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U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

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871–880 of 919 posts

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#871

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the virus can spread on surfaces I think. As well as food, and organic matter.

No. From the CDC: > It may be possible that a person can get COVID-19 by touching a surface or object that has the virus on it and then touching their own mouth, nose, or possibly their eyes, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads. > In general, because of poor survivability of these coronaviruses on surfaces, there is likely very low risk of spread from food products or packaging that are shipp…

Today I read that it can survive for up to 3 days on some surfaces.

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#872

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about to your job, if you don't have a job that you can do remotely? Employers generally don't like paying people who can't make it in to work, and it's hard to pay for food without money.

Even if employers were happy to pay the wages, most small employers aren't going to be able to keep going when incoming cashflow goes to zero I assume the U.S. government will be pumping money directly into the hands of small businesses and employees.

You assume a hell of a lot.

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#873

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Death is not the only thing that coronavirus can do to you. You can spend weeks or months in therapy before you are recovered, or you can get scarring in your lungs - or worse - that leaves you with a permanent disability. Not to mention damage to other organs. I think many are discounting, or are unaware of, these other nasty possibilities. We don’t know enough yet of the prevalence of these effects, but we do know…

> You can spend weeks or months in therapy before you are recovered, or you can get scarring in your lungs - or worse - that leaves you with a permanent disability. Not to mention damage to other organs. Given that we've only been tracking the virus closely for 2 months, and we've only had a decent sample size of patients for only about 1 month, you really can't be making claims like this at this point.

I'm not making these claims. A senior doctor in Western Europe is making these claims[1].

> Fatality is the wrong yardstick. Catching the virus can mess up your life in many, many more ways than just straight-up killing you. "We are all young"—okay. "Even if we get the bug, we will survive"—fantastic. How about needing four months of physical therapy before you even feel human again. Or getting scar tissue in your lungs and having your activity level restricted for the rest of your life.

[1]: https://www.newsweek.com/young-unafraid-coronavirus-pandemic...

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#874

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(to be completely pedantic, flattening the curve is about changing the base. The exponent is time.)

No, the equation is (currently infected)^(rate*time). Community mitigation changes the rate.

Okay, I think you're right here. But then why when I calculate compound interest, it's (1+rate)^time ?

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#875
post #847

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Death is not the only thing that coronavirus can do to you. You can spend weeks or months in therapy before you are recovered, or you can get scarring in your lungs - or worse - that leaves you with a permanent disability. Not to mention damage to other organs. I think many are discounting, or are unaware of, these other nasty possibilities. We don’t know enough yet of the prevalence of these effects, but we do know…

AFAIK besides spending weeks in therapy, other possibilities are not confirmed for COVID-19.

Source: https://www.newsweek.com/young-unafraid-coronavirus-pandemic...

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#876
post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't answer the "significant" part, I think. It's an easy decision for the reasons you mention, but that doesn't mean it has a significant impact.

Depending on how spread goes, it would be easier to ban internal travel after banning international travel than going 0 to 100% ban in one swoop. Don’t underestimate that the damage of social unrest can easily surpass the potential damage of the virus. Remember public policies deal with people with emotions, not robots.

This would make more sense if the travel ban was bidirectional. But as you said, a lot depends on how things are progressing, which we don't actually know in the US due to poor monitoring. Which is why I said it's not clear if this is a step that will make any significant impact, although to your point it might work as theater either way.

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#877

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The president didn't say that the virus is a partisan hoax. His actions clearly indicate he doesn't believe it is a hoax. The president did claim that some criticisms about his handling of the situation were a "new hoax" in the same way he has labeled previous unfounded criticism and accusations as hoaxes.

""When you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that's a pretty good job we've done."

so? That is not the same thing as saying it is a hoax. Plenty of reasonable criticisms to make but that doesn’t mean the President thinks the virus itself is a hoax. I am arguing for clear communication and facts and people are basically saying screw that let’s just spread rumors because, reasons. How is that helpful?

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#878
post #646

Important updates: a) This does not apply to US citizens or their family members[1]. b) This does not apply to cargo[2]. It appears that the President misspoke regarding point 2. [1] https://www.dhs.gov/news/2020/03/11/homeland-security-acting... . [2] https://twitter.com/AnaSwanson/status/1237921160500830208

Does it apply to H1B holders? (Are they “US residents”?)

This applies to H1B holders. Basically if you have a non-immigrant visa, you can assume this rule applies to you.

The rule only excludes US citizens, green card holders and their immediate families.

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#879
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's all about flattening the curve at this point. You can do your best to identify those infected and have them self-quarantine, but if the gates are open and infected people are streaming into your country, you're not going to get far.

You’re describing the opposite of flattening the curve. Closing the gates now does nothing. I do not mean to be patronizing, but this is literally life or death and the math is very simple. Today there are k infected people. Tomorrow there will be kn people. If n is unsustainable, any positive value for k is equivalent. Arbitrarily large changes to k today make an arbitrarily small contribution to the final doubling.…

You're all over this thread with the same point: what makes you think that not letting new cases in (in this case, travel from hotspots) is somehow not improving the situation?

>the math is very simple

Yes it is. There are infected people in Europe. Stopping travel from Europe = less infected people in the US. Yes, there are already infected people in the US, but a travel ban will neither increase or reduce that number; it's irrelevant.

Re: U.S. will suspend all travel from Europe for 30 days

#880
post #724
post #699

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Americans have big garages to stockpile supplies, which means less trips to the store This is FUD. That isn't where you risk getting sick. The countries with the most effective response to COVIR-19 doesn't even try to stop everyday shopping or movement in cars at all. >In Europe by contrast, much more of life revolves around public spaces, like the park, cafes, the city square, and public transport. You don't get si…

From what I've read, China tries to get people to go grocery shopping only once per week. They are the only ones who appear to manage to get the infection rate from 1.3x down to 0.3x in the past days.

Interesting. Once a week was status quo in the suburb I grew up in (west of Chicago), is that not normal elsewhere?
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