Live data from Hacker News

Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

bbc.com

271–280 of 915 posts

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#271
This is an account from one of the doctors in Italy. https://twitter.com/jasonvanschoor/status/123714289107769753...

Read the whole thing, but this passage in particular is just chilling.

"5/ Patients above 65 or younger with comorbidities are not even assessed by ITU, I am not saying not tubed, I’m saying not assessed and no ITU staff attends when they arrest. Staff are working as much as they can but they are starting to get sick and are emotionally overwhelmed."

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#272

This is an account from one of the doctors in Italy. https://twitter.com/jasonvanschoor/status/123714289107769753... Read the whole thing, but this passage in particular is just chilling. "5/ Patients above 65 or younger with comorbidities are not even assessed by ITU, I am not saying not tubed, I’m saying not assessed and no ITU staff attends when they arrest. Staff are working as much as they can but they are start…

Does that mean they're just triaging them and letting them die?

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#273

This is an account from one of the doctors in Italy. https://twitter.com/jasonvanschoor/status/123714289107769753... Read the whole thing, but this passage in particular is just chilling. "5/ Patients above 65 or younger with comorbidities are not even assessed by ITU, I am not saying not tubed, I’m saying not assessed and no ITU staff attends when they arrest. Staff are working as much as they can but they are start…

[deleted]

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#274
post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China has seen massive decline in the number of new cases in Hubei. It’s no surprise the response is being praised.

Can they be believed?

The CCP claims new cases are almost eliminated outside of Wuhan city limits; that'd be a hard thing to fake if it were really churning along at peak strength.

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#275
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lockdown in Italy is a concept that is difficult to enforce. And it's probably very different to what it means in China or even just South Korea or any other more organised and centrally governed country in Europe like France. But in essence: Schools are closed until next month. People can still move around freely for work reasons, and in general people still work in offices. Bars and restaurants close after 18pm. Sh…

Completely random and off-topic. I'm in the US and used to 12-hour time. I personally prefer 24-hour time, and am comfortable with 18:00 or similar for a time indicator. I don't know that I've ever seen a 24-hour time with am/pm attached to it. Is this common?

I say 6pm but write 18:00. I imagine things like that can very easily lead to awkward translations.

I've found countries (Slovakia springs to mind) that would say "a quarter of 8" for 7:15 (think "7 hours and a quarter of the eighth hour") and "half 8" for 7:30. Time can translate in rather interesting ways.

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People in other countries put too much weight in what the president says, Trump or otherwise, because they don't fully understand that there is an entire system of government that can fully function with or without the president. I won't go so far as to say that the position of the president is a figurehead, but it's been more than a little advisory for several generations. I watch a lot of BBC, NHK, and DW, and see…

> there is an entire system of government that can fully function with or without the president. Except when a major global catastrophe hits, like a pandemic, the response requires massive coordination across local, state, and federal levels. What he says now may not be so relevant but the president's lack of appoints to key executive branch positions within the CDC and the rest of the healthcare apparatus (including…

Just look at the testing for an example. There's absolutely no reason we couldn't be doing 10 times as many tests as we are; there's just nobody sitting at the top insisting that test capacity must be available and demanding that everyone do what they can to make it happen.

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#277
post #73
post #6

For anyone claiming that this is just a flu: I've never heard of an entire country being shut down because of the flu.

But the flu does kill a lot of people yearly. I tried to look up the mortality rate for Italy. The best I found is estimated 68000 attributed to flu over period from 2013-2017. And you will find similar high numbers in many other countries. Perhaps we are expecting it to be worse that this? https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S120197121...

Think about 10x

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#278
post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any numbers or is it just anecdotal? Because when worked in a nursing home back the day, the seasonal flus was already bad enough, so...

My wife said they didn't lose a single resident to diagnosed flu last year. 26 people have died in a matter of weeks at that nursing home from Coronavirus. If this thing gets into these other facilities, it's going to wipe them out.

Do people typically die of diagnosed flu? It's my understanding that most flu deaths are undiagnosed, which is why the CDC's ranges for flu deaths are always so broad; they're estimating how many pneumonia deaths they think were caused by the flu season.

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is impossible to contain. The purpose of the lockdown isn't to contain, it's just to spread out the infections over a larger period of time so that hospitals don't get overwhelmed. But there's likely not a plausible scenario at this point where we globally jump on this and only a few million or even tens of millions are infected. All we can do is slow it down.

China has demonstrated that it is in fact possible to contain the spread. Please use the links I provided to review the data. Do remember that the Chinese built two make-shift hospitals in something like 10 days. Once a couple of weeks pass we'll see if Italy is able to replicate what China did. Here are my calculations based on current data[1]: Country tot. deaths pop. (1m) tot. deaths/1m pop. Italy 463 62 7.46 Iran…

China’s current status is impressive but it’s come at enormous cost which is unsustainable in the long run. And it’s unclear what’s going to happen in the long run as China opens up workplaces and public gatherings, and as international travel and commerce resumes. It may very well explode again. Some countries will get a handle on this for now, but many won’t, and it will continue to spread globally. It might take months, it might take years, but it’s not going away.

Re: Italy is extending its coronavirus quarantine measures to the entire country

#280
post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* Health services in Italy are entirely controlled at the regional level * The two worst-hit regions (Lombardia and Veneto) are ruled by right-wing coalitions * Not even the administrations of those regions, who should be politically on the same page, can agree on what to do / what should have been done * Prato in Toscana, the "unofficial Chinese capital of Italy", has seen no cases whatsoever. But sure, let's use a…

I don't think pointing out business connections between individuals belonging to particular nation states is an example of "casual racism". It's no kind of racism at all. But the rest of the information you provided is very interesting! That the "Chinese capital" of Italy has no cases is very interesting, in particular.

> It's no kind of racism at all.

The political situation in Italy has been an absolute powder-keg of not-even-casual racism for years now, not unlike some areas of the UK. The "political boss" of those two regional administrations I mentioned, Matteo Salvini of Lega Nord, tried to scapegoat Asian communities pretty brutally at the onset of the epidemic, with the usual result (Asian-looking people being shouted at in the streets etc).

We now know that the European "patient 0" was likely from Germany, so these right-wingers were left with egg on their faces and are now running around like headless chickens - just yesterday Lombardia asked for more rigorous lockdown measures, whereas Veneto was asking for the opposite. So I get pretty pissed off at the strenuous attempts to go back to the original talking points about discrimination of entire ethnic groups, particularly when Italians abroad (a category that includes me) have to suffer the same idiotic attitudes at the moment.

Post reply on HN