Stopping COVID


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For the record - I am currently of the mind that no one (mortal) knows how to stop the COVID pandemic.   There is so much differing information within the professional and international medical community - I personally have become skeptical of all so called preventive methods.   This includes any advancements of a vaccine - because of the relationship of COVID to the common flu.  In short the possibility that COVID will mutate and need a new vaccine each season.  But these seasonal vaccines are a crapshoot effort to guess what is coming and not what actually ends up evolving.

In short we may slow the progress of the virus but even the experts have no clue how to stop it.  What is also depressing in this whole thing - is what to do (treatments) once you have contracted COVID.  I have not found any consistency.  What I have found are a lot of claims and claims that such claims are void of any scientific evidence.  Why would anyone say any treatment is void of any scientific evidence if even one person recovered from the use of the treatment?  It seems that the treatment for COVID is more a matter of where someone is being treated than it is science.

Now I am reading another alarming statistic concerning COVID.  I had assumed that since over 90% of COVID deaths were among individuals with unrelated to COVID chronic conditions - meaning they were about to die anyway.  So I assumed that COVID was not so much taking out so many in our population as a cause but more of a catalyst.   Now I am reading that if we remove all the COVID stats from current death rates - that the death rates in places of high COVID infection have  otherwise raised or increased on the average of 30%.  But when I went to add the link for this thread - I could not find it?????

Recently - where I live (Utah) the news is calling this region of the country a "Hot Spot".  Currently in Utah most of the problem is in Salt Lake County - which is the most populated area of the state.  But the hightest infections and death (currently) are in 3 townships - Magna, Rose Park and West Valley.   Interesting that these areas are high areas of crime and minorities.  It is also where a lot of good hard working but lesser paid individuals live.  I can only guess what minority populations and crime has to do with all this.

Bottom line is that I think the whole COVID thing is more to do with politics than science.  But at the same time - I believe we are facing a critical and important threat. But we are proceeding like chicken running around with our heads cut off.  I do not believe COVID is a hoax - but our response as a nation - especially in the political arena with a upcoming election, might as well be.

 

The Traveler

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3 hours ago, Traveler said:

For the record - I am currently of the mind that no one (mortal) knows how to stop the COVID pandemic.   There is so much differing information within the professional and international medical community - I personally have become skeptical of all so called preventive methods.   This includes any advancements of a vaccine - because of the relationship of COVID to the common flu.  In short the possibility that COVID will mutate and need a new vaccine each season.  But these seasonal vaccines are a crapshoot effort to guess what is coming and not what actually ends up evolving.

In short we may slow the progress of the virus but even the experts have no clue how to stop it.  What is also depressing in this whole thing - is what to do (treatments) once you have contracted COVID.  I have not found any consistency.  What I have found are a lot of claims and claims that such claims are void of any scientific evidence.  Why would anyone say any treatment is void of any scientific evidence if even one person recovered from the use of the treatment?  It seems that the treatment for COVID is more a matter of where someone is being treated than it is science.

Now I am reading another alarming statistic concerning COVID.  I had assumed that since over 90% of COVID deaths were among individuals with unrelated to COVID chronic conditions - meaning they were about to die anyway.  So I assumed that COVID was not so much taking out so many in our population as a cause but more of a catalyst.   Now I am reading that if we remove all the COVID stats from current death rates - that the death rates in places of high COVID infection have  otherwise raised or increased on the average of 30%.  But when I went to add the link for this thread - I could not find it?????

Recently - where I live (Utah) the news is calling this region of the country a "Hot Spot".  Currently in Utah most of the problem is in Salt Lake County - which is the most populated area of the state.  But the hightest infections and death (currently) are in 3 townships - Magna, Rose Park and West Valley.   Interesting that these areas are high areas of crime and minorities.  It is also where a lot of good hard working but lesser paid individuals live.  I can only guess what minority populations and crime has to do with all this.

Bottom line is that I think the whole COVID thing is more to do with politics than science.  But at the same time - I believe we are facing a critical and important threat. But we are proceeding like chicken running around with our heads cut off.  I do not believe COVID is a hoax - but our response as a nation - especially in the political arena with a upcoming election, might as well be.

 

The Traveler

What they've found is that their appears to be those that are not recording COVID deaths at least in some areas.  What they are seeing are FAR higher death counts (normally attributed to Pneumonia).  This is a trend that they've seen occasionally when other pandemics of this sort hit (the famous 1920, but there were also others which were pretty large such as in the 1950s) where the only way they can see or estimate how many actually died from the epidemic is by following the actual death averages vs. the death counts. 

This happened a LOT during the early months of the Pandemic.  This led them to think that either the number of cases were higher than thought, or the number of deaths were being under-reported.  There was a mortality nationwide around 5-6% in relation to the number of recorded COVID cases which was FAR too high a percentage of mortality which led some to think that it was that the number of cases were actually far to low (thus more testing needed to be done) and that many of the deaths otherwise could also be COVID, especially when deaths were from symptoms that were also symptoms of COVID.

They also saw a drop of other types of deaths that could be related to disease.  Part of it could be the connection to COVID, but another thought was that with people self isolating and other measures (Such as washing their hands) which people neglect they were actually preventing the spread of other factors which cause the spread of other diseases.

What I've heard now is that the number of deaths has not risen greatly over the past few weeks (though with what is happening in Texas and Florida, that may be changing in those states soon, or is currently in the state of change) even though the number of cases have.  Two thoughts have been that this is because more testing has been done and thus the averages of mortality have fallen (more towards the 2-3% range now rather than the high of around 6% in the US), as well as it is being found more in the younger populations rather than the older populations recently.  The other factor is that, unlike when it was at a high in New York, the hospitals are not being overrun anymore (though, as I said, that is starting to change in some parts of Texas and Florida...have not heard of this occurring in Utah yet).

Thus far, though there have been mutations, the biggest one I'm hearing about COVID is that there is one that is more contagious overall than the original Wuhan strain, but not any more or less deadly than it.  It is still the same version though and a vaccine that affects one strain will be effective on another.  This is because COVID does not (at least from the news stories) mutate as quickly as the Flu virus.  Coronaviruses are not a Flu or cold virus (though they can have similar symptoms, they are a separate thing in and of themselves), and thus normally do not mutate as quickly or change. 

With the Flu or Cold, because they mutate quickly, normally more lethal strains die rapidly and a less deadly strain of the Flu appears.  This has not happened with COVID-19. 

The hope has been related to SARS in creating a vaccine.  Several years ago SARS came out and many thought it would be an epidemic similar to what has happened with the recent SARS2 (COVID-19) epidemic.  It turns out it actually was killing it's host much too quickly and with the pandemic responses we had (and I believe Trump did away with some of them...ironically) it didn't really turn out to be a threat.  They still had started trying to find a vaccine to it.  Some (not all) of the recent vaccines are based upon that research as the strains are similar (but not the same Coronavirus).  In that way there were years of research already completed (and what they are doing with many of the vaccines in development are computer generated vaccines in that regards, which means they don't have to use a live virus to necessarily create the vaccine) towards a Coronavirus vaccine already.

The thought is if they can get it out among the population fast enough that it, in and of itself can create a herd immunity and quash this thing.  Unfortunately, another thought has arisen in the past few months after seeing the behavior in the US, and the attitudes that have come out concerning the vaccine that even if a vaccine is created, and the opportunity to create herd immunity is there, the will is not.  That is, enough will refuse to accept a vaccine, even if it is free, that herd immunity will not be able to be reached.

In most of the world, COVID-19 is NOT political and they have taken steps to reduce it greatly (though it is currently also starting to rise again).  The US has turned it political instead, which is why travel from the US is banned in almost all but 3-4 nations (Canada has a technical ban, but allow people travelling from the mainland to Alaska for work, which some have tried to use to escape to Canada instead which has spread the virus to some areas by those doing that, as well as many attempting to get through the porous areas of the border despite Canada's best attempts, thus though technically a ban, Canada still has people coming in from the US).  The other nations see the US as a disastrous hotspot and are attempting to keep the US out of their nations, at least for now.

Some think that the US's response (and perhaps the same applies to Brazil or a few other nations which have taken a similar response as the US) indicates a lack of will to deal with the virus and any vaccination attempts in the US will likewise result in a failure to establish herd immunity.

I don't know how long the vaccine will be effective in producing antibodies in the long term, so it could be that the Coronavirus is here to stay and that in the long term we will just have to learn to live with it.  There are many questions still related to Coronaviruses and COVID-19 from what I've seen, but hopefully the Lord will bless us to find answers. 

Edited by JohnsonJones
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9 hours ago, Traveler said:

Currently in Utah most of the problem is in Salt Lake County - which is the most populated area of the state.  But the hightest infections and death (currently) are in 3 townships - Magna, Rose Park and West Valley.   Interesting that these areas are high areas of crime and minorities.  It is also where a lot of good hard working but lesser paid individuals live.  I can only guess what minority populations and crime has to do with all this.

It's more than that.  I grew up in the worst part of West Valley (but after moving from a worst neighborhood in a bad part of Chicago).

You have to understand that in low income areas, housing is very crowded .   For example we had one bedroom for four boys (we slept on cots on a concrete floor).  Infection rate are always higher in crowded places.   

If one of the boys got sick, there was no way to seperate them unless we slept outside.  My sister got her own room.  My dad slept in a tiny space of a basement and my mom slept on the couch.   There just isn't a way to seperate kids (or adults) in small houses or apartments.  If someone gets sick, everyone does.   If you have a larger house (my kids both have their own bedroom), there's at least a chance that they entire house won't get it.   Some of the minority families in the neighborhood would live with 3-4 families in the same tiny house.  Also, low income families are (usually) less likely to seek medical attention.  

That would be my guess why infection rates are higher in those areas.   

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On 7/24/2020 at 9:13 AM, Scott said:

It's more than that.  I grew up in the worst part of West Valley (but after moving from a worst neighborhood in a bad part of Chicago).

You have to understand that in low income areas, housing is very crowded .   For example we had one bedroom for four boys (we slept on cots on a concrete floor).  Infection rate are always higher in crowded places.   

If one of the boys got sick, there was no way to seperate them unless we slept outside.  My sister got her own room.  My dad slept in a tiny space of a basement and my mom slept on the couch.   There just isn't a way to seperate kids (or adults) in small houses or apartments.  If someone gets sick, everyone does.   If you have a larger house (my kids both have their own bedroom), there's at least a chance that they entire house won't get it.   Some of the minority families in the neighborhood would live with 3-4 families in the same tiny house.  Also, low income families are (usually) less likely to seek medical attention.  

That would be my guess why infection rates are higher in those areas.   

I don’t know that I completely buy that.  Speaking anecdotally, I think once *one* person in a house has a cold or flu or COVID, the other residents are likely to get it no matter how large the house is—particularly if you have three or more kids in the house.  I believe downtown SLC has much higher population density then any of the three other areas mentioned, generally speaking; if their rate isn’t as bad as the other three, than that suggests this is more a result of behaviors than of mere population density.

Speaking of behaviors:  it just occurred to me that thirty years ago, we dealt with an AIDS pandemic that could have been easily eradicated if a critical mass of society would simply have 1) practiced sexual monogamy, and 2) avoided intravenous use of drugs.  And we couldn’t even do that.  To suggest that thirty years later, our even less-disciplined society is capable of doing all the things it would reportedly take to eradicate COVID-19, strikes me as not being particularly realistic.  (Oh, I’ll do it, don’t get me wrong.  But I fully expect that critical mass of people won’t; that the mess will get worse;  and that—just like with AIDS—the Powers that Be will avoid taking a hard look at risky behaviors perpetrated by their own pet constituencies and instead attribute the lion’s share of the blame to the Evil Conservatives who failed to love government enough).

Edited by Just_A_Guy
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1 hour ago, Just_A_Guy said:

the Powers that Be will avoid taking a hard look at risky behaviors perpetrated by their own pet constituencies and instead attribute the lion’s share of the blame to the Evil Conservatives who failed to love government enough).

Because Conservatives (In the small government sense) are a direct threat to their getting and keeping power.  The axiom is Power Corrupts  therefore it should be no surprise that that government has a broad streak of corruption in it.  Because of this we quickly see that politicians can not let a crisis go to waste.  Does not matter what the crisis is... medical, guns, racism, sexism, whatever.  They will promise to "DO SOMETHING" and they do. They grab power and defect from their own crimes.  Case in point, how long has the government been "DOING SOMETHING" about poverty, racism, sexism,, immigration, whatever... and it does not get any better.

But when Conservatives point out that this Emperor has no clothes... we get attacked.  We get called racist, we get called sexist, we get called uncaring about people dying and even UnChrist-like... all because we see the honey trap for what it is an try to get others to see it as well. 

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On 7/24/2020 at 7:04 AM, NeuroTypical said:

C-19 will largely die out eventually, when we get herd immunity and a vaccine.  Probably 2021.

 

Just like the flu and died out from herd immunity?  I would like to believe there will be herd immunity and that COVID-19 will not mutate into something worse  but when have the experts been spot on and without mistake?

 

The Traveler

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On 7/24/2020 at 9:13 AM, Scott said:

It's more than that.  I grew up in the worst part of West Valley (but after moving from a worst neighborhood in a bad part of Chicago).

You have to understand that in low income areas, housing is very crowded .   For example we had one bedroom for four boys (we slept on cots on a concrete floor).  Infection rate are always higher in crowded places.   

If one of the boys got sick, there was no way to seperate them unless we slept outside.  My sister got her own room.  My dad slept in a tiny space of a basement and my mom slept on the couch.   There just isn't a way to seperate kids (or adults) in small houses or apartments.  If someone gets sick, everyone does.   If you have a larger house (my kids both have their own bedroom), there's at least a chance that they entire house won't get it.   Some of the minority families in the neighborhood would live with 3-4 families in the same tiny house.  Also, low income families are (usually) less likely to seek medical attention.  

That would be my guess why infection rates are higher in those areas.   

I am not so sure - I grew up in close quarters - three boys sleeping sideways in a single bed with our feet hanging over the edge. But we were seldom sick.  Also in Taiwan there have been just over 450 cases and 7 deaths and Taiwan is one of the most densely populated countries in the world that has deep connections with all the hot spots for COVID.  I think we are missing something.

 

The Traveler

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4 hours ago, Traveler said:

Just like the flu and died out from herd immunity? 

I'm hoping it will be more just like ebola, SARS, H1N1/Swine flu all died out.   

 

4 hours ago, Traveler said:

I would like to believe there will be herd immunity and that COVID-19 will not mutate into something worse

Perhaps it will mutuate into something less harmful.

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Three people at work got sick in the past few days.  I was one of them.  Then my daughter and wife got sick.

My coworker just got sent to the hospital and isn't doing well.  He tested positive which means we probably are too.  Apparently only hospital patients can get the rapid test, but we're pretty sure we have it too.

Achy, dizzy, hurts to breathe, etc.  It's pretty bad.

Had a false alarm a few months ago with only the flu, but this time it looks like we have it. :(

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23 minutes ago, Scott said:

Three people at work got sick in the past few days.  I was one of them.  Then my daughter and wife got sick.

My coworker just got sent to the hospital and isn't doing well.  He tested positive which means we probably are too.  Apparently only hospital patients can get the rapid test, but we're pretty sure we have it too.

Achy, dizzy, hurts to breathe, etc.  It's pretty bad.

Had a false alarm a few months ago with only the flu, but this time it looks like we have it. :(

Sorry to hear that, Scott.  Here’s wishing you a speedy recovery.

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Hi Scott - sorry to hear that!  Be of good cheer though - you and your family now fall into some statistics, and as long as everyone is under 70, those statistics are pretty comforting:

image.png.af7ea2c37a2eab97a76179ebb82a60c3.png

Needing to be hospitalized can be a big worry, but those numbers are only slightly less comforting.

It all comes down to age, and co-morbidities.

Edited by NeuroTypical
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Guest Scott
4 hours ago, NeuroTypical said:

Hi Scott - sorry to hear that!  Be of good cheer though - you and your family now fall into some statistics, and as long as everyone is under 70, those statistics are pretty comforting:

image.png.af7ea2c37a2eab97a76179ebb82a60c3.png

Needing to be hospitalized can be a big worry, but those numbers are only slightly less comforting.

It all comes down to age, and co-morbidities.

I'm pretty sure we'll survive, but it sounds like my coworker is not doing well.  He's in his 70's I think.

Apparently more coworkers got sick as well.

 

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12 hours ago, Scott said:

I'm pretty sure we'll survive, but it sounds like my coworker is not doing well.  He's in his 70's I think.

Apparently more coworkers got sick as well.

 

@Scott Your posts sum up why I am somewhat confused and upset.  If you have COVID-19 you ought to know and immediately begin a regiment for recovery.   It seems logical to me that the sooner recovery methods are employed for  any health concern - the better the outcome will be.  However, with COVID there are no recommendations to change anything but to wear a mask and social distance.  There are no diet or health regiments recommended.  Waiting til you require hospitalization or ICU before beginning aggressive treatment seems somewhat insane to me.  And even in the most sevier cases - I have not heard any kind of recommended treatments other than front line people ought to have PPE.   If someone official just recommends vitamin D or C they are attacked for perpetrating a fraud.  In fact if anything health wise is recommended prior or in many cases when there are symptoms -there is criticism - it seems that the "experts" want this to be the worse pandemic ever????   I don't get it!!  The doctrine that if you have it or do not want to get it - the best thing is to run off to someplace far away and hide - comes across as quite stupid to me especially with a mortality rate of 1% or less????  

Sorry if I come across as unsympathetic but honestly - I do not have any idea of anything I can say or do that will be an actual and real benefit.  I am open to suggestions.

 

The Traveler

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On ‎7‎/‎26‎/‎2020 at 12:41 PM, Traveler said:

I am not so sure - I grew up in close quarters - three boys sleeping sideways in a single bed with our feet hanging over the edge. But we were seldom sick.  Also in Taiwan there have been just over 450 cases and 7 deaths and Taiwan is one of the most densely populated countries in the world that has deep connections with all the hot spots for COVID.  I think we are missing something.

 

The Traveler

In many other nations they actually did contact tracing at the beginning and were able to isolate.  In addition, no one rebelled and proclaimed it against their rights when told to wear a mask, social distance, and to avoid going out for unnecessary items.

It's amazing what an iota of prevention can do...

That does not mean it's over for them yet, just that thus far, they have managed to keep it from blowing up to levels that the US and other nations which did not practice safe practices have.

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3 hours ago, Traveler said:

@Scott Your posts sum up why I am somewhat confused and upset.  If you have COVID-19 you ought to know and immediately begin a regiment for recovery.   It seems logical to me that the sooner recovery methods are employed for  any health concern - the better the outcome will be.  However, with COVID there are no recommendations to change anything but to wear a mask and social distance.  There are no diet or health regiments recommended.  Waiting til you require hospitalization or ICU before beginning aggressive treatment seems somewhat insane to me.  And even in the most sevier cases - I have not heard any kind of recommended treatments other than front line people ought to have PPE.   If someone official just recommends vitamin D or C they are attacked for perpetrating a fraud.  In fact if anything health wise is recommended prior or in many cases when there are symptoms -there is criticism - it seems that the "experts" want this to be the worse pandemic ever????   I don't get it!!  The doctrine that if you have it or do not want to get it - the best thing is to run off to someplace far away and hide - comes across as quite stupid to me especially with a mortality rate of 1% or less????  

Sorry if I come across as unsympathetic but honestly - I do not have any idea of anything I can say or do that will be an actual and real benefit.  I am open to suggestions.

 

The Traveler

This is something that SHOULD be pushed in the US.  There ARE some treatments that other nations have pushed forward and aggressively have utilized. 

One difficulty is that some of these would cost over $100 in the US where as in other nations the drugs are far cheaper.  In addition, doctors seem hesitant to write prescriptions, especially in conservative areas (the more liberal areas seem to have doctors that push for a more aggressive medication schedule and it seems easier to get certain drugs that are thought could be helpful).

Of course, as some of these are still considered controversial or non-proven yet in the US, it also means it falls under experimental in some areas of the nation which also comes with their own barriers.

I think it would be more useful to have doctors take it seriously and be proactive and be ENCOURAGED to be proactive (as I said, currently it appears to me that more conservative areas of the nation are trying to avoid even calling certain cases COVID-19 and thus not prescribing anything to combat it until someone is sick enough to be hospitalized...while other areas that are more liberal are being more proactive...unfortunately it seems even some in the medical community are trying to see it politically rather than being proactive fighting it...and of course...that little thing with many of the treatments still considered experimental rather than having Federal approval).

There's too much politics concerning how we are treating it currently, which is unfortunate.  Some other nations have similar problems (Brazil...etc).

Nations that do not seem to be having problems like the US seem to have taking a more scientific approach and avoided all the political slush that we've been conducting in the US recently (refusal to see it as a disease/epidemic to be dealt with and a refusal to take any sort of safety precautions by the far right, BLM and other protest movements on the far left downplaying the virus and safety measures that should be taken, both sides acting crazy in political fashions rather than actually deal with the epidemic in the US). 

It SHOULDN'T be political, but unfortunately it has become a political issue in the US being used by BOTH sides at this point, rather than letting scientists advise and tell us what to do, we are letting politicians!

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4 hours ago, Traveler said:

If you have COVID-19 you ought to know and immediately begin a regiment for recovery.

I agree, but only those admitted to the hospital and in bad condition can get a rapid test.  Everyone else has to wait 5-10 days for results.  Some people are waiting 16 days for test results. 

As for me, I had no idea I had any contact with someone who had COVID19.  I just started feeling crappy on Friday afternoon.  Then my wife and daughter got sick on Saturday. I called in sick on Monday and my supervisor told me to go get a COVID test right away (I already had an appointment to get one on July 31) because the lab manager just got sent to the hospital and his rapid test (at the hospital) came back positive.  

As far as what to do, we're supposed to stay self quarantined until we have either a negative test or no fever for three days straight.  I haven't had contact with any non-medical worker or family member since getting sick.

The bad thing is that unless you can answer yes to being in direct contact with a COVID positive person, you have to wait five days or so to get a test.  Then you have to wait another 5-10 days to get a result back (or 16 in some cases).

We're also not supposed to go to the hospital unless we have trouble breathing.

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On 7/24/2020 at 7:04 AM, NeuroTypical said:

C-19 will largely die out eventually, when we get herd immunity and a vaccine.  Probably 2021.

 

That is what they are finding in Sweden. I think it will magically disappear after the election, but only if Biden wins. If Trump wins, which is likely, then it will only get worse and we will see Tens of Billions of death. ;)

 

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3 hours ago, Emmanuel Goldstein said:

That is what they are finding in Sweden. I think it will magically disappear after the election, but only if Biden wins. If Trump wins, which is likely, then it will only get worse and we will see Tens of Billions of death. ;)

Oddly enough, the same thing happens with wars.  We all knew the daily death toll of our engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan, and heard about every stubbed toe and sunburn at Guantanamo Bay when there was a Bush in charge.    Then Obama won on promising to close Gitmo and friendly up with the world and end wars, and suddenly we didn't hear a peep about wars or Gitmo for 8 years.  And Obama became the first US President in the entire history of our nation, to exit office 8 years later in the exact same wars as when he entered office.   These days, the antiwar left gets ticked and screams bloody murder whenever Trump brings troops home from places like Syria.

Yes indeed, if Biden wins, I expect all my hard left buddies will suddenly get behind reopening schools and the economy and businesses.  And they'll start publicly opining about how we need to stop violence in the streets.

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On 7/24/2020 at 9:04 AM, NeuroTypical said:

C-19 will largely die out eventually, when we get herd immunity and a vaccine.  Probably 2021.

 

How will the vaccine help?

My understanding based on the "flatten the curve" models I've looked at is that the assumption is that a supermajority of the population will get it. From there, there's basically 3 groups: those who will die regardless, those who can recover on their own, and those who will die unless they get professional medical assistance. The idea behind flattening the curve was to try to minimize deaths among the third group by ensuring availability of hospital beds.

If we had a vaccine today (or even 3 months ago), how much does that change the grouping? Will that make it so that enough people move from group 3 to group 1 that we no longer worry about group 2 overwhelming the hospitals and preventing group 3 from receiving life-saving care? Or would that mean that we would still try to flatten the curve, but we would be a full one or two phases further along?

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13 minutes ago, mordorbund said:

How will the vaccine help?

My understanding based on the "flatten the curve" models I've looked at is that the assumption is that a supermajority of the population will get it. From there, there's basically 3 groups: those who will die regardless, those who can recover on their own, and those who will die unless they get professional medical assistance. The idea behind flattening the curve was to try to minimize deaths among the third group by ensuring availability of hospital beds.

If we had a vaccine today (or even 3 months ago), how much does that change the grouping? Will that make it so that enough people move from group 3 to group 1 that we no longer worry about group 2 overwhelming the hospitals and preventing group 3 from receiving life-saving care? Or would that mean that we would still try to flatten the curve, but we would be a full one or two phases further along?

The supermajority getting it, and the survivors then having resistance to greatly slow any future spread is what's known as "herd immunity".  Which will eventually & naturally make things less spikey, and fewer infections/deaths.  There's plenty of diseases that have gone this way through history.

The way a vaccine alters this: (running with the fairyland example of a perfectly effective vaccine that everybody can take tomorrow) is that makes group #4: people whom don't ever get the disease and can't or spread it, keeping themselves and the population at large much safer.  In this fairyland where everyone could/would take this 100% effective medicine tomorrow, it could accelerate opening and get everything back to the old normal.

Obviously fairyland doesn't really exist.   Any vaccine is a looooonnnnng way out for development, testing, approval, mass manufacturing, distributing, get people on board, etc.  And it will also likely be messy with flawed protection and possible side effects.  So even getting a vaccine to people will be a phased approach.

All in all: we're stuck with the new normal for 2020 and 2021.

 

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Whole family tested positive and quarantined until August 5.

Losing taste is more unpleasant than I thought.  I'm really hungry, but all food is unappetizing because all food completely tasteless.  I didn't lose all taste because I can still taste Nyquil.  It's the only thing that has a taste.

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2 hours ago, Scott said:

Whole family tested positive and quarantined until August 5.

Losing taste is more unpleasant than I thought.  I'm really hungry, but all food is unappetizing because all food completely tasteless.  I didn't lose all taste because I can still taste Nyquil.  It's the only thing that has a taste.

Good Luck!

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21 hours ago, Scott said:

Whole family tested positive and quarantined until August 5.

Losing taste is more unpleasant than I thought.  I'm really hungry, but all food is unappetizing because all food completely tasteless.  I didn't lose all taste because I can still taste Nyquil.  It's the only thing that has a taste.

Of all the things to be able to taste........That's too bad.  Prayers for your family to have a speedy recovery.

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On 7/23/2020 at 11:47 PM, Traveler said:

For the record - I am currently of the mind that no one (mortal) knows how to stop the COVID pandemic.   There is so much differing information within the professional and international medical community - I personally have become skeptical of all so called preventive methods.   This includes any advancements of a vaccine - because of the relationship of COVID to the common flu.  In short the possibility that COVID will mutate and need a new vaccine each season.  But these seasonal vaccines are a crapshoot effort to guess what is coming and not what actually ends up evolving.

In short we may slow the progress of the virus but even the experts have no clue how to stop it.  What is also depressing in this whole thing - is what to do (treatments) once you have contracted COVID.  I have not found any consistency.  What I have found are a lot of claims and claims that such claims are void of any scientific evidence.  Why would anyone say any treatment is void of any scientific evidence if even one person recovered from the use of the treatment?  It seems that the treatment for COVID is more a matter of where someone is being treated than it is science.

Now I am reading another alarming statistic concerning COVID.  I had assumed that since over 90% of COVID deaths were among individuals with unrelated to COVID chronic conditions - meaning they were about to die anyway.  So I assumed that COVID was not so much taking out so many in our population as a cause but more of a catalyst.   Now I am reading that if we remove all the COVID stats from current death rates - that the death rates in places of high COVID infection have  otherwise raised or increased on the average of 30%.  But when I went to add the link for this thread - I could not find it?????

Recently - where I live (Utah) the news is calling this region of the country a "Hot Spot".  Currently in Utah most of the problem is in Salt Lake County - which is the most populated area of the state.  But the hightest infections and death (currently) are in 3 townships - Magna, Rose Park and West Valley.   Interesting that these areas are high areas of crime and minorities.  It is also where a lot of good hard working but lesser paid individuals live.  I can only guess what minority populations and crime has to do with all this.

Bottom line is that I think the whole COVID thing is more to do with politics than science.  But at the same time - I believe we are facing a critical and important threat. But we are proceeding like chicken running around with our heads cut off.  I do not believe COVID is a hoax - but our response as a nation - especially in the political arena with a upcoming election, might as well be.

 

The Traveler

The only problem I see is the Vaccine will not happen, because they have never created a vaccine for a Covid virus. This is like trying to create a cold vaccine.

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