Potential Good News On the COVID Front

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Originally Posted by q9

No, not wondering. We had that analysis back in Feb/March.

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So did everyone. I gather from the "gotcha" way that you posted that that you've got a partisan "right answer". Some of these newspaper articles are extrapolation - on one side, you have a writer like the one in this article who is arguing against some false points or exaggerating. There is a very small group here in the states that says "open it all, who cares what the consequences are. I can go without a mask". It tends to be more vocal in areas where there's really no virus and no population (interior US, especially in farming areas - people don't have a whole lot of contact with others in a given day). So a writer comes along and writes an article against that on the false premise that all of the extreme points in one are the only opposing viewpoint, and then adds a dash of exaggerated death rate (probably knowingly) because of the conscious or subconscious thought that the real death rate of 0.25-0.5% isn't going to be good enough for the argument.

-1 to the writer for lack of diligence or honesty, whatever it is.

On the opposite end here, perhaps in focus for very narrow groups and taking money to cater to those groups, you have people writing the argument from the opposite side, stating that the death rate is 0.25-0.5%, or perhaps exaggerating lower and saying everyone has already had it (which isn't true) or that it's been around for years and everything should be open.

-1 or -2 for dishonesty, maybe -5.

The rest of the group here is in the middle. The average sentiment in the US is we'd like to have things as open as possible. When an area gets a dose of the virus, then that area shuts down and other than a couple of loudmouths on both ends, nobody says much.

Society here is different. We don't have the desire in general to shut down for one or two years and then perhaps have another version of this five years down the road. But we won't keep plugging on when hospital beds start to fill.

It's not a contest. There's two ways of going about it right now - the folks who the far end who want guaranteed safety at the expense of others when they themselves can reasonably have it (it's not that prevalent *anywhere* that a person who really wants to avoid it can't do so - don't let people in your house, wear N95 when you're out - you won't get it no matter what) -they're in the weeds. The folks who want to congregate in large groups in a closed air space and no masks, they're in the weeds in the other direction. The sentiment that there will be some fix in the near term isn't great, and the people who are claiming moral superiority right now have a chance of looking stupid in the end.

The reality is the rest of us in the middle here in the states aren't interested in holier than thou stuff, and we don't attach ourselves to what our politicians say like much of the rest of the world does. It's not a realistic picture of the average person, but what we're doing is about what people want here. It's not a contest for someone else to be better or worse off than we are (leave that to the politicians) or be like some other culture. If australia wanted to be like the US, you'd be like the US. If we wanted to be like australia, we'd be like australia.

Folks who are just so sure that they know everything about the best move right now (on either end) should be ready to be derided if they're really opinionated and turn out to be wrong.

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Originally Posted by Glider

It's difficult to track the actions of 50 states' governors and their public health authorities, but I'm led to believe that border closures (mostly soft), lockdowns, public distancing and surgical masks have all been employed in varying degrees. Exponential growth hasn't continued for these reasons.

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That's a correct assessment here. The news makes whatever story they'd like because it's more interesting to exaggerate, but local health authorities generally talk a good game until an area gets a concentration of the virus, and then they shut down to whatever is reasonable. What's considered reasonable here may not be the same as elsewhere , and what's considered reasonable elsewhere may not fly here, at least in various regions.

The reality is that on the ground, the typical desires are "just a little more or a little less" on the lockdowns, and the extreme endpoints don't represent much. Also getting publicity are certain union mouthpieces. Teachers draw a negotiated salary here - the union representatives will do what they can to get the teachers out of exposure, but also out of having to work. If a rep can get the teachers full salary and an hour of work a day for the duration of this, then they'll get a vote. Those folks go to the news, and then someone follows them demanding that teachers get a pay cut until they're working full time again.

But - it doesn't really happen on the ground.

I understand that the biggest cost so far is that the folks who are mentally ill take what they see on the news to heart and those with OCD, etc, are being driven nuts. They don't have the same judgement as the average among us who say "this is what the world around us is like, and here's my reasonable effort to deal with it". I feel for them -I guess they can't resist turning the news on.

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Originally Posted by AlexS

each state has a governor who makes a lot of the rules, and may or may not be relatively sane. We have 8 states & territories to wrangle; they have 50.

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make that 9 for -- you have to include the Commonwealth in that count so it's 9 jurisdictions for us.

by my count the US has 57 jurisdictions -- the 50 states plus the White House (=51), then there's representatives for Guam, Washington DC, American Samoa, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands, Northern Mariana Islands -- taking the total to 57.
However, I don't really know how each of the US territories are governed. I know that Puerto Rico has a governor plus a bicameral legislature, and Guam has a governor plus a unicameral legislature. For the other four ???

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Originally Posted by ian

However, I don't really know how each of the US territories are governed. I know that Puerto Rico has a governor plus a bicameral legislature, and Guam has a governor plus a unicameral legislature. For the other four ???

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Most people in the US don't know either. I'm not sure what great benefit those territories get other than a pretty solid level of safety due to military threat of anything otherwise. That seems like it's getting antiquated, but maybe that's the case because of the lack of conflict that a couple of strong militaries with economic interests provides (i.e., imperialism is now much less profitable and more risky than is legitimate economic development).

I think most of the territories get "short straw" governing from the US.

Cases on the rise in europe, which is predictable. As places reopen, case numbers will go back up. With a combination of more testing and more awareness (for at risk people to stay out of risk, etc), the median or mean age goes down and initial deaths are low (we see the same thing here. I see an article in the paper today that says the new deaths and cases now are below june levels (which was the end of our initial shutdown).

Case numbers rise again in Europe but with fewer deaths - SFGate

there will be a quiet follow up to this stuff as the deaths start to peak about a month later. But it's been quiet here, too. The number of cases were way up in our second outbreak, and the number of deaths have been about the same as the last outbreak, potentially fewer as there's a lot more screening now.

In regard to a wider measure, the CDC keeps death data here in the states. It lets us know how mortality goes, and helps detect where medical money should go (for example, until recently, efforts in reducing smoking paid off huge in expected increase in lifetime - heart and cardiovascular deaths are exacerbated by smoking -cancer is well known, but cancer has improved on a steady pace for decades with most improvement not in lower death rates, but in tolerability of treatment) - but things like dementia and Alzheimers have been climbing steadily - not a good thing.

At any rate, the CDC sees a slight increase in the number of deaths vs. their expected death rate. I believe the death rate overall is about 10 to 1 - as in, despite the covid outbreak, 9 out of 10 deaths are still something else. We shouldn't all forget that the two main causes are cancer and heart disease, and if avoiding covid has us picking up a sedentary lifestyle or doing things that increase cancer rates, we have to be vigilant.

I do believe that while cancer and heart disease may be contributory with covid, covid will have the dubious distinction by the end of the year of rising to #3 in the US (above alzheimers and accidental deaths, but well below cancer and heart disease).

Flu deaths in the US are generally about 55-60k per year. Covid is at 182k right now, one would guess that lagging (meaning if all new cases stopped, how many deaths would still occur) deaths would be a fair number more, maybe getting close to 200k when the dust settles.

And for the first time, I have at least seen in person someone else who I know has covid - an elementary school teacher here who lives across from one of the wife's friends. I don't know the teacher, I just could visually identify for the first time someone who I know who has had covid.


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The other interesting thing here is even community to community how different behavior is. In our county park (more conservative area, but suburban conservative, not MAGA-circus stuff) north of the city, we have seen exercising since day one (the park pools didn't open, large gatherings were banned, but nobody was prevented from running and masks have never been mandatory outside) and maybe one in 10 or 20 people wearing masks.

You go into a more affluent area in the middle of the city here, and 90% of the residents walking around outside have masks on. Friends of ours moved back from UK recently and are a little bonkers about how many people are in their community wearing masks all the time walking around outside. They were in the UK and had some neighbors die in the initial outbreak, and are pretty liberal, but for some reason, are put off by the number of people wearing masks outside (they didn't explain it, but I gather because it pressures them to wear them outside, too, so that they don't stand out).

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I know a farmer here several states away, further south and inland but affected weather-wise by the recent hurricane. He contracted covid after not thinking much about it, his three kids did and his wife is at risk. They've managed to all stay away from her thus far and she has tested negative. Unfortunately, he contracted covid during a multi-week harvest period and has chosen to work through it 13-15 hours a day. His account of it has been interesting to read - that's typical for farmers here - to have planting and harvest seasons where they work bonkers for several weeks to a month and then spend a fair amount of time between not particularly inundated with demanding work. This farmer has blogged for us (not public) his trials so far - even going as far as finding someone who had a private stash of hydrochloroquine ("fever broke the day after starting it and I feel a little better"), accounting for the extreme fatigue he's experiencing and the gigantic volume of sweat that he sweats at night ("not convinced I didn't pee the bed several times as much sweat as there is"), and has volunteered that aside from being difficult in terms of fighting the fatigue that self-isolation via combine cab is just about ideal.

(i'd bet his fever broke the next day because his fever was going to break the next day, but a moderate dose of hydrochloroquine is essentially a harmless placebo - higher doses, not so much).

Lets add some information useful to local Australians rather than diverting this thread to a boring political black or white tirade.
About the Victoria state and specifically the northern suburbs, we had to sustain a harsh restriction because the government found threats originating from some facilities and then the stage 4 restrictions with curfew, like we are in war.
And that wasn't enough so we've had a water emergency poisoning issue since two days ago, the council didn't inform all residents (including me) and also we are still not clear on what "exactly happened.
ALL supermarkets's shelves were empty, no water, nothing left like during a war!
In the recent past we blamed (and stereotyped) the Chinese people because they were legally buying too much powder milk.
Then we "locals" rushed to buy "toilet paper" and we saw fighting scenes just for a toilet paper roll, this time no Chinese blame.
And now water emergency and empty shelves, again non blame on Chinese.
Pointing back to the title, I don't see good news here but again and still boring black or white political talking and numbers being read out.

The water contamination issue was due to bad weather causing a power outage at one of the treatment plants. It was on the news on Friday. One of those "it's probably still fine, but just to be safe..." things.

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Originally Posted by elanjacobs

It was on the news on Friday

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Thanks for the information, it was the council's obligation to inform all residents, they know how to do it like when they decided on the same gender referendum.

They also had weeks, if not months, to do it then. Unless the council has everyone's mobile number or email, informing people within hours is simply not possible. Perhaps you should take up your complaint with them.
Also, I suspect that it's the water suppliers' responsibility, not council's.

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Originally Posted by elanjacobs

Unless the council has everyone's mobile number or email, informing people within hours

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My council got both e-mail, phone number and address, it's a matter of emergency so in my opinion they had the obligation to alert all residents.

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I suspect that it's the water suppliers' responsibility, not council's.

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I believe that but we are residents not share holders of the water supply's holdings so to say they may not divert the blame to each other but take responsibility.

Where did share holding come in to it? You're their customer. Council has nothing to do with water supply; they don't manage the infrastructure or collect payment for it.

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Originally Posted by elanjacobs

Council has nothing to do with water supply

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Councils have the obligation to inform residents because it is an emergency, a collective HEALTH emergency when people get poisoned.
We are not talking about a "faulty" private service offering but an health emergency.

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Originally Posted by allfix

Lets add some information useful to local Australians rather than diverting this thread to a boring political black or white tirade.
About the Victoria state and specifically the northern suburbs, we had to sustain a harsh restriction because the government found threats originating from some facilities and then the stage 4 restrictions with curfew, like we are in war.
And that wasn't enough so we've had a water emergency poisoning issue since two days ago, the council didn't inform all residents (including me) and also we are still not clear on what "exactly happened.
ALL supermarkets's shelves were empty, no water, nothing left like during a war!
In the recent past we blamed (and stereotyped) the Chinese people because they were legally buying too much powder milk.
Then we "locals" rushed to buy "toilet paper" and we saw fighting scenes just for a toilet paper roll, this time no Chinese blame.
And now water emergency and empty shelves, again non blame on Chinese.
Pointing back to the title, I don't see good news here but again and still boring black or white political talking and numbers being read out.

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The panic will blow over. People bought toilet paper here, then the government lied about it and said that diarrhea/cha chas wasn't a symptom. I had the trots awful in early march (plenty of TP here), but unlike most folks, I think I had the trots for a few days, not covid.

After about a month of toilet paper buying, people got tired of buying toilet paper.

After about a month of panic about all of the different places one could get covid, people realized the mail people weren't getting sick and the meat packing plants where covid was spreading, the average case was more mild and there were more asymptomatic people in those places.....the panic is pretty much over here except for the OCD folks.

Now it's something to face.

The supposed first person here in the states to get a second different mutation than the first had a tough road first go around and is asymptomatic the second, and the panic about antibodies not lasting has given way to the idea that the T cells remember it and it won't be the antibodies.

That's good news.

For folks who want a magic fix and a guarantee they'll never get it....well, good luck with that. There is good to do at your doorstep every day. don't let negativity kick in and eat you up - the local news stations will love the opportunity to latch on to that tit and feed you all you want as long as you watch ads. It's not that easy to pass from person to person unless you're sitting in an enclosed space with someone who has it. Minimize that and not much happens.

We found that the person (first person we know now) who got COVID is someone at our pool (private pool) who has flouted the rules from day one. When we were shut down, they were arranging play dates for their kids, and their kids have been full on with any activities they could find the whole time. It's only a matter of time. That person is a teacher - they couldn't shut down their behavior for two weeks before school started and now potentially will have spread to kids.

School here was one day in person, split into four different days (25% of the class each day) to get the kids initiated with the digital equipment they'll be using at home. Selfish teacher, but that's reality. We're human.

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Originally Posted by D.W.

We're human.

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And that is why we have rules and institutions which are financially maintained by the community to protect us and to prevent illegal activities.
You might now know that Police used to give security licenses for long time (years?) to migrants all coming from a specific country who supplied false declarations and who worked at the hotels (for example) where they had to secure the quarantined area.
Some of these illegal migrants and scammers had sex with the same people they were securing, the same security went out and bought groceries then they went back in the hotels.
These security went to their homes and their families were free to go around.
These security scammers were never tested for Covid by falsifying documents (again) and declaring that they had the test.
Well, many people went to hospitals with Covid symptoms and the authorities restricted the areas were these people came from and did the Covid tests to the security scammers, many of them were found positive!
Now there are investigations going on and that won't fix anything because the damage has been done.
Years ago we had a scandal at the immigration department where the very top boss was investigated for corruption by facilitating migrants from a "specific" country (again) to illegally get visas and settle in Australia, the same people have gained monopoly in the security field, I can't say the country because blind people would label me racist but it's a fact that only people from ONE country work as security in Melbourne, well I believe at least 95% of them so I don't see multiculturalism.
And I can't feel relaxed nor safe because our incompetent politicians are telling too many lies about the Covid vaccine, they pretend that the community test trial (they don't say the word) something that doesn't even exist, they are even spreading rumors that the vaccine might be compulsory!
Russia has already a functional vaccine and it has beer registered to the world health organisation, many countries all around the world are making orders at exception of countries friendly with the US including Australia (of course) so I didn't ear a single word coming out of our incompetent (and bribed) politicians' mouths about this vaccine but only the one from Oxford.
The problem is that everything is always run but greed and personal interests and gains, we are experiencing a world pandemic situation while our politicians keep on profiting at our expenses, how could I see a good future?

1) The Russian vaccine HAS NOT been through all the required trials, HAS NOT been approved with WHO and no one has seen the data from any trials it has been through, so the claim that it's functional is dubious at best if not outright garbage.
2) Vaccines are basically compulsory here in general already. If your kids aren't vaccinated, they can't be enrolled in kindergarten or daycare.
3) The Oxford vaccine is not the only one being talked about (if you followed the news, you would have heard that we are doing local research as well), but the gov't has signed a deal with the UK to get access should they come up with something that works.

You obviously have an axe to grind, but I suggest you get things right if you're going to go on a rant about them.