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Guest MormonGator
11 minutes ago, Just_A_Guy said:

We agree in principle, but let me push you a bit; because I’m curious where this goes (and I’m still shaping my own thinking on the matter):

Given that people who unknowingly carry ordinary flu and other potentially deadly airborne diseases, have through the course of daily commerce and contact contaminated their fellow man throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, resulting in tens if not hundreds of thousands of deaths each year amongst the sick and the aged and the otherwise immunocompromised—

—Aren’t you really making the case that morally speaking, we never should have stopped wearing face masks after 1918?  And aren’t you really arguing that, indeed, we should keep on wearing masks even after the current COVID-19 pandemic burns out, and on into the future indefinitely?

If not, why not?

Is the life of a person who dies of ordinary flu, worth less—in principle, in sacrifice, in inconvenience to the rest of us—than the life of a person who dies of COVID-19?

It's a great question, and I understand where you coming from 100%. It's an excellent question, actually. 

initial thoughts: (these are just my initial thoughts, like you, I'm still kicking it around as well)

There is a flu vaccine, and, while certainly not perfect, it's better than nothing. Right now, there is no Covid vaccine. So, the flu is slightly different-you can get the flu shot. Again, there is no Covid shot. There is some protection against the flu (yes, it's not perfect, but the flu shot almost always helps). There is no protection against the flu other than each other. 

The fatality rate of the flu goes up and down. In 1918, and in the 1960's there was a season where it was brutal. If it strikes back like that, then yes, we should wear masks in public again.

Every life is sacred. Covid-19 is new and we are still learning about it. We are still learning about the flu too, but we know more about the flu than we do Covid. 

If you have friends or family who are very old or sickened, than you should take every precaution possible to keep them healthy and alive. If that means wearing a mask near them, then you should do it. It costs you nothing to wear a mask.  

These are just my initial thoughts. @Just_A_Guy you raise some great talking points. Much to think about. 

 

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9 hours ago, MormonGator said:

Slightly off topic: I've seen other people lose it over being asked to wear a mask in public. I have no idea why this is such a big deal for people. 

I've been lucky, and had some masks sewn for me that I can wear.  There is even a filter in there (and can be washed, but not put in the dryer) to help!

On the otherhand, I have not been able to buy masks in the market for weeks.  I look to see if they have masks and they never have them. 

I think that's the biggest problem I have with the mask policy.  If people cannot find a mask to buy, how are they supposed to wear them?

I was lucky I that my wife could make an effective mask, but it's been shown some materials people use (bandana's for example and the cloth they are made out of generally) do little, if anything, to actually stop the spread of the germs. 

If they actually had masks for people to buy (and maybe it's just my area, but we haven't had any masks in stock at any of the stores I've gone to.  I expect that it could be that the stocks are being redirected to medical workers which is a GOOD thing, but for the general public, they can't buy masks) that would be one thing, but without people even being able to obtain effective masks...I find the enforcement of the idea sort of ridiculous.

Just speaking for myself (I do wear a mask in shopping, but I've been one of the lucky ones).

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In some good news that I heard (I'm not medical personnel, so I cannot verify I read the information correctly) regarding the medical research going on (as opposed to a LOT Of the bogus information people are posting attributed to supposed medical research...like drinking bleach and such...) there is starting to appear that he human immune system has a robust response in regards to the Coronavirus.

From what I understand (with my own personal comments tossed in)

This would mean that there IS immunity to it afterwards that can be somewhat long lasting (probably not a lifetime, but it could be a year, or even longer than that...upwards of maybe 5-7 years.)  Furthermore, it looks like that if you've had other coronaviruses (and a similar hypothesis has actually been applied regarding the flu vaccine and it's effects on other strains of the flu that came out which are very close to the strain in the vaccine, but not the strain in the vaccine itself, is that the individual may have the flu hit them more weakly or they are more resistant to these other strains in addition to the ones in the actual vaccine) you may have an added resistance to the SARS2/COVID19.

It also means that it may be easier to create a targeted vaccine.

In short, if we had a coronavirus cold over the past 5 months, we may have greater resistance/immunity to the COVID 19 that is out and about.

Edit: Ah, yes, before I forget...and I already forgot once...a link to the paper itself.

Targets of T-Cell responses to SARS2-COV in humans with COVID 19 and unexposed individuals

Edited by JohnsonJones
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Guest MormonGator
14 minutes ago, JohnsonJones said:

I think that's the biggest problem I have with the mask policy.  If people cannot find a mask to buy, how are they supposed to wear them?

 

I think that's a cop out, to be honest. I've been able to buy masks off Amazon for at least a week and a half now. 

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22 minutes ago, MormonGator said:

I think that's a cop out, to be honest. I've been able to buy masks off Amazon for at least a week and a half now. 

I have a mask that was sewn, but there really are no masks in our area.  None.  I would have bought some if I could have, but there have been none on our shelves.  We now have Toilet paper, isopropyl alcohol, Clorox wipes, and even the occasional can of Lysol...but no masks available.

I was not aware they were available on Amazon at this point (shipping to our area from Amazon has been delayed it seemed for awhile, when I looked at Amazon last month it gave me delivery date of May 15th, a few weeks after that.  Right now, it appears to be around a week to a week and a half for delivery though, which is quicker...though the masks seem a LOT over priced from the store.  It looks like $35 for a pack of 50 for something that at least looks like the approved masks...though that brings up the other question of whether it really is the approved version or not.  The boxes don't seem to have the approval symbol on them (they'll have the FDA on the box for example).  The store packs all have the right approval.  The unapproved ones could be cotton or worse (which basically can restrict breathing but does almost nothing to stop the stuff coming out of your mouth, or going through the clothe.

Still, I was not aware they were available on Amazon at this point until you pointed out there were masks on Amazon and I looked it up.  I know they aren't in the stores right now (and it could be FDA approved masks vs. the cheap ones that are not approved).  The ones in the stores normally have the approval symbol on them, but the few that show the boxes on Amazon I wasn't seeing the symbology shown.

That gives another relevant, but off topic question.  Is it better to have the illusion of doing something (as in, wearing a mask that really doesn't do anything to stop the spread that much) and wearing it (giving the false impression that one has something on that would actually help when it does not) , or simply wear no mask if an effective one can not be found?

I suppose the best option would be going through the effort to actually GET something that could be useful (for example, my wife got a bunch of filters utilized for heap, allergens, and dust and integrated it into our masks to try to get the best filter on the mask possible) and wear that instead, but when that is impossible to do, what is the best option?

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2 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

We agree in principle, but let me push you a bit; because I’m curious where this goes (and I’m still shaping my own thinking on the matter):

Given that people who unknowingly carry ordinary flu and other potentially deadly airborne diseases, have through the course of daily commerce and contact contaminated their fellow man throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, resulting in tens if not hundreds of thousands of deaths each year amongst the sick and the aged and the otherwise immunocompromised—

—Aren’t you really making the case that morally speaking, we never should have stopped wearing face masks after 1918?  And aren’t you really arguing that, indeed, we should keep on wearing masks even after the current COVID-19 pandemic burns out, and on into the future indefinitely?

If not, why not?

Is the life of a person who dies of ordinary flu, worth less—in principle, in sacrifice, in inconvenience to the rest of us—than the life of a person who dies of COVID-19?

I think that some of the relevant considerations that would need to be taken into account when addressing the question of whether or not we should have stopped wearing masks after 1918 are the relative effectiveness of masks in slowing the spread of the flu vs their relative effectiveness in slowing the spready of covid19. It would also be necessary to take into account the differences between how infectious the two diseases are and their mortality rate. So I guess I'm saying that at a certain juncture of cost, inconvenience, effectiveness, mortality and infectiousness (and a whole bunch of other factors) , it may become desirable to wear masks, at another juncture of the same things, it might not be. Where that juncture is at any particular time, and for any particular group, or nation, is a decision to be made by that group, or nation, or the leaders chosen by and for that group.   

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Guest MormonGator
34 minutes ago, JohnsonJones said:

That gives another relevant, but off topic question.  Is it better to have the illusion of doing something (as in, wearing a mask that really doesn't do anything to stop the spread that much) and wearing it (giving the false impression that one has something on that would actually help when it does not) , or simply wear no mask if an effective one can not be found?

 

"In light of this new evidence, CDC recommends wearing cloth face coverings in public settings where other social distancing measures are difficult to maintain (e.g., grocery stores and pharmacies) especially in areas of significant community-based transmission." 

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/cloth-face-cover.html

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/05/14/require-masks-stop-coronavirus-spread-over-100-health-leaders-column/5182076002/

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/coronavirus-mask/art-20485449

Face masks do something, even if people don't want to admit it. 

34 minutes ago, askandanswer said:

So I guess I'm saying that at a certain juncture of cost, inconvenience, effectiveness, mortality and infectiousness (and a whole bunch of other factors)

If all you have to complain about is the "inconvenience" of wearing a mask, your life is going very well. That is truly a "first world problem." I think that's part of my issue with the anti-maskers. It takes so little effort to do this that I truly wonder why it would be a problem. I still don't get it. 

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9 minutes ago, Plein Air said:

We don't have to go back to 1918 to do some Monday morning quarterbacking. Per my original comments at the top -  the CDC has stated that deaths from the Swine Flu in 2009 may have approached almost 600,000 the first year. Nearly double the number of deaths so far from C-19, yet we did nothing that I noticed in the USA. No masks, no social distancing. We just watched it unfold with no precautions unless I missed quite a lot 11 years ago.  Very sparse records were kept on Swine Flu related deaths, so we will likely never know how bad it really was. Obviously the speed at which C-19 hit SOME areas appears to have been substantially more aggressive than the Swine Flu but it certainly has not been where I live. I have not researched the Swine Flu pandemic at all other than finding the death numbers on the CDC website and some other places. My best recollection is that I was not overly concerned about it, nor was anyone I knew.  

So maybe what we are seeing now in 2020 in response to Covid 19 is the application of lessons that were learnt from the 2009 Swine flu? It would seem to be almost criminal neglect to do nothing in response to 600,000 deaths. I can just imagine some bureacrats, scientists and medical specialists saying "look we did nothing in response to to swine flu and 600,000 people, died, we can't let that happen again, so next time their is a pandemic, we better do something."

Edited by askandanswer
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Let's clear up a few things. 

Estimates for how many people in the US contract the flu each year vary from 5% to 20%. (Source) That includes asymptomatic carriers. In real numbers, that is 16.4M to 65.6M US citizens per year. Flu kills 12,000 - 61,000 in the US each year (source). That puts the upper limit of total infection mortality at 0.093%.

SARS-nCOV-2 (Covid) currently has 1.5M confirmed cases with 89,000 deaths (source) as of 16 May. @Plein Air's research indicates that the actual number of infections may be 20 to 50 times higher, or 30M to 75M cases. That yields a total infection mortality rate upper bound at 0.112%.

That places the Covid total infection mortality upper bound at 1.2 times the flu upper bound.

 

------------------------------------

Another way to look at this is look at the number of symptomatic cases only. With the flu, the US sees between 3 - 11% of the population present with flu symptoms (source), or 9.8M to 36.1M cases per year. Covid, by comparison has 1.5 million cases so far (source) as of 16 May. These numbers put the upper bound of symptomatic mortality rate at 0.17% for flu and 6.93% for confirmed Covid. 

What we are missing here is a symptomatic Covid estimate (total - asymptomatic). Estimates for how many cases are asymptomatic range from 3% to 80% (source). Continuing to use worst case numbers, if 80% of 75M total Covid cases are asymptomatic, then 15M are symptomatic. This would put the upper bound of symptomatic Covid mortality at 0.593%. much lower than the confirmed case mortality, but 3.5 times higher than the flu symptomatic mortality rate. 

------------------------------------------

But wait! How can the total infection mortality rates be so similar but the symptomatic infection rates be so different. That difference describes how Covid behaves differently than flu. Covid is more transmissible, more likely to lay dormant, but more likely to be severe when the immune system fails to suppress it.

So, mortality isn't everything. Virulence also plays an important role. And in four months, Covid has infected more people than flu does in a year. Or a moderately more fair comparison, we've only been looking at Covid for the last half of flu season. So it's reasonable to expect Covid to infect twice as many people as the flu. Even at comparable total mortality rates, that is twice as many deaths.

---------------------------------

Regarding the difference in response between swine flu and Covid, consider the following worldwide metrics: (source)

Duration of pandemic: 20 months

Total confirmed cases: 491,382

Total suspected cases: 1.4B (upper bound, 70M per month)

Total confirmed deaths: 18,449 (922 per month)

Total estimated deaths: 575,400 (upper bound, 28,770 per month)

Now look at the worldwide statistics for Covid: (source, as of 16 May)

Duration of pandemic: 6 months (including December 2019)

Total confirmed cases: 4.64M

Total suspected cases: 232 M (upper bound calculated as 50 times confirmed, 38.7M per month)

Total confirmed deaths: 312,000 (52,000 per month)

Total estimated deaths: too early to tell

 

To be frank, swine flu wasn't as big a deal as Covid. It looks like swine flu may have been more virulent, nowhere near as deadly. By the numbers, it seems like the "lack of response" may have been appropriate. 

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5 minutes ago, Plein Air said:

I never said that was deaths in the US. It was a worldwide (Not USA only) estimated number, directly from the CDC website. The actual number quoted by the CDC was 151,700-575,400 people worldwide the first year it circulated. Nobody knows how many died from it. I could have been way more than the high number or lower than the low number.  We won't ever know the real numbers with C-19 either. 

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/spotlights/2018-2019/decade-since-h1n1-pandemic.html

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/spotlights/pandemic-global-estimates.htm

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/766406

Thanks for clarifying.  It does seem a little problematic to compare the mortality for the first twelve months of swine flu versus the first four months of COVID-19 to conclude that COVID-19 is less deadly.  If we assume that COVID will continue to be as lethal as it’s been (which, granted, is a big assumption; historical month-over-month figures would lead to a better projection), then we’re looking at about 1.2 million first-year COVID-19 deaths globally versus a little under 600K for swine flu.

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46 minutes ago, Plein Air said:

No problem. I should have included those CDC links in my first post about the Swine Flue.

Agreed. I do expect C-19 documented deaths to exceed the estimated max deaths from the Swine Flue within the first 12 month period, yet the fact remains that there may have been over 1 million deaths from the Swine Flue the first year. Just my gut feeling on C-19 is that in reality there are probably fewer deaths that were actually caused by C-19 than the current reported ones and that there were more than the estimated high numbers for the Swine Flu, so for me they seem very similar in their mortality rate. Let's check back in January 2020 and see by how much the C-19 recorded deaths have surpassed 574,000. 

Indeed.  And while there are some issues with the haziness of COVID-19, I have no reason to believe that the same haziness does not also apply to statistics related to swine flu.  I don’t know that there’s reason to suggest that the COVID death count is being inflated whereas the swine flu death count was deflated. 

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For the past 5 days the US has been on the rise again with overall cases. (on 5/11 it was ~18.5K new cases, it's gone up to around 25-26K over the past 5 days, though it's taken a dip [normal weekend dip that occurs due to how it is reported] to around 24.9K cases yesterday).

The Stay at home orders were supposedly 2 fold.  The first was to flatten the curve.  The Second was to give time for us to come out with a treatment or vaccine or both.

Right now there are promising treatments and several possible vaccines that are on the horizon.  A Treatment may be here as soon as 30-60 days (or even less, but 30-60 days looks to be the timeline if it even turns out to be viable).

Flattening the curve ONLY works as long as people continue to flatten the curve.  If they decide to do away with stay at home and do not have something just as effective, eventually the curve breaks and goes upwards again.

The wild card is, and always has been whether this disease is seasonal.  We do not know entirely WHY flu and cold season is seasonal.  Some have guesses, but we really do not know why. 

That does not mean flu and colds go completely dormant, they always have cases around.  It means that the numbers get less severe for some reason which we do not fully understand yet during the summer months.

It COULD be that the COVID 19 is Seasonal.  It appears it may be (cases are still going up in the US, but not as drastically as I thought it would be predicted) from my vantage point.  If it is not, we are in for a second wave sooner than later.

If it is, we may have a brief respite before the Fall and Winter bring in a new resurgence.

If it is not, this is NOT a case of everyone will get it eventually and we might as well all get it now (such talk reminds me of those who really don't care about others to be honest, or, just ignorance that it's easier to get over a disease when there is a treatment, or avoid it if there is a vaccine), it's a case where we are trying to avoid as many deaths as possible.

There is a BIG difference between everyone getting it NOW and having a rather high mortality rate vs. everyone eventually getting it AFTER we have a treatment.  In which case, the mortality could be very low comparatively and chances of survival much higher.  There is also a BIG difference between people able to be vaccinated and the disease being out among the wild and no one being vaccinated.

Of course, it is all a big gamble.  Will we have a treatment soon and will we have an actual vaccine?  The research out there looks promising right now.  That doesn't mean we will have either.

However, what would you do to save your neighbor's life?  Is it worth a little economic pain?  Is it worth going without shelter or food eventually?  Is it worth giving up your own life to save your neighbor?

How much are people willing to sacrifice?

From what I'm seeing, there are a LOT of people that aren't willing to even sacrifice a trip to the hair salon or McDonalds to save their neighbor's life in the US. 

Luckily, there are many that I think still are willing to help their neighbor in that way.

I'm lucky that I am more in the research area than the teaching area for my university (an easier way to understand it would be that they have research professors and teaching professors).  I still teach classes, but my focus has normally been more on the research side.  We don't know what is going to happen next year with the university.  They could go completely online if things continue, OR, if not that many students return or register, we could have many lose their jobs.  I think the university is already looking HARD at those options.  I feel that I am safer than many due to my focus (but that does not mean safe, I could still easily be cut) and the general footing of our department (our department has a better foundation on why it should be cut later than earlier compared to other departments).  Still, if we continue to self-isolate and/or people continue to do so because they do not trust the government actions (even if all those who are anti-stay at home went out to eat and spent all their money, if no one else does, the economy will still go into a depression) I see that I may very well be without a job in the next few months.  This of course is a double whammy because the retirement I did have has also taken a big hit with the Stock Market (though I haven't checked back to see how it is doing recently, maybe there is good news) difficulties recently.

It boils down to, I suppose, how much am I willing to sacrifice to save my neighbors life.  Is it worth my job, my retirement, and hence my ability to pay taxes on the house and buy food?  It seems easy when we glance at it without the danger of reality (of course we love our neighbors as ourselves...right?) but in practice, it can lead to hard choices and decisions.  Thus far, even with the relaxing of the policies, I am still staying at home except to buy groceries and the occasional foray to work.  How long will I continue is an excellent question.

 

Edited by JohnsonJones
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2 hours ago, JohnsonJones said:

Flattening the curve ONLY works as long as people continue to flatten the curve.  If they decide to do away with stay at home and do not have something just as effective, eventually the curve breaks and goes upwards again.

Nonsense. This is contrary to the intrinsic meaning of the "infection curve".

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Guest MormonGator
3 hours ago, JohnsonJones said:

It boils down to, I suppose, how much am I willing to sacrifice to save my neighbors life.

Yes, in a way. 50 cents a mask and 10 seconds is a huge sacrifice. It’s asking for the world.

I think the mask drama is very revealing. The temper tantrums you are seeing about the refusal to wear one speaks volumes

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Guest MormonGator
14 minutes ago, Plein Air said:

There is another side of that coin as well. Temper tantrums, drama, verbal and physical assaults, vulgar language, rude looks, gestures and more from those who are offended, dumbfounded, angered, triggered, feeling afraid or endangered, or whatever is motivating them to lash out against those refusing to wear a mask, rather than allowing that person to make the choice for themselves. I haven't read every response in this thread so pardon me if this has already been mentioned.

Probably because their selfish choice puts all of us at risk, especially sick and innocent people. It’s incredibly selfish. So, yes, we should ridicule them. No apologies at all. None. Zero. If you (generic!) get offended at that or my foul language directed at you, well surprise! We’re offended at your selfishness. So we’re equal. 

The funny thing? My foul language might offend your ears, but won’t hurt you. Your refusal to wear a mask might legitimately kill someone. 

Of course, violence is gravely immoral and I condemn that completely, just to be clear. 

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Guest MormonGator
1 minute ago, Plein Air said:

Or, regardless of which side of the debate one is on, one could take the higher path and refuse to take offense. Refuse to let someone else's differing views or actions, push them to lose control of their own thoughts and or actions. 

All that is correct, lovely and fine until human life is at stake. Once that comes into play, the time for cuddles,  cupcakes and the “high ground” is over. 

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