Do you have any friend that is confirmed negative (spent at least 10 days stationary as far as interactions go) and has a car? They can scoop you up and take you somewhere. Whether that's home to your parents or whatever. Otherwise you need to stay inside for at least the next 3 weeks or go outside with a mask and stay way away from people (just to get sun).
Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
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Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#12Sounds like you are setup to ride it out in NYC. I would stay in place, carefully have groceries delivered when possible and ride it out until the healthcare system can support you if needed then revaluate your situation. You are probably safest in your current environment since you don't have to go out and have already been in 10 days.
If you go that route, perhaps have 1-2 months of groceries and toiletries delivered?
That would give the groceries enough time to decontaminate before you touched them, even if later on nobody is able to make deliveries to you.
I don't know about refrigerated / frozen foods though. Not sure how long covid19 remains viable when frozen.
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#13It’s hard to know what to do. Personally, I’d stick it out through April and reassess.
If it were me and I had family out in the country somewhere, I’d consider staying with them. But... you seem to have your stuff together and the devil you know may be better than the one you don’t!
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#14Sounds like you are setup to ride it out in NYC. I would stay in place, carefully have groceries delivered when possible and ride it out until the healthcare system can support you if needed then revaluate your situation. You are probably safest in your current environment since you don't have to go out and have already been in 10 days.
If you go that route, perhaps have 1-2 months of groceries and toiletries delivered? That would give the groceries enough time to decontaminate before you touched them, even if later on nobody is able to make deliveries to you. I don't know about refrigerated / frozen foods though. Not sure how long covid19 remains viable when frozen.
[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
Damn. What is safe though? Is it safe to rent a car? Better to drive across the country and stay with family, where healthcare systems aren't crumbling? Or find a random cabin upstate NY to rent, but risk access to healthcare?
Yeah, good questions. I'd say if you already have a car, probably reasonably safe to make your way to it and drive somewhere. But renting, hmm not so sure. Also, staying with family has its risks. Maybe someone is infected but asymptomatic. Sorry man, I don't have much advice for you. Best of luck. Whatever you decide to do, think it through, preferably with some other brains involved. Don't rush. As others have said…
Thank you :)
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#16Isolate if you can. If you receive packages let them sit somewhere for 2 days before opening and handling them, or open and clean the box inside and clean your hands right away.
If you do go out wear rubber gloves and a mask. Never touch your face when out. Thankfully you got a job that allows WFH and you should be able to ride this out.
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#17It’s hard to know what to do. Personally, I’d stick it out through April and reassess. If it were me and I had family out in the country somewhere, I’d consider staying with them. But... you seem to have your stuff together and the devil you know may be better than the one you don’t!
Bad advice, relatives would contaminate the OP with high probability.
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#18At this point I think it is a frying pan / fire equation.
Although NY might not be the best place, where would, and can you get there in time, and without risk.
I see how the calculation is that NY ICU will be overwhelmed, not sure that there is anywhere which will not be. I see little difference between a 1% chance of getting an ICU bed and a 0.02% chance. If it was me, I would stay put.
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#19It’s hard to know what to do. Personally, I’d stick it out through April and reassess. If it were me and I had family out in the country somewhere, I’d consider staying with them. But... you seem to have your stuff together and the devil you know may be better than the one you don’t!
Bad advice, relatives would contaminate the OP with high probability.
I agree all things being equal. But they're not. The delivery guy or mailman or building super could infect them too.
It's a hard problem that I struggle with personally. My parents are elderly and not in great health. I live in fear every day that the efforts of my family and their support network (visiting nurses, etc) to help them can kill them.
Re: Ask HN: NYC with autoimmune disease, what should I do?
#20At this point I think it is a frying pan / fire equation. Although NY might not be the best place, where would, and can you get there in time, and without risk. I see how the calculation is that NY ICU will be overwhelmed, not sure that there is anywhere which will not be. I see little difference between a 1% chance of getting an ICU bed and a 0.02% chance. If it was me, I would stay put.
Yes, thank you.
My thought experiments have been hand-wavy expected value calculations like this: P(failure) = P(infection) * P(critical) * (1-P(icu))
0.1 * 0.8 * 0.9 = 0.072
and cost of failure is, well, infinite.
That infection probability is optimistic, considering what you mention above. That ICU availability probability is the situation we're facing in NYC.