outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

Eh, she hasn't even invited anyone yet, but I'm anticipating that she might want to so I'm trying to head it off and be proactive. They've been really good and understanding so far, but she's always considered hosting Thanksgiving to be one of her favorite things and I'm worried she's going to really struggle with the loss even if she ultimately understands.

The other day I watched a Zoom funeral for someone I knew who died of COVID -- he was pretty old and unwell and already probably in his final hospital visit when he caught it, but all the same it was kind of startling that someone spoke at the funeral without a mask on -- like, everybody else was masked and this one person was like "THIS is the right moment to show I don't think it's that big of a deal and people are overreacting"

Went to my sister's house for a distanced outside fire-pit chat a few weeks ago. These are the only people I've IRL socialized with since March.

It started drizzling, and my kids went inside the house for a bit to get out of the rain while we wrapped up the socializing.

Two days later my daughter started feeling sick. You can, I suspect, imagine the terror.

She tested positive - for strep throat.

I've never been so relieved to get a positive result on a test for an infectious disease. But no, even the ostensibly safe hangs are off the menu again. And the good weather for outdoor meetups is likely gone.

to be fair to that map, i've felt like Florida has been in uncontrolled spread since June or July

we are assholes.

So more mealy-mouthed bullshit from Lightfoot, I guess? A 30-day stay at home "advisory", whatever that means. I just don't see how making it an "advisory" has any teeth at all.

I mean, I don't mean to harsh on Lori, she's done a pretty decent job all things considered. But "advisory" feels like it makes it all sound much more optional than it should be, given our numbers.

She tested positive - for strep throat.

Forgot to mention that this EXACT thing happened to us after my aunt and uncle's visit -- we also got her a COVID test (negative)

The only people we see indoors are my wife's parents, and I was actually hesitant about that (more for their own sake) but we are both careful and they insist on it.

I've had one friend over for patio beers a few times and we've had a couple outdoor playdates - our little kids can't really be kept at distance but we do so as parents.

Question: It seems like testing is readily available in NYC now--is it also in other places? Liiike, re Thanksgiving, are there...reasons not to get everyone tested and then isolate for a couple of days until you get results and then get together? We are considering this for my roommate/house-mates, who are semi- all podded together anyway. The testing is just out of extra caution.

that is our plan for seeing my wife's kids/grandkids for Thanksgiving, who are in our bubble anyway as we have seen them several times since March

I can't see any reason not to get test results before we head down there

my anecdotal COVID story:

president of my company has a pregnant wife & kid, she has a "mom pod" and they share a nanny. The nanny went to a "family gathering" maybe 2 weeks ago where there was a super spreader event, then gave it to boss' wife's friend, then boss' wife hugged her friend goodbye, now they both have it. total failures of basic precautions all around. thankfully neither of them seem super sick yet.

Idk, why risk it? There will be thanksgiving again next year.

yeah I bet we end up not going, given the progression we see

Testing without symptoms varies out here, also depends on which service you'd like to use:

1) my PPO health insurance provider: incredibly strict (2-3 more symptoms present)
2) the County: more strict (1 or more symptoms)
3) tech-driven testing (eg Project Baseline® by Google™): less strict (no symptoms), but then they want to connect your google account(s) & mobile # with your virus samples/biometrics... maybe even your DNA? haven't really researched this option tbqh lol

xps: to In Orbit^^^

Personally I can do without Thanksgiving & Christmas stuff

It helps that I don't really like very many people

xp to Albert

Well that makes more sense, that's like where NYC was in June/July. Now there's free walk-in testing in every neighborhood and you can request the rapid test or the PCR, which takes about 2 days to get back.

My wife and I see no one indoors. Our social visits (mainly with our daughter) are outdoors, masked, and abbreviated. We continue to limit our time in public indoor spaces to the minimum necessary visits to buy groceries - about 3 trips per month. Our non-grocery shopping is close to zero. Since mid-March I did have one blood draw done to renew a prescription, and we've each had one dental exam.

I did get one in-person haircut. Only one in the shop and the barber wore his mask properly. I still may do the next one myself.

Well that makes more sense, that's like where NYC was in June/July. Now there's free walk-in testing in every neighborhood and you can request the rapid test or the PCR, which takes about 2 days to get back.

― Ima Gardener (in orbit), Thursday, November 12, 2020 4:08 PM (fourteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I'm on Long Island and my experience at the very end of August was that the PCR testing was widely available but with 2-10 day results. On the other hand the rapid testing availability varied depending on how many tests were available when you called - I was able to get the rapid test after a couple of phone calls but had to drive about half an hour.

We're renting a house in Woodstock with another couple for the week of Thanksgiving and everyone is going to get tested the week prior (everyone WFH and everyone pretty smart and safe). We'll see.

Question: It seems like testing is readily available in NYC now--is it also in other places? Liiike, re Thanksgiving, are there...reasons not to get everyone tested and then isolate for a couple of days until you get results and then get together? We are considering this for my roommate/house-mates, who are semi- all podded together anyway. The testing is just out of extra caution.

― Ima Gardener (in orbit), Thursday, November 12, 2020 3:54 PM bookmarkflaglink

It's pretty readily available in Florida, but there are definite defects in the communication part. I don't think it's a bad idea for everybody to get tested. really the main concern is that if you get a positive test, yeah, pretty sure you have it, but there is no current COVID test which has a high enough degree of confidence in its negative results where you can be 100% sure you don't have it.

I was told that if I got tested prior to 8 days after I came into contact with an infected, I might test negative and still be positive. that was horrifying to me, because most people who get tested after exposure do so, like, the day after, and then get what they think is a clean bill.

there are two tests I took this past summer that I was never given results on. and when I searched the system, no record of the tests. thanks guys!

ima probably have to start getting occasional tests again now that I live with the folks, but I may also go back to masking in the house. hate it but...y'know....gives me piece of mind.

today at least according to worldometer we've passed the 150,000 new cases a day mark in the US, and we're rapidly approaching 11,000,000 overall cases, just days after passing the 10,000,000 mark

The thing really pissing me off is that I was supposed to have the kids for Thanksgiving this year but instead I haven’t seen them in person since February and it’s a crap shoot as to whether I will be able to have them after Christmas.

that's got to be hard.

I'm ok not spending this Thanksgiving or Christmas with my adult family, but even that sucks

Circumstances like DJP's have to be the most infuriating. What can you even do besides FaceTime as much as possible?

Damn, hang in there DJP.

Awful. And I was just lamenting the possibilty (dependending on test results) of not seeing my own for a couple more weeks...I can't imagine how hard that is.

Stay safe Chicago. I thought we'd be next but Mayor Lightfoot was quick on the draw.

did she announce anything good? only thing i saw was an "advisory" starting monday to do certain things people should have been doing anyway

starting monday: stop doing dumb things you shouldn't be doing. pretty please!

That's pretty much all it was, "maybe you might stay home so you don't make us think about considering how we might discuss possibly landing on some meaningful action".

xps in orbit:

Where test positivity rates are above 15%, accessible testing with prompt results is difficult.

South Dakota (56.4%), Iowa (51.4%), Kansas (46.2%), Wyoming (45.8%), Idaho (40.5%), Missouri (28.2%), Alabama (27.0%), Pennsylvania (19.7%), Oklahoma (19.3%), Utah (18.6%), North Dakota (16.2%), Montana (16.0%), Wisconsin (15.9%), Mississippi (15.6%).

...

New York (2.6%)

And yes, Kristi Noem of South Dakota is the worst.

so many of those south dakota deaths are in long-term facilities, too, at a higher rate than the rest of the country, even

Air can hurt you too
Some people say not to worry about the air
Some people never had experience with air

according to worldometer there have been 180,000+ new cases today in the US

where will be the peak

I mean, everyone could just get infected, that's a strategy.

it definitely won't peak over 2 or 3 billion per day, unless something unexpected happens

We gotta run out of people at some point, right?

December thread title

just imagine if in the movie 12 Monkeys, instead of moving underground, everybody just said the virus was a hoax and then slowly died, insisting to the grave that they were killed by something completely different and it was a complete coincidence.

If you sneeze and then you get hit by a bus and die, they’ll say it was coronavirus is what I heard

We gotta run out of people at some point, right?

We run out of testing supplies, first.

But yeah, I can easily see some 30% of the nation infected by inauguration day, and about a tenth of those suffering from the new disabling preexisting condition #longcovid. We'll be half-way to herd immunity.

It is a grim certainty that New Year's Eve is not going to be very cheerful this year, even with our leaving 2020 behind and the early doses of vaccine becoming available for emergency use. We're already hitting 150,000 new (known) cases a day.

I know this doesn't mitigate against the national totals, but what we are seeing now is still nowhere near as intense as what we saw in March-May, it's just that it's spread across the 50 states. On a per million severe and dead basis, no state is suffering anything close to what NY and NJ suffered, and so far I don't know that you can say that we're on a trajectory to get there. It may just be the nature of less dense states that you're going to get an ongoing slow burn rather than a raging wildfire.

what we are seeing now is still nowhere near as intense as what we saw in March-May

I think a large part of the intensity depends on how overwhelmed the regional hospitals become. When there are many more patients in dire need of care than there are nurses and doctors available to administer to them, things get intense in that area, no matter how it's spread out across other parts of the country.

and so far I don't know that you can say that we're on a trajectory to get there.

how can you look at trends that are exponentially rising and say you don't know that we're on a trajectory to get there?

give 103% growth another several days to exponentially grow, you'd be surprised