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New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

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Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#121

Post by tunesmith »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #83
sojournerc wrote: post #4

> For every confirmed case of COVID-19, there are likely another five to 10 people with undetected infections. I wish this was reflected more in the numbers being presented by various authorities. There is just too much confidence that confirmed cases are representative of the spread of the virus. This unknown denominator can change mortality rate, and severe case rate by orders of magnitude. Because of the dearth of…

> I'm fairly certain I've just recovered from COVID-19 given my symptoms, but can't get tested here in Colorado. I'm glad you're better. Please be careful going forward, though. You shouldn't assume you have an immunity unless you have a positive test result. Even with the strict pre-test screening that focus strictly on high probability patients, some locations are reporting very high (90%) negative test results fro…

Yeah, I keep getting stuck on the early test positivity stats in the US. Over the last two weeks, only the most urgent cases were getting tested. But even then, something like 92 - 98% of tests were negative. There are a lot of illnesses out there that are presenting as close enough to COVID to concern health workers, even when it's not COVID.

People don't talk about it much yet, but we really need an immunity test to determine if someone has antibodies.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#122

Post by PeterisP »

djsumdog wrote: post #115
PeterisP wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you test on antigen that matches the virus, then that will return a negative result in the very beginning of infection and after recovery. If you want accurate numbers for statistics, including people who never had symptoms, you can do antibody testing on a random sample of population, that will indicate people who had the disease - but that's kind of too late for that particular location and those particular pati…

I heard in an interview with Michael Osterholm, that scientists in China started testing people who had come in contact to those who were sick in the early days of the outbreak, and found people who were not showing any symptoms, but had a large amount of viral load in their throats they were actively breathing out. What kind of testing they do in those situations?

The first one - if you have the virus, it's multiplying in you and you're infectious then that test will detect it (during that time) no matter if you have severe symptoms or light symptoms or if for you the infection doesn't have any symptoms that you would notice.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#123

Post by tunesmith »

david_draco wrote: post #7
sojournerc wrote: post #4

> For every confirmed case of COVID-19, there are likely another five to 10 people with undetected infections. I wish this was reflected more in the numbers being presented by various authorities. There is just too much confidence that confirmed cases are representative of the spread of the virus. This unknown denominator can change mortality rate, and severe case rate by orders of magnitude. Because of the dearth of…

From the number of deaths you can crudely infer the number of infected, assuming the mortality on the Diamond princess and in South Korea (1%). Demographic effects are in play that don't make this quite right.

South Korea went over 1% fatality yesterday, and they're seeing a rise in numbers again... they might not be testing enough either, so natural fatality could still be lower. (Maybe they should have shut down for two weeks.)

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#124

Post by markkanof »

odorousrex wrote: post #119
AntonStratiev wrote: post #87

Introducing social distancing for the entire population comes at huge economic and social cost. It is more effective to follow these three simple measures: 1. Symptomatic cases stay at home for 7 days 2. All household members of symptomatic cases stay at home for 14 days 3. Social distancing for the over 70 population only https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/s... Social distancing of the entire…

>It might even be logical with the above 3 steps in place for zero/low risk group to deliberately seek out the virus. This grants immunity quicker, and if they become sick, they can receive treatment whilst hospitals are still underwhelmed. This is extremely irresponsible. The long-term effects of the virus are currently unknown but there are some worrying signs of possible long-term lung and other-organ damage that…

If the immunity period is unknown/short then isn't there some logic in trying to build heard immunity amongst the entire lower risk group before the immunity would be lost. If we shut everything down for a bit, then start returning to normal life, that would stretch out the timeline for everyone being exposed and risk creating a cycle where people get it over and over again.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#125

Post by tunesmith »

rubidium wrote: post #13
david_draco wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the number of deaths you can crudely infer the number of infected, assuming the mortality on the Diamond princess and in South Korea (1%). Demographic effects are in play that don't make this quite right.

Totally agree. That’s the number I’ve been watching most to get a sense of how many total are infected for different regions e.g. 1 death today = 50-200 people were infected 2 weeks ago.

Applied to US data... 21 deaths today. 14% daily increase, doubling time of 5.2 days (2 week lag; hopefully social distancing has lengthened it since then). Assuming 1% fatality, that would mean 2100 "actual" cases two weeks ago. Assume no social distancing and doubling time of 5.2 days, or say it doubled three times in two weeks and you get 16,800 cases today. But we've already got 11k confirmed cases today, and I can't believe our confirmed count has already caught up that much.

I dunno, maybe that's an indication that the fatality rate is lower than 1%. Or that dying takes longer than 14 days.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#126

Post by feanaro »

scott_s wrote: post #46
thu2111 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the amount of testing being done in South Korea, we can rule out that there are a lot more people currently infected than we know about That's a very strong claim. SK has done a lot of testing relative to most places but it's still: a) A tiny amount relative to the population b) Not a random sample of the population Their tests were done at testing clinics that people had to take themselves to, which in many ca…

China tested hundreds of thousands of people in provinces with known cases, and found very little evidence of asymptomatic circulation. See my comment from a week ago, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22475853 , which quotes Bruce Aylward, an assistance director general and epidemiologist for the WHO. Our current evidence points to there not being millions of asymptomatic people.

That still does not rule out mild cases which are regarded as a regular viral illness.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#127

Post by mattnewton »

sojournerc wrote: post #120
djsumdog wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard this before and it's the most troubling. Humans have adaptive immune systems. When our bodies first encounter a virus and a while blood cell successfully attaches too and breaks down a virus, it should either replicate or release the right activator proteins that will aid in breaking down the virus. Vaccines are all about tricking our immune system into preparing those specific antibodies before an infecti…

I've also heard it, but I think we need more data. If true, it would go against all priors for how humans build immunity to viruses - especially coronavirus (common cold). There may be a time limit to immunity, but having none at all after recovery would be rare indeed. Without significant evidence (more than one somewhat anecdotal case of re-emergence), there's little reason to assume the body doesn't "remember" the…

> If true, it would go against all priors for how humans build immunity to viruses - especially coronavirus (common cold).

Another possible implication is that there could be multiple strains in circulation, not that the first strain wasn’t immunized against.

You are totally right that we need more evidence and this is very unlikely to be happening. But, I am trying to convince OP to continue to be cautious even if they appear to have recovered, both for themselves and for others. It seems reasonable to be cautious. People have presented apparent recovery only to go on to appear infected again.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#128

Post by krzat »

kubav wrote: post #62
krzat wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? Where do they recommend this? Sounds insane. Czech Republic recently started requiring face covers so we will have results in few weeks.

There is really low number of infected people and also low density of people walking outside in Czech republic. I am not sure you can make a lot out of it. I think requiring face covers outside is more panic than reasonable measure. I live in Prague and when I go outside I meet someone once in few minutes and majority of the people are not wearing face cover despite it is required. Mostly they have it prepared on the…

Sounds reasonable. Mask should be required in grocery shops and crowded places, but it was probably easier to include all public spaces.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#129

Post by milesvp »

magduf wrote: post #116
gbacon wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“I’ll see … and raise” is known as a string raise and is seen as bad form or even cheating. Actions in poker must be atomic. https://upswingpoker.com/angle-shooting-string-bet-raise/

Sorry, I don't know anything about poker, but didn't Riker do this all the time on TNG?

He did, and the poker on the show was generally abysmal. But partly for the ‘I’ll see you... and raise you’ prevalence in drama is that it creates a more dramatic situation. The dramatic effect is the very thing that can be taken advantage of in poker, and is why there’s a rule at most professionally run tables that what you claim, on your turn, is what you must do. Once you call, you can no longer raise no matter how much you want to.

Though the bigger reason for not allowing it, is that it can really add confusion and slow down the game when a person says call and the next person now has to wait until they’re sure the current asshole isn’t going to say ‘and raise’ before they can act.

Oh, and keep in mind that poker is full of assholes who will do all kinds of anti social behavior to gain an edge. So the fact that this is a standard rule really gives some idea as to just how annoying it is to the poker community.

Re: New research shows social distancing a must to beat Covid-19

#130

Post by djsumdog »

sojournerc wrote: post #120
djsumdog wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard this before and it's the most troubling. Humans have adaptive immune systems. When our bodies first encounter a virus and a while blood cell successfully attaches too and breaks down a virus, it should either replicate or release the right activator proteins that will aid in breaking down the virus. Vaccines are all about tricking our immune system into preparing those specific antibodies before an infecti…

I've also heard it, but I think we need more data. If true, it would go against all priors for how humans build immunity to viruses - especially coronavirus (common cold). There may be a time limit to immunity, but having none at all after recovery would be rare indeed. Without significant evidence (more than one somewhat anecdotal case of re-emergence), there's little reason to assume the body doesn't "remember" the…

> especially coronavirus (common cold).

Remember, coronavirus are ~25% of colds. There are many other families (like rhinovirues), that cause what we think of as the cold.

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