161–170 of 218 posts
Hopefully some of these aren't re-inventing the wheel. For instance, currently the first one is helping build APIs for getting healthcare data. This is potentially a solved problem; indeed, interoperability is rather a large market in the healthcare world (I speak as someone who does this for a living).
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We really need to start distinguishing between masks and respirators. Surgical masks are useless for protecting the wearer from infected people, however they help protect others from an infected wearer. If used properly, a respirator will help protect the wearer from infected people, as it will block them from inhaling virus-containing droplets.
> Surgical masks are useless for protecting the wearer from infected people They are not useless for protecting the wearer, and this anti-vaxer level dangerous misinformation needs to stop. It's like saying condoms are useless for protecting the wearer from HIV because they sometimes break. The lie that masks don't work was spread because there weren't enough masks. Sad that people are still falling for it/spreading…
Frankly I see no downside to people wearing homemade masks.
Edit: More friendly article that references the paper I'm talking about.
https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/best-materials-make-diy-...
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>I never got the logic behind living in the perpetual cocktail party/high school that is a big city. I'm really struggling to interpret that charitably but I'll try - Some reasons to live in a big city: (1) It's where your friends and (perhaps elderly) parents live. (2) It's where your job is. (3) You can't afford, (or don't want to own) a car. (4) You're single (especially true if you are LGBTQ). (5) You like the cu…
You don't like narrow minded, holier-than-though attitudes that tend to be more common (IMHO) in smaller towns. Have you ever been to San Francisco?
I applaud the intent, but this looks like a laundry list of random ideas. There's no leadership or vetting or job descriptions. I'd love to help us build 1,000,000 ventilators, but I think the answer to that one is for governments to allocate money to manufacturers (which is starting to happen), not to crank out some javascript.
These are all moonshot projects. If someone can come up with a creative and simple ventilator that relies entirely on 3d printed and massively available electronic parts they can save a lot of lives and it appears to be entirely possible. If they don't produce anything of value, at least they tried.
There are concrete things we can all do, and probably ways for we programmers to contribute using our professional skills, but just wishing for a million ventilators is a distraction, not a contribution or even a project to be brutally honest.
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We're being told by the medical establishment, quite angrily, that masks are useless - unless you work in the medical establishment, then they're essential. Who is right?
A mask doesn't "work" in the sense of preventing you from catching the virus, because airborne is not its transmission method. A mask does work in the sense of reducing your transmission to others if you are infected (and may not know it), by keeping your moisture-laden exhalations confined. A mask can reduce your risk by reminding you not to touch your face after having contacted potentially infectious surfaces. And…
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200317150116.h...
That indicates airborne transmission is a vector.
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As long as you don’t have any other diseases, you’re statistically sort of “safe”. 0.2% risk of dying for your age group regardless of physical health according to https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-age-se... Wash your hands, stay safe.
> Death Rate = (number of deaths / number of cases) = probability of dying if infected by the virus (%). Nonsense! Unless we can count every death caused by the virus, and correctly diagnose every infection , then this is a ridiculous (and irresponsible) guess. The number for "all cases" comes from the CCDC paper: > A total of 72,314 patient records—44,672 (61.8%) confirmed cases, 16,186 (22.4%) suspected cases, 10,5…
Until we have antibody tests, the PCR-based tests we're using will only tell us if you actively have the disease not if you had it ages ago and already recovered. This disease could have easily spread unnoticed (due to the overwhelmingly mild flulike symptoms most people get) for months. Due to its highly-contageous nature, it probably did.
Until we calm down and analyze what all actually happened my guess is just as good as anyone else.
I applaud the intent, but this looks like a laundry list of random ideas. There's no leadership or vetting or job descriptions. I'd love to help us build 1,000,000 ventilators, but I think the answer to that one is for governments to allocate money to manufacturers (which is starting to happen), not to crank out some javascript.
These are all moonshot projects. If someone can come up with a creative and simple ventilator that relies entirely on 3d printed and massively available electronic parts they can save a lot of lives and it appears to be entirely possible. If they don't produce anything of value, at least they tried.
I recognize the optimism and idealism in this way of thinking and feel bad about countering it, but as someone who has taken on a number of “if we fail at least we tried!” ideas over the years, this is a recipe for burnout.
Enthusiasm and passion are valuable and scarce resources: we don’t have an unlimited amount. Each time we take on a project and really throw ourselves into it, we’re investing a bit of our limited passion supply. If the project works out and makes an impact, we get a return on that investment, and feel the motivation to take on even bigger projects! But if you throw yourself body and soul into too many projects that totally fail, you’ll eventually run out of steam to keep going, and you may not even see it coming until it’s too late.
To continue the investment analogy: I recommend folks invest themselves in projects with an eye to risk. “A weekend project that will almost certainly go nowhere, but could go somewhere” is a small investment, sure go ahead. A months long grind with a startup better come with a plausible strategy for success that doesn’t hinge on something unlikely.
Invest well, friends.
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People have been setting up mutual aid and volunteer groups to do just this. If you’d like to find one in your local area we’ve built a directory for them: https://coronavolunteer.org Helping in your local community (safely) will be one of the most important things you can do in the coming months.
Have you seen https://coronavirustechhandbook.com/volunteering ?