The Walls Come Down: No Travel Betwen US and Europe for 30 Days

[aerius]

I'm not sure we have the same definition of an asymptotic carrier. For covid-19, there are 2 types; those who are in the first 5-6 days of the disease before they develop symptoms, and those who are infected but never develop any measurable symptoms. Both of them are infectious but the latter is nearly impossible to trace once it gets past 1 or 2 generations.

If we were going to contain it we had to get it early. South Korea got on it early and threw a shitload of resources at it as soon as they had their super-spreader event. Meanwhile in North America, we let pockets build up in every state & province and pretended that it was "contained" because there were only a few dozen or hundred cases in each pocket. Which we never bothered to trace or quarantine. And then it blew up in our faces because that's how exponential growth works.

[chimericoncogene]

I'm not sure we have the same definition of an asymptotic carrier. For covid-19, there are 2 types; those who are in the first 5-6 days of the disease before they develop symptoms, and those who are infected but never develop any measurable symptoms. Both of them are infectious but the latter is nearly impossible to trace once it gets past 1 or 2 generations.

If we were going to contain it we had to get it early. South Korea got on it early and threw a shitload of resources at it as soon as they had their super-spreader event. Meanwhile in North America, we let pockets build up in every state & province and pretended that it was "contained" because there were only a few dozen or hundred cases in each pocket. Which we never bothered to trace or quarantine. And then it blew up in our faces because that's how exponential growth works.

It doesn't really matter regardless of whether the index case is ever symptomatic or not. For COVID, the asymptomatic group is definitely not an overwhelming majority - it's a large proportion at best. You'll just have to track the secondary/tertiary symptomatic cases that you end up finding, and spend a lot more effort doing so. Contact tracing works either way. It's tough, but not impossible. It's what Hong Kong, China and Korea were doing, and it still worked even if it was more expensive. You'll miss some cases, but as long as R0 is below one, the outbreak will mostly burn itself out - but that will take weeks of backbreaking contact tracing. It's what happened to SARS-1 back in 2003 - gone without a trace, even if nobody was sure if they had nailed down the last cases.

When you have a case load of several a day, this is entirely doable, which is why the WHO insisted that it was containable. People were giving up. North America and Europe gave up, and frickked up, as you note yourself. This was in no way the WHO's fault, or the fault of the PRC. They have no responsibility to bear for the outcome of this outbreak in North America, which was the result of decisions made by governments in North America.

And I repeat, everyone knew the numbers looked scary, and the WHO told everyone that it was scary. What this translated into (hyper-overloaded medical system and need for lockdown as a first response) was not appreciated in North America and elsewhere, where the Wuhan/Hubei lockdown and quarantine was viewed as an aberration - because it was intended to help contain, stop, halt, eradicate (not just suppress, mitigate) the outbreak by cutting case loads down to single digits to allow the abovementioned contact tracing to work (doesn't work very well if you have a thousand cases a day!). Works even if >1/2 of the cases are asymptomatic from start to finish (the definition you're using), because R0 just needs to go below 1.

Get it early, right? What do you think the entire Wuhan lockdown was about? It was a decision made to allow contact tracing to work. But nope. Somebody overseas decided contact tracing would be too hard, and wasted the effort put into the draconian Wuhan lockdown.

You know when hundreds of cases a day started reaching international borders? When northern Italy went boom! Neither Wuhan nor China ever exported a hundred cases a day to my East Asian country, but Europe did. My country's epidemic curve goes up to the hundreds/day right after Europe lost containment, even though we're practically next door to China. Before that? Single digits a day. We were quarantining all returnees from anywhere, so yeah, it became non-optional at that point.

The WHO recommended open borders and aggressive contact tracing/testing. This had a good chance of working.

South Korea went with open borders and aggressive contact tracing/testing. This worked. Then they closed the borders for good measure with the PRC and then Japan. The Japanese yelled at them for closing borders with Japan.

Nobody recommended closed borders and aggressive contact tracing for anyone, and nobody did it except Hong Kong and Taiwan (mandatory 14-d quarantine for people entering from the PRC). That would probably have worked too, but was in no way standard procedure. Not done for Ebola, not done for SARS-1. Justifiable because of higher exposure risk.

The UK wanted to do open borders and no contact tracing, instead relying on herd immunity. This did not work. The WHO and the PRC yelled at them long and loud for this.

The US went with open borders and lax (insufficiently rigorous in hindsight) contact tracing/testing. This did not work. Remember the kerfuffle with the test kits? That was the screwup.

Italy tried open borders and lax (insufficiently rigorous in hindsight) contact tracing. This did not work. It went boom, and the EU and Eastern Seaboard caught the boom right in the face.

[aerius]

Well this is getting interesting
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... r-get-sick

China’s Data on Symptom-Free Cases Shows Most Never Get Sick
Bloomberg News
April 15, 2020, 6:01 a.m. EDT Updated on April 15, 2020, 8:56 a.m. EDT

China for the first time publicized a breakdown of people testing positive for the novel coronavirus without outward signs of being sick, revealing that those among them who remain symptom-free throughout infection are in the majority.

Among 6,764 people who tested positive for infection without showing symptoms, only one fifth of them -- 1,297 -- have so far developed symptoms and been re-classified as confirmed cases, China’s National Health Commission spokesman Mi Feng said at a briefing in Beijing Wednesday.

Some 1,023 are still being monitored in medical quarantine to see if they develop symptoms. The rest -- 4,444 -- have been discharged from medical observation after recovering from the virus.

The phenomenon of asymptomatic transmission is a puzzling feature of the virus that’s allowed the pandemic to spread wider and faster than previous outbreaks. While researchers earlier thought that most patients ultimately end up developing symptoms, the indication from China’s data that a sizable group remains symptom-free throughout infection underscores the challenge of containing the widening pandemic.

Researchers are still struggling to understand asymptomatic cases: there’s a possibility that patients who appear to be symptom-free are actually just manifesting symptoms that doctors don’t know yet to look for. For months, a fever and dry cough were understood to be the disease’s main markers, and it’s only recently emerged that a loss of smell and taste is also a sign of infection. China has not disclosed the range of symptoms it looks for.

China continues to detect asymptomatic infections even after new confirmed cases dropped to zero for the first time in March. The virus, which emerged from the central Chinese city of Wuhan last December, has officially sickened some 82,000 and killed over 3,000 in the country.

Ten provinces and cities in China, including Wuhan, are conducting surveys so researchers can learn more about asymptomatic cases and antibodies in people with coronavirus infections, the Hubei Daily has reported. The survey in Wuhan will cover 11,000 people randomly selected from 100 neighborhoods.

The number of asymptomatic infections is likely higher than the 6,764 China has detected. These cases were found through efforts to test the contacts of confirmed patients. Otherwise, those who show no signs of being sick have no reason to seek out testing on their own.

Once found, asymptomatic patients are placed under isolated quarantine for monitoring and discharged only when they no longer tested positive for the virus. Those who develop symptoms during the two-week quarantine period will be re-classified as confirmed cases under China’s counting method and treated in hospital.

Those surveys are going to tell us a lot. We need those antibody tests and we need them now. We need to find out how this disease works and where we are on the infection curve so that we can make the right policy decisions.

[madd0ct0r]

Nobody recommended closed borders and aggressive contact tracing for anyone, and nobody did it except Hong Kong and Taiwan (mandatory 14-d quarantine for people entering from the PRC). That would probably have worked too, but was in no way standard procedure. Not done for Ebola, not done for SARS-1. Justifiable because of higher exposure risk.

Point of order. Vietnam did it too for a brief period before closing airlines entirely. I think it was the period where they found that idiot socialite infected half the plane she was on, so they ended up quarantining planes rather then having to round them up + contacts of contacts a week later. She would have been quarantine d on the spot if she'd admitted coming from Milan.

Of course Vietnam has far fewer air passengers then London and it also has a lot of army bases to quarantine people in relatively easily.

[ray245]

Nobody recommended closed borders and aggressive contact tracing for anyone, and nobody did it except Hong Kong and Taiwan (mandatory 14-d quarantine for people entering from the PRC). That would probably have worked too, but was in no way standard procedure. Not done for Ebola, not done for SARS-1. Justifiable because of higher exposure risk.

Point of order. Vietnam did it too for a brief period before closing airlines entirely. I think it was the period where they found that idiot socialite infected half the plane she was on, so they ended up quarantining planes rather then having to round them up + contacts of contacts a week later. She would have been quarantine d on the spot if she'd admitted coming from Milan.

Of course Vietnam has far fewer air passengers then London and it also has a lot of army bases to quarantine people in relatively easily.

To be fair, Europe didn't experience a big spike until cases started to spread rapidly in Italy.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Well to the surprise of no-one the UK lockdown has been extended another three weeks, and for the fourth week in a row, millions of people across the UK have taken part in a mass round of applause to show their appreciation for NHS workers from doorsteps, balconies and open windows.

Meanwhile, in China questions have been raised over official coronavirus figures:

Officially 3,342 people died in China amid the coronavirus outbreak, but as the death tolls in country after country exceeds that of the Covid-19 epicentre, those government figures have come under increasing scrutiny and don’t appear to stack up.

It’s true that tens of thousands of medics and vast resources were deployed to Wuhan in the days and weeks following its lockdown; it was an unprecedented response and one no other country in the world has had the capacity to repeat.

The Chinese government claim it was that herculean effort which helped prevent fatalities on the scale now seen elsewhere.

But the virus had well and truly taken hold in the city by the time the lockdown was enforced and we’ve repeatedly been told by people in Wuhan, including doctors and nurses, that hundreds - if not thousands - died at home, untested and unaccounted for.

Link.

[bilateralrope]

8 new cases in New Zealand today. 6 probable, 2 confirmed.


Looking at the cases by DHB and I'm expecting the lockdown to be relaxed to level 3 for at least part of the country. Level 3 meaning safe activities are allowed, instead of just essential.

[Highlord Laan]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/16/politics ... index.html
Spoiler

CNN)Patience is in ever-shorter supply. No one is happy with the current situation. But some Americans see the yoke of oppression in public health efforts to keep people home, and they're growing louder.

Underneath the general frustration and dazed acceptance of so much of the world changing its lifestyle for the time being lurks a growing defiance of the science that tells us how to deal with Covid-19 and the government that is telling everyone (to varying degrees) to stay indoors.
That President Donald Trump, normally an expert stoker of conspiracy theories, is leading the government may have initially muted the Covid-19 deniers. No more. A few instances of Twitter protest -- including from Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who bragged over the weekend about going to the beach -- have flowered into full-scale public demonstrations in Michigan.
Success creates second-guessing. Trump's anxious efforts to get the economy opened even before the curve of Covid-19 cases is flattened, and his chronic spreading of fake promises about treatments, will only feed that growing angst.
The more successful the federal and state governments are at flattening the coronavirus infection curve, the more people will question whether halting the nation's economy was necessary in the first place.

Despite the deniers, even Trump is not rushing to open things up. Read more about his announcement Thursday of new guidelines on reopening the country.
The guidance is not unlike what California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced recently as his own criteria. Read it here.
The bottom line: Trump and Newsom appear to agree that the worst of this must pass, different parts of the country will open earlier than others, and testing and tracing of cases must improve.
The doubters. But another 5.2 million people filed for unemployment last week, bringing the total since mid-March to 22 million. That is an astonishing number. As the economy continues its free fall, you can feel the backlash grow. The government has already blown through the $349 billion it earmarked to help small businesses during this mess.
We're all going to be paying for this for a very long time.
Protesting public health -- CNN's Jeff Zeleny writes a must-read profile of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who has been on the job for only a few months but is already turning into a key national figure.
Drivers jammed into Michigan's capital and surrounded the state Capitol in a protest against her stay-at-home order that featured neither face masks nor social distancing, but rather the honking of horns that could be heard inside.
Zeleny: "The collision between a public health battle and a political one, which played out for more than five hours here on Wednesday, underscores the boiling tensions of a restless nation struggling with the wisdom of reopening the economy before the deadly pandemic subsides, even as President Donald Trump moves closer to easing national guidelines for social distancing.
"Whitmer could hardly ignore the scene, considering the honking horns, raucous jeers and blaring music became background noise for her video conference call with health care workers."
Regional authorities -- Whitmer is among the bipartisan group of seven Midwestern governors who have said they will coordinate their efforts to slowly reopen society.
It mirrors a similar announcement by governors on the East and West costs, completing the emergence of ad hoc regional pacts in place of national guidance from a skeptical President.
Fox News turns again. In February and much of March the conservative outlet fed the coronavirus deniers, then took things seriously when New York became ground zero for the pandemic in the US, but it has turned again.
Now conservatives are fomenting rebellion against public health guidelines.
In their warped telling, people who venture out in public aren't vectors for infection but rather freedom fighters standing up to oppression.
As CNN's Brian Stelter writes, "Fox News host Laura Ingraham on Wednesday tweeted approvingly of people in Michigan demonstrating against Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's order. "Time to get your freedom back," Ingraham declared.
"Soon Marylanders, Virginians, etc will stand for their right to work, travel, assemble, socialize and worship? Massive long lasting damage is piling up day after day as many 'experts' continue to get the virus analysis wrong," Ingraham wrote in another tweet.
The disease has been felt much differently by different groups of people. African Americans and Latinos are much more concerned they will personally get the disease, that they'll unknowingly spread it, according to a recent Pew poll. A Gallup poll suggests widespread respect for social distancing, but party identification is the largest differentiator and Republicans are more likely to say they'll immediately get back to normal after restrictions are lifted.
Those perceptions could change. See the recent reports about a rise of coronavirus in rural America.
About those protests
CNN's Jeff Zeleny is the rare person who has traveled lately. Here's what he had to say about the protest:
What set this rally apart
ZW: First and most important, the thing that struck me most in your story was this apparent backlash to social distance in the form of a protest that could literally be heard from the governor's office. Did that feel different to you than a normal partisan disagreement? Was it more grassroots or groundswell?
JZ: The protest was large, but the thing that struck me the most is that it went on and on, with honking horns, blaring music and raucous jeers for more than five hours. It was protest-by-parade — definitely not organic, considering it was organized by the Michigan Conservative Coalition, but the anger was absolutely real. It had the feel of a Trump rally from 2016 and a Tea Party rally from 2010 — back at a time when rallies were the norm.
What was striking was dozens upon dozens of people who stood on steps of the Capitol and the surrounding sidewalk, defying not only the strict stay-at-home orders, but also blatantly ignoring basic medical common sense.
There's no question the economic pain is real in Michigan, with about one-quarter of the state's eligible workforce seeking some type of unemployment help. But the Village People's "YMCA," which blasted from a Trump trailer that's often seen at the President's campaign rallies, seemed oddly discordant on a day that the state's death toll hovered around 2,000 people.
Traveling during Covid-19
ZW: Second, you're the first person I've talked to recently that has been away from their house. What was it like in an airport? In a hotel? Or did you avoid both?
JZ: I flew from Reagan National in Washington to the Detroit Metro Airport, both of which were virtually empty. The biggest inconvenience: No coffee for my 6 a.m. flight on Wednesday, since all restaurants were closed. And only bottled water, with a side of Biscotti and Purell wipes served in a plastic bag, on the plane. But I'm certainly not complaining, given the janitorial staff and airline workers still on duty as before.
I travel often — or I did before the pandemic — but I don't believe I've ever stayed in an entirely empty hotel. The front desk manager told me only one other room was occupied, which was for my colleague Jake Carpenter, a CNN photojournalist. I limited my trip to one night and ordered pizza and salad from a nearby restaurant in East Lansing.
Hertz rental? Open and easy.
Coronavirus journalism
ZW: Third, how do you interview people in person and social distance?
JZ: I mainly just observed people at the rally, having conversations with only a couple people from a respectable distance. Their hand-made signs made their opinions easily known.
I traveled to Lansing to interview the governor, which we did from six feet away in two chairs, with two cameras. I spent time in her office, where I also stayed at a safe distance.
Heading toward a new normal, or dystopia?
It sounds like science fiction. But this is real. CNN's Ray Sanchez tried to envision what life will be like in the near term. What was most striking was his description of how contact tracing -- tracking whether you've come into contact with the disease -- could work in practice.
Forget about privacy. The tracing of people with regard to coronavirus is underway in China and some other places. In China, the use of a color-coded badge on your phone dictates where you can go. So the question for the US and other countries is whether people will have to prove their health to return to normal ways of life.
Don't trust. Verify. Want to eat in a restaurant? You'll essentially have to prove that you're clean. Want to get on a plane? You might have to take a test.
This is Orwell come to life. It's a Philip K. Dick-level societal shift. Is that person walking next to you infected? Do you have a right to know? I'd take an online philosophy course on the future of privacy.
Corporations like Google and Facebook already track your movements, by the way. Apple and Google are working on ways to make your phone into a coronavirus tracker.
It's like the movie "Gattaca," where Ethan Hawke's character buys blood from Jude Law so that he can deceive authorities about his genetic deficiency and take part in society.
Low-tech alternatives -- Sanchez, borrowing from some reports and suggestions, includes these ideas for the near term:
Staggered school days and smaller class sizes
Disposable menus and masked servers
Empty stadiums and concert halls
Tracking of location and other personal information
Who got it right?
Every country has experienced coronavirus somewhat differently, but some have escaped much of the death, as well as the social and economic upheaval, that has characterized the US experience. CNN looked at what Taiwan, Germany, Iceland and South Korea did differently. This is a long story and worth reading. But the 12 key lessons appear to be:
Be prepared
Be quick
Test, trace and quarantine
Use data and tech
Be aggressive
Get the private sector involved
Act preventatively
Respect privacy
Make drive-thru tests available
Learn from mistakes
Test even more after restrictions ease
Build capacity at hospitals
The reality is that the world has seen a series of disease outbreaks in recent years -- SARS, Ebola, Zika. So the big question for this country now is how much we can learn from the Covid-19 experience and what we do to get ourselves better prepared for the next time.

Stupid people in large groups again. Frankly, I am all in and completely behind showing this horde of fucking idiots and their enablers what oppression actually looks like. Failing that, I'll just take solace in the knowledge that a number of these fucking idiot knuckledraggers are going to die horribly.

"We're freedumb fighters!" Cool. Guess what's more often than not happened to those through history.

[loomer]

China has officially raised the Wuhan death toll by 50%.

[mr friendly guy]

China has officially raised the Wuhan death toll by 50%.

Indeed. This was to take into account the people who died at home and couldn't get to a hospital. France also counts these so we saw a spike in their numbers. One country that hasn't is the UK.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-16/ ... 9/12149024

So I guess that means the UK are faking their numbers. Same logic right?

[Lost Soal]

China has officially raised the Wuhan death toll by 50%.

Indeed. This was to take into account the people who died at home and couldn't get to a hospital. France also counts these so we saw a spike in their numbers. One country that hasn't is the UK.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-16/ ... 9/12149024

So I guess that means the UK are faking their numbers. Same logic right?

WHAT! The UK government faking numbers, why that's never happened in the history of... this year?
Hardly surprising considering this country's been trying to ape the US for a while now. They might, at some point, quietly add those numbers or just not test them so they don't have to.

[mr friendly guy]

Remember how the Netherlands made a note of poor quality control for Chinese products. Well as it turns out..

https://www.rtlnieuws.nl/nieuws/nederla ... d-haastige

translated from Dutch via google translate

'Delivery of rejected mouth masks from China was a mistake for the Netherlands'
April 17, 2020 3:52 am
Modified: April 17, 2020 7:09 AM


Last month, a supply of mouth masks from China was rejected because they did not meet the safety requirements. It now appears that the Netherlands made mistakes when purchasing these masks. The company that produced the mouth masks did not have the correct certificates.

BNR Nieuwsradio reports this after its own investigation. The 600,000 mouth masks were rejected by the Ministry of Health.

Not for medical purposes
The Chinese Foreign Ministry has previously responded to the matter. According to China, it was clearly stated in advance that the masks were not for medical purposes. That would also have been clearly stated by the manufacturer.

Masks rejected
The Dutch Ministry of Health rejected the hundreds of thousands of masks last month. It concerned 600,000 masks. That was almost half of a batch of 1.3 million FFP2 masks. These are masks used to treat critically ill patients with the coronavirus.

Research organization TNO rejected the masks because they do not meet the safety requirements. For example, they do not fit well around the face and the filters that must stop virus particles do not function properly. And that is dangerous for doctors and nurses. Some of the masks had already been distributed to hospitals.

Our own research by BNR Nieuwsradio now shows that the masks are produced by the Chinese manufacturer Putian Jinli LAISI Clothing Weaving Co. The company would normally make clothing and fabrics, but focused on mouth masks due to the worldwide coronavirus outbreak.

Medical certificate
In China, medical products receive a certificate from the Chinese government according to BNR. Just as in the Netherlands the Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority checks whether products meet the conditions, there is also strict control in the Asian country.

In China, hundreds of companies are said to be certified to make medical masks, but the company from which the Netherlands ordered the masks was not. Experts, who have experience with the Chinese market, therefore call the purchase 'very questionable'.

It is unclear how it is possible that the Netherlands ordered from Putian Jinli LAISI Clothing Weaving Co. At the time, there was an acute shortage of face masks, which put the Netherlands under great pressure to buy quickly.

Response of the ministry
The Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport informs BNR that it does not want to respond to the story. A spokesperson only reports that no statements are made about the number of deliveries and the content of deliveries.

The narrative that poor Chinese quality control rather than European buyer fucks up unfortunately will be the dominant narrative simply because it came out first.

[mr friendly guy]

https://www.vox.com/2020/4/15/21221948/ ... oronavirus

Florida Gov. DeSantis declared WWE an “essential service.” His explanation doesn’t make much sense.
“I think people have been starved for content ... we’re watching, like, reruns from the early 2000s.”

During a news conference on Tuesday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) was asked to explain a bizarre move: Classifying professional wrestling as an “essential service,” thereby allowing World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) to continue to broadcast live shows from a facility near Orlando, despite the state’s stay-at-home order. His answer didn’t inspire confidence that good public health reasons underpinned the decision.

“Obviously, WWE, there’s no crowd of anything, so it’s a very small amount of people,” DeSantis said, overlooking that WWE announced last week that one staffer recently tested positive for Covid-19, and that putting others in a position where they feel obligated to travel to and from work at the live shows is a risky proposition.

DeSantis went on to make a case that WWE shows will help people who are currently “starved for content.”

“I think people are chomping at the bit,” he said. “I mean, if you think about it, we’ve never had a period like this in modern American history where you’ve had such little new content, particularly in the sporting realm. I mean, people are watching, we’re watching, like, reruns from the early 2000s, watching Tom Brady do the Super Bowl then, which is neat because he’s gonna be in Tampa and I think they have a chance to win a Super Bowl this year. But I think people, to be able to have some light at the tunnel, see that things may get back on a better course — I think from just a psychological perspective I think is a good thing.”

With over 21,600 confirmed Covid-19 cases and more than 570 deaths as of April 15, Florida is currently one of the nation’s coronavirus hot spots. DeSantis, a former Congress member whose zealous support of President Donald Trump was a key part of his successful 2018 gubernatorial campaign, didn’t help matters by refusing to implement a stay-at-home order until the late date of April 2 — after the virus had already had an opportunity to spread among spring breakers who flocked to the state in March.

DeSantis’s comments about wanting to make his state a welcoming place for a variety of sporting events even amid a pandemic reflects his priorities. But his move in particular to classify WWE as “essential” has the whiff of the swamp Trump talked about draining during his 2016 campaign.

DeSantis helped the McMahons on the same day that a super PAC run by Linda McMahon announced it’s pouring money into Florida
WWE is run by Vince McMahon, husband of Linda McMahon, who served in Trump’s cabinet as his small-business administrator from 2017 until 2019, when she became chair of the pro-Trump super PAC America First Action. After weeks of broadcasting taped shows, Vince quickly took advantage of the DeSantis administration’s April 9 memo classifying his business as “essential” by resuming live broadcasts on Monday night. The plan is to continue with them going forward.

While WWE performers are reportedly unhappy with the change of plans, having the ability to do live shows could be important to the company’s bottom line. As wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer has detailed, WWE has lucrative television deals that require almost all of its shows be broadcast live. DeSantis’s classification of the company as an essential service allows McMahon to avoid jeopardizing those agreements.

In a statement about the resumption, WWE didn’t allude to any financial motives, but instead claimed “[w]e believe it is now more important than ever to provide people with a diversion from these hard times ... [a]s a brand that has been woven into the fabric of society, WWE and its Superstars bring families together and deliver a sense of hope, determination and perseverance.” But there’s no reason WWE couldn’t deliver this “sense of hope” with the same sort of taped shows they’ve been broadcasting for the better part of a month.

The big losers are WWE staffers, who instead of riding out the coronavirus pandemic at home are now faced with having to travel to the Orlando area for live shows on Monday, Wednesday, and/or Friday.

While it’s true the events are taking place in empty arenas, wrestling obviously requires physical contact — and WWE hasn’t been careful about observing social distancing. One staffer has already tested positive for the virus.

But DeSantis may have had reasons for classifying WWE as “essential” that go beyond content starvation. On April 9, the same day DeSantis’s administration classified Vince McMahon’s business as an essential service, Linda McMahon’s pro-Trump super PAC announced it’ll be spending $18.5 million on advertising in Florida.

“America First is making the Florida and North Carolina reservations because we are confident we can secure inventory at the best possible rates in these crucial battleground states,” a statement from the super PAC said. “We will make further decisions in May.”

“We have to get our sports back”
Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings told reporters that while wrestling wasn’t exempted from the state’s original stay-at-home requirement, the change was made following “some conversation with the governor’s office regarding the governor’s order.” Police officials have even said they tried to shut down WWE’s taped shows before the April 9 memo, because they ran afoul of the state’s stay-at-home order.

It’s possible there is no connection between DeSantis’s classifying WWE as essential and America First Action’s huge Florida ad buy — but if DeSantis has other good reasons to greenlight WWE’s broadcasts, he certainly didn’t provide them during Tuesday’s news conference.

Then again, as is often the case, DeSantis appears to be on the same wavelength as Trump. Hours after his news conference, Trump did one of his own in which he echoed the same sentiments.

“We have to get our sports back,” Trump said. “I’m tired of watching baseball games that are 14 years old.”

Trump also announced that Vince McMahon will be part of a large group of business leaders who will be advising him about how to relax social distancing measures and get the economy back up and running again as soon as possible. But thanks to DeSantis, McMahon may not be feeling as much urgency about that as he did a week ago.

I am looking forward to a story line where one wrestler tries to bring America down by spreading the coronavirus.

[loomer]

Newscorp is pushing the Wuhan Lab origin story today.

[Zaune]

I am looking forward to a story line where one wrestler tries to bring America down by spreading the coronavirus.

In fairness to the governor, would you want to find out what happens when all the Florida Men get bored if you were going to be stuck with cleaning up the mess afterwards?

[EnterpriseSovereign]

I am looking forward to a story line where one wrestler tries to bring America down by spreading the coronavirus.

In fairness to the governor, would you want to find out what happens when all the Florida Men get bored if you were going to be stuck with cleaning up the mess afterwards?

I'm surprised they didn't do what the minnow AEW has been doing- shows are mostly normal except there's no audience in the arena. Very different atmosphere but it still works.

[mr friendly guy]

Newscorp is pushing the Wuhan Lab origin story today.

Murdoch media have been pushing this conspiracy theory for a while now. They even went as far as writing about how Dean Koontz (the author) predicted a viral outbreak from Wuhan. A US politician also pushed this particular conspiracy theory. And then they have to gall to complain the Chinese are pushing conspiracy theories when people in China return the favour.

[Broomstick]

China has officially raised the Wuhan death toll by 50%.

That's a start..... I still doubt that's accurate.

[The Romulan Republic]

If one wants to get a rough estimate of how many Americans have died due to Trump's inaction and sabotage, the Biden campaign shared an interesting graph on Facebook today. It says that intervening 1 week earlier would have cut the current death projections from 60,000 to 20,000. Two weeks would have dropped it to 6,000.

Original source: https://nytimes.com/2020/04/14/opinion/ ... ncing.html

During disease outbreaks, epidemiologists agonize about the timing and extent of interventions like social distancing to slow the spread. Their instincts are almost always to move sooner rather than later, because preventing new infections as early as possible can disrupt chains of transmission and save many lives. Our experience with Covid-19 makes that clear.

Projected deaths in the United States
The estimated number of deaths falls sharply with earlier interventions, using calculations based on a model by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. Ranges reflect uncertainty in the model’s estimates.

In cases like that of the novel coronavirus, for which we have neither an effective treatment nor a vaccine, interventions must go back to the basics, including simply keeping individuals from one another by prohibiting large gatherings, closing schools and asking people to stay at home. The graphic above illustrates the extraordinary effect that the timing of social distancing policies can have on an outbreak’s death toll.

On March 16, the White House issued initial social distancing guidelines, including closing schools and avoiding groups of more than 10. But an estimated 90 percent of the cumulative deaths in the United States from Covid-19, at least from the first wave of the epidemic, might have been prevented by putting social distancing policies into effect two weeks earlier, on March 2, when there were only 11 deaths in the entire country. The effect would have been substantial had the policies been imposed even one week earlier, on March 9, resulting in approximately a 60 percent reduction in deaths.

To determine the impact of early interventions, we used growth rates in cumulative deaths calculated by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington from the date that social distancing measures were introduced until the predicted end of the epidemic, and applied them to case numbers from earlier points when such measures could hypothetically have been put into effect.

The absolute numbers are largely beside the point. No model is a crystal ball, and there is far too much uncertainty in the trajectory of the U.S. epidemic to conclude that a certain prediction will be borne out. What matters more is the relative effect of moving earlier rather than later in trying to contain the spread. The relative effects of moving earlier necessarily depend on the assumed rate of growth, but the general conclusion is the same: Earlier is better.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said as much on Sunday on the CNN program “State of the Union.”

“Obviously, you could logically say that if you had a process that was ongoing and you started mitigation earlier, you could have saved lives,” he said. But, he noted, “there was a lot of pushback about shutting things” early in the outbreak.

Whatever the final death toll is in the United States, the cost of waiting will be enormous, a tragic consequence of the exponential spread of the virus early in the epidemic.

To a large extent, the growth in U.S. deaths from Covid-19 has been fueled by the devastating events in New York, where the state’s stay-at-home order did not take effect until March 22. Our assessment echoes that of Dr. Tom Frieden, the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who was New York City’s health commissioner from 2002 to 2009. He has estimated that deaths might have been reduced by 50 percent to 80 percent in the city if social distancing had been widely adopted a week or two earlier.

The point here is not to cast blame on mayors or governors for the timing of what were difficult decisions for both public health and the economy, but rather, to alert cities and states where full social distancing measures are not in place that hesitation can come at a very high cost.

We also looked at state estimates and illustrate two that have only recently introduced statewide stay-at-home provisions (April 3 for Mississippi and Florida), and one that has yet to do so (Iowa, for which we selected April 14 for a possible stay-at-home order). The results for a one- or two-week earlier start on statewide policies are consistent and resemble those for the United States as a whole: Applying social distancing one week earlier is associated with a 60 percent reduction in the expected final death count.

The percentage reductions are, of course, estimates but this hardly blunts the take-home message.

Many governors have argued for following the data and the science to determine when to act. Some states have already experienced partial effects of social distancing by taking intermediate steps to moderate the growth in infections, like limiting the size of gatherings or shutting some nonessential businesses. But the data and science are clear: It’s always too late if you wait until you think the number of deaths is sufficient to act.

There is no need to rely on the hypothetical calculations that we have described. The recent divergence of epidemics in Kentucky and Tennessee shows that even a few days’ difference in action can have a big effect. Kentucky’s social distancing measure was issued March 26; Tennessee waited until the last minute of March 31. As Kentucky moved to full statewide measures in reducing infection growth, Tennessee was usually less than a week behind. But as of Friday, the result was stark: Kentucky had 1,693 confirmed cases (379 per million population); Tennessee had 4,862 (712 per million).

It is important to understand that lockdowns are not a solution to the virus, but they do buy us time to better prepare for further waves of infection and to develop treatments and vaccines. Decisions about the timing of imposing social distancing are now largely behind us. The next critical decisions will center on when we begin easing stay-at-home policies.

Getting that wrong will lead to second wave of infections and a return to lockdowns. We can’t afford to repeat the same mistakes.

Britta L. Jewell is a research fellow in the department of infectious disease epidemiology at Imperial College, London. Nicholas P. Jewell is the chair of biostatistics and epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and a professor at the University of California, Berkeley.

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[aerius]

First antibody test on a representative sample of the population is in.
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101 ... 20062463v1

COVID-19 Antibody Seroprevalence in Santa Clara County, California
Eran Bendavid, Bianca Mulaney, Neeraj Sood, Soleil Shah, Emilia Ling, Rebecca Bromley-Dulfano, Cara Lai, Zoe Weissberg, Rodrigo Saavedra, James Tedrow, Dona Tversky, Andrew Bogan, Thomas Kupiec, Daniel Eichner, Ribhav Gupta, John Ioannidis, Jay Bhattacharya

Abstract

Background Addressing COVID-19 is a pressing health and social concern. To date, many epidemic projections and policies addressing COVID-19 have been designed without seroprevalence data to inform epidemic parameters. We measured the seroprevalence of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in Santa Clara County. Methods On 4/3-4/4, 2020, we tested county residents for antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 using a lateral flow immunoassay. Participants were recruited using Facebook ads targeting a representative sample of the county by demographic and geographic characteristics. We report the prevalence of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in a sample of 3,330 people, adjusting for zip code, sex, and race/ethnicity. We also adjust for test performance characteristics using 3 different estimates: (i) the test manufacturer's data, (ii) a sample of 37 positive and 30 negative controls tested at Stanford, and (iii) a combination of both. Results The unadjusted prevalence of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in Santa Clara County was 1.5% (exact binomial 95CI 1.11-1.97%), and the population-weighted prevalence was 2.81% (95CI 2.24-3.37%). Under the three scenarios for test performance characteristics, the population prevalence of COVID-19 in Santa Clara ranged from 2.49% (95CI 1.80-3.17%) to 4.16% (2.58-5.70%). These prevalence estimates represent a range between 48,000 and 81,000 people infected in Santa Clara County by early April, 50-85-fold more than the number of confirmed cases. Conclusions The population prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in Santa Clara County implies that the infection is much more widespread than indicated by the number of confirmed cases. Population prevalence estimates can now be used to calibrate epidemic and mortality projections.

About 3% of the population sample (after adjusting for sampling demographics) tested positive for antibodies as of early April when they did the testing. Assuming the sampling is good, this would imply that there's at least 50 times more infected people in the county than have showed up in confirmed case counts.

If we use that as a baseline for the US as a whole, we can estimate how long the lockdowns need to last before we have herd immunity given the generation time which is about 5 days and R0. Problem is we don't know what the actual R0 is since we have all these positive cases which haven't showed up in the numbers until this study.

[Ralin]

So, meant to post this earlier, but good news is the government does seem to be cracking down on the racist shit Africans in Guangzhou are dealing with

https://au.int/en/pressreleases/2020041 ... cans-china

Following the reported incidents of brutalities and related injuries allegedly inflicted on Africans in Guangdong province in the People Republic of China, the Deputy Chairperson of the African Union Commission, HE Mr. Kwesi Quartey invited the Chinese Ambassador to the African Union, H.E. Amb. Liu Yuxi, to the Commission today for a discussion on how the matter would be resolved.

HE Mr Kwesi Quartey informed Amb. Yuxi that given the closeness of the relations between China and Africa, the reported incidences were clearly unacceptable.

In his response, HE Amb. Yuxi reiterated the immense value China places on its relationship with Africa and China’s commitment to protecting and developing this relationship. He registered the regret and embarrassment that the incidents have caused China. Amb. Yuxi recounted steps the Government of China has taken, and continues to take to restore calm and to protect the safety, security and dignity of the African population in China.

H.E. Amb. Liu Yuxi informed the Deputy Chairperson that, the Chinese whose social media post caused the unfortunate incident has been arrested. Also, law enforcement personnel exerting excessive force have been reprimanded and cautioned to exercise restraint whilst discharging their duties. He also mentioned that two hotels have been secured for the affected Africans and the cost would be borne by the Chinese Government. Furthermore, seized passports and personal belongings have been retrieved and handed over to their rightful owners, Amb. Yuxi added.

He expressed overall regret for what had happened and intimated China’s determination to use this as a lesson to improve relations with their African brothers.

Clearly this matter has caused grief, pain and humiliation to all Africans.

Africa values its relationship with China but not at any price. Further act of brutality meted out to Africans will not be countenanced by the African Union and indeed all Africans.

In other news, got tested Thursday. And missed a dentist's appointment because of it. Hospital I go to is requiring tests for all foreigners before they're allowed to enter regardless of how long we've been in town. Haven't confirmed whether this is/will be standard for all hospitals in Shenzhen, but it seems likely.

[MKSheppard]

1,081 sailors aboard the French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle have tested positive for coronavirus; hundreds more are still waiting for their results

[MKSheppard]

Murdoch media have been pushing this conspiracy theory for a while now.

Washington Post is pushing it. I guess Jeff Bezos is really Murdoch?

[aerius]

Murdoch media have been pushing this conspiracy theory for a while now.

Washington Post is pushing it. I guess Jeff Bezos is really Murdoch?

Same shit, different pile.

[loomer]

Murdoch media have been pushing this conspiracy theory for a while now.

Washington Post is pushing it. I guess Jeff Bezos is really Murdoch?

Have you ever actually seen Murdoch and Bezos in the same room with your own eyes?