulfilling culture in which people assume governments of all levels are incompetent. these are all bad!

no kidding

I mean was it too optimistic in March to think that we'd get a handle on this by May or June?

the extremely stupid ideas about what constitutes 'freedom' add that little extra

xp to caek
i think all that is true. the self-fulfilling distrust of government, especially, is tailor-made for disaster in a situation like this.

but there are different levels of bad outcomes. imagine where we'd be if CDC successfully implemented a nation-wide testing strategy, back in erly February, for example. it's absurd that we still don't have a consistent federal strategy. they're not even trying any more!

yeah as shitty as our health infrastructure is it didn't have to be *this* horrible

yeah the absentee landlord situation at the CDC is particular to the present administration, and it's bad!

but i'm skeptical a nationwide anything is possible in a nation in which half the states are actively hostile to efforts from the federal government to help them... i dunno.

they're actively hostile to the federal government - unless it's got the seal of approval from their thought leader, donald trump. if trump was even 10% serious about coronavirus, it would give these governors political cover to do the right thing (not absolving the governors there - they are fucking pathetic). instead, as per the authoritarian way, he has decided to do the exact opposite of the helpful thing and focus on the fantasy where problems just don't exist.

granted anti-gov't energy has always been strong w/ these idiots, but in this case they are dismissive of the (already seriously comporomised) federal effort because the administration is encouraging them to be! it's twisted