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Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

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Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#261

Post by zomglings »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #69

"To think that we're in New York City and this is happening," he added. "It's like a third-world country type of scenario. It's mind-blowing." Historically, when sexually transmitted disease outbreaks occurred in the US, social workers would ask for the names of everyone you had slept with if you were infected and they would contact them and screen them and treat them. This was effective in stopping outbreaks. We lar…

Thank you. This was a very informative comment and I am especially grateful for The Hot Zone PDF.

It was difficult to follow your chain of comments to find the information on air clearance techniques separate from ventilators. This is the relevant thread for anyone interested - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22624959

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#262

Post by 3JPLW »

yters wrote: post #250
3JPLW wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't have enough tests to do it. The testing backlog is getting worse — not better. The current backlog is estimated at 7-14 days in some areas.

where did sk get all their tests? they didnt know about cov2 before the outbreak. seems we could fast track test production, or do whatever they did

We absolutely could have... two months ago. There were a number of missteps that cost us very important time:

* WHO developed its protocol based on a German solution and open-sourced it mid-Jan

* The CDC decided to develop its own protocol and finalized it by end of Jan. They told local and private labs that they'd handle all of the testing and thus the FDA did not grant authorization for local and private labs to begin standing up their own testing protocol.

* By early Feb, it was becoming obvious that the CDC tests had manufacturing troubles.

* In mid-Feb the FDA re-iterated its guidance to labs to not stand up their own tests

* On Feb 29, the FDA finally allowed local labs to develop their own tests

* Two weeks later, those other tests finally started rolling in

https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2020/03/23/us/politics/ap-u...

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/us/coronavirus-testing-de...

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#263

Post by 3JPLW »

dingaling wrote: post #260
viklove wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Loyola University Health System in Chicago—which set a hospital flu-activity record of 190 confirmed cases between January 7 and 13 It's not even close to what we saw just this week from coronavirus. Stop making a comparison where there isn't one to be made, this is much worse than the flu.

> this is much worse than the flu. The CDC estimates that up to 710,000 Americans have been hospitalised by the flu in the past six months out of 54 million infected. Up to 59,000 of them died. IN SIX MONTHS. In the USA alone. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-e... Stop trivialising influenza.

> This coronavirus hasn't even approached those levels globally in five months.

Three months, and yes, that's how exponential growth works. It's pretty small at the beginning. You'd think a community of (largely) computer scientists would appreciate the power of exponential growth.

Edit: ah, looks like you're editing your post.

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#264

Post by viklove »

gridlockd wrote: post #203
jtbayly wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter. The point still stands. So far he's been worse off when getting the shot than when not. But who's to say what would have happened those two years without the shot? Perhaps it saved him from a severe flu case or even death.

> It doesn't matter. It does matter. The claim here is basically "for certain people (me), the flu shot has been worse than the flu". If that person never experienced an actual Influenza infection, then that claim was made in error.

The claim has not been made in error. If he has never experienced the flu, but has experienced symptoms from the flu shot, then the statement "the flu shot has been worse than the flu" is 100% true.

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#265

Post by smacktoward »

EvanAnderson wrote: post #225
smacktoward wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must have missed the most recent round of GOP talking points, where they were suggesting we write off the lives of people in high-risk groups so everyone else can get back to work. See https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.vice.com/en_us/arti... , https://www.marketwatch.com/story/fox-news-contributor-on-pu... , https://www.mediaite.com/news/glenn-beck-issues-call-for-old... for a few examples.

My perception of registered Republicans (not so much people who might incidentally vote Republican) is that the average age is pretty high. I wonder how these viewpoints sit with the older party members.

I suspect that the answer in this case is pretty simple. You have the interests of Republican voters (who, yes, do skew older) on one side of the issue, and the interests of Republican funders, who are generally big business types who are losing money every day their businesses are idle, on the other.

And the funders won.

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#266

Post by 3JPLW »

slazaro wrote: post #253
dreen wrote: post #24

Judging by the history of most pandemics, I am currently more worried about the capacity of morgues than hospitals. Maybe this one will be different though.

Really? You're more worried about lifeless atoms piling up than actual humans dying?

I see a morgue at capacity and I think about the thousands of family members who aren't able to properly grieve for, manage, and bury their deceaseds.

I wouldn't jump to accusations of callousness on the part of the GP quite so fast.

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#267

Post by Ididntdothis »

viklove wrote: post #264
gridlockd wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It doesn't matter. It does matter. The claim here is basically "for certain people (me), the flu shot has been worse than the flu". If that person never experienced an actual Influenza infection, then that claim was made in error.

The claim has not been made in error. If he has never experienced the flu, but has experienced symptoms from the flu shot, then the statement "the flu shot has been worse than the flu" is 100% true.

I am not claiming I had the flu. What I am saying is that the flu shots made me more miserable than any cold/flu I ever had. I am very reluctant to intentionally make myself sick for a few days every year.

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#268

Post by soperj »

SlowRobotAhead wrote: post #118
dominotw wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "I get sick every time!" No, you don't. This is possible theoretically . yes? There is no guarantee that you get lucky from flu shot at-least once.

Well now hang on... The flu shot you get every year in USA and Europe is the vaccine for the most common flu that was seen in Asia and Australia the 6 months previous. And vice versa. It’s a guess. If there are two common flus that went around, they pick one to vaccine for. Sometimes they get it wrong and the shot you get has nothing to do with the flu that ends up being common in your area. It’s very possible to get…

Normally there's at least 2 strains the vaccinate against. They've had flu shots with three strains before (around the time of swine flu)

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#269

Post by ceejayoz »

throw1234651234 wrote: post #252
ceejayoz wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The definition of "sick" matters here. A dead-virus vaccine like the flu shot cannot give you the flu. It can cause "sick" side-effects (for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillain%E2%80%93Barr%C3%A9_sy... , or the fairly common aches and pains from the immune response), but not the flu . A live-virus vaccine like the flu nasal spray can give you the flu, especially if you're immune suppressed or something al…

I don't understand the point of contention - a lot of vaccines have historically included a live virus that has been stored for a while, often in a frozen and/or dried out form. Are you saying that a lot of vaccines are NOT weakened versions of the actual virus which can give you the sickness if your immune system is weak? Or are you saying that the commonly used flu vaccine in the US does not utilize a live form of…

The latter.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/prevent/misconceptions.htm

> No, flu vaccines cannot cause flu illness. Flu vaccines given with a needle (i.e., flu shots) are currently made in two ways: the vaccine is made either with a) flu viruses that have been ‘inactivated’ (killed) and that therefore are not infectious, or b) using only a single gene from a flu virus (as opposed to the full virus) in order to produce an immune response without causing infection. This is the case for recombinant influenza vaccines.

Re: Coronavirus patients start to overwhelm US hospitals

#270

Post by viklove »

dingaling wrote: post #260
viklove wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Loyola University Health System in Chicago—which set a hospital flu-activity record of 190 confirmed cases between January 7 and 13 It's not even close to what we saw just this week from coronavirus. Stop making a comparison where there isn't one to be made, this is much worse than the flu.

> this is much worse than the flu. The CDC estimates that up to 710,000 Americans have been hospitalised by the flu in the past six months out of 54 million infected. Up to 59,000 of them died. IN SIX MONTHS. In the USA alone. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-e... Stop trivialising influenza.

It's hard to take you seriously when you take a range given by the CDC (38,000,000 – 54,000,000) and cherry-pick it as a specific figure that makes your position look stronger. You're arguing in bad faith.

Even according to the figures you've given from the CDC, the flu has a 0.1% death rate, which is nowhere near the 1.4% death rate COVID-19 currently has in the US.

No one is trivializing the flu, but it's silly to say we should relax w.r.t. COVID-19 because we're used to the flu. At a minimum it kills TEN TIMES as many infected people as the regular flu, even without considering vaccines.

Influenza is chump change compared to COVID-19.

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