California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf] • Hacker News Board

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#331

Post by ridaj » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:17 AM UTC

xienze wrote: post #96

Ninjak8051 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Additionally, notice that the orange data points (actual hospitalizations) are significantly under the "With Intervention" plot. So why even include the slide? Clearly the assumptions behind the "With Intervention" plot do not match reality TODAY, let alone in a few weeks. Not a good sign if people are making actual decisions based on this.

> Clearly the assumptions behind the "With Intervention" plot do not match reality TODAY, let alone in a few weeks. I feel like I’m taking crazy pills with the way people are talking about this whole thing still being out of control, when data shows the situation is even better than the most optimistic models were predicting. And by that I mean, pretend I was on HN 3 weeks ago predicting 25K deaths in the USA by toda…

I don't understand what you're suggesting, that California should ease up faster? It seems to me that reality being better than models had predicted is more the result of everyone flying blind due to lack of testing... California has probably been lucky that it turned out its infection was lower than New York's turned out to be. It is just hard to make a model starting from extremely shitty and noisy base data about facts on the ground, but someone still has to make very difficult public health decisions based on the best models available.

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#332

Post by Ankaios » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:19 AM UTC

raywu wrote: post #291

papeda wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar but more general question: is testing available to everyone, e.g. random asymptomatic passersby?

I found a source[0]. Stanford was testing a larger population to get an estimate of the spread. [0] https://www.stanforddaily.com/2020/04/04/stanford-researcher...

That reference describes a separate antibody survey that Stanford ran on April 3 and 4. It's unrelated to great-great grandparent's test today.

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#333

Post by anewhope » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:24 AM UTC

icelancer wrote: post #301

mdorazio wrote: post #3

Am I missing something? I don't see any kind of roadmap in here - it's just 6 generic talking points without any actual plan or timeline.

It notably does not present any sort of figures, expectations, statistics, or mathematics. No one wants to take responsibility. They'd rather have nebulous goalposts they can shift whenever they like. Hell, it's worked so far in convincing people mathematical models don't need to be accurate anymore - you have people in the streets defending embarrassingly poor epidemiological models.

I’m not into politics but as a person this is not good leadership. These people are not sharing in the sacrifices they demand. Ante up if you’re going to play with people’s lives and livelihoods to this extent.

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#334

Post by tanilama » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:29 AM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #199

jml7c5 wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Something weird happened in California, where 20% of their tests were coming back positive, then all the sudden 04/04/2020 they started seeing This is not surprising. When tests were scarce, tests would be rationed to those most suspected of infection.

Tests are still scarce.

Maybe or may not be true.

I just got an email from local urgent care that they have the fast test equipment that can offer a result within 15 minutes if you are negative.

The situation is changing quickly

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#335

Post by marcell » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:35 AM UTC

gabaix wrote: post #154

ravenstine wrote: post #130

It doesn't make any sense that we continue the lockdown in its current state. Hospitals in California aren't overrun. We were insisted upon that the "flattening the curve" was to prevent the medical system from being overwhelmed. With what we've been able to do, we're not even close to having overrun hospitals. By now, we should have ramped up the system to account for greater numbers of severe cases. Given that, we…

Hospitals around me are at half capacity. San Mateo is at 56% capacity in ICU beds.[1] Covid cases were doubling every 3 days (up to 5). Would it be correct to say that had we waited another week, hospitals would have been overrun? If that's the case then I understand why health authorities are cautious. [1] https://www.smchealth.org/post/san-mateo-county-covid-19-dat...

Typically a hospitals run at near full capacity, especially during flu season.

I have a friend who works at the Kaiser in Oakland in ER, and she says it has been pretty empty right now, relative to a typical flu season.

The data linked shows about half the beds are taken up by COVID-19 patients, and the other half are other cases. They claim to have 77 standard ICU beds, and 300 surge beds available. Of those, 34% of the standard and 94% of the surge beds are unused. So out of 377 total beds, 5% are taken up by COVID-19 patients.

I think it's hard to estimate the doubling rate based on the numbers we have out there. Confirmed cases is a poor proxy for actual cases, since it depends a lot on testing rates, who gets tested, etc. A lot of new data is suggesting that coronavirus spread further we previously though, and that it started spreading in America sooner than we previously though. We don't know the true numbers because they didn't start testing for coronavirus in America until March, and even then it was at a very low rate.

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#336

Post by tomerico » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:36 AM UTC

ridaj wrote: post #330

tomerico wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What bothers me the most is that the comparison is always against a hypothetical "do nothing" strategy, ignoring the fact that different countries have employed different strategies, some of them have been highly successful in containing the disease without any lock down (Korea, Taiwan, and Australia) come to mind.

Aren't the techniques that Taiwan and Korea have employed (testing, isolation of known cases, contact tracing) irrelevant at this stage of contagion? I doubt of the efficacy of contact tracing when you have enough of a percentage of population infected that a single visit to Costco or any other supermarket would mean a very high chance of being there at the same time as an infectious person...

I think that the answer is that we don't know what's the effect of each measure. The fact that Japan & Australia did not employ contact tracing, but also managed to contain the spread shows that there are other factors at play. It might be face masks use, or temperature (for Australia), but it does show that there are potential alternatives that could be viable.

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#337

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:40 AM UTC

mappu wrote: post #168

throwaway237683 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it amazing that an absolutely massive privacy invasion that is called contact tracing is already accepted as _inevitable_ if we are ever to be allowed to step out of our homes? Talk about cynicism.

Contact tracing does not need to be a privacy invasion - the Apple/Google implementation seems very well thought out. https://ncase.me/contact-tracing

[deleted]

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#338

Post by prawn » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:45 AM UTC

tomerico wrote: post #327

mikekij wrote: post #30

This entire plan is based on models that do not align with what we are seeing. The graph on slide two[1] of the official CA govt plan shows hospitalizations With Intervention rising exponentially, exceeding our hospital capacity in early June. The actual new infection data shows that the rate of new infections has been decreasing since at least 4/4 [2], meaning that the graph of active hospitalizations should be a be…

What bothers me the most is that the comparison is always against a hypothetical "do nothing" strategy, ignoring the fact that different countries have employed different strategies, some of them have been highly successful in containing the disease without any lock down (Korea, Taiwan, and Australia) come to mind.

"some of them have been highly successful in containing the disease without any lock down (Korea, Taiwan, and Australia) come to mind."

How are you defining lock down here? I live in Australia and most people I know have been working from home for weeks and have had kids out of school during that time. All restaurants have been closed for a while now. There are stops/checks at border entry points between states, even at points 1-2 hours in from the border, enforced quarantine for anyone arriving interstate. Weddings restricted to 5 people, funerals to 10. People are getting fined $1k+ for non-essential travel (group of kids this week copped big fines for getting up and congregating to see the sunrise).

At almost every "essential" business I've visited, there have been spacing markers on the floor. Supermarkets have plastic shields between the checkout operator and shopper. Gloves, hand-washing, etc at any food pick-up place I've seen.

I don't favour our current leaders at either state or national level, but since Morrison's Hillsong weekend, he's barely put a foot wrong. Senior politicians have been serious and escalated restrictions as appropriate (ignoring Ruby Princess). I'm sure there are more serious levels of lock down, but it's been part of the response in Australia.

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#339

Post by aylmao » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 6:57 AM UTC

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #321

aylmao wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All those need the supply lines and critical infrastructure to stay functioning, which they can be even if the rest of the "economy" isn't. What's needed is money for households to pay for them, which is the biggest concern at the moment, but which can technically be solved by giving households a cheque.

Many of the things currently shut down are part of supply lines and critical infrastructure in the long term. Eventually we're gonna have to print books and build cars.

Books and cars are not ideal examples to pick in my opinion, in the case of books because they're easily substituted by electronic media. In the case of cars because all car manufacturing in the US involves imported parts [1][2], so that industry largely depends on other countries' sheltering policies. Also because both are very durable. I have tomes from the 80s, and a friend of mine just sold his van from 1995 haha.

I get the point though, and it's a fair one, but the "eventually" is important to consider here. Eventually when? No one is arguing in favor of permanent sheltering, Implying that the only option is to reactivate the whole economy "soon", knowing that there could be adverse health consequences isn't giving the alternative options, some of which might be better for public well-being, the consideration they deserve.

[1]: https://money.cnn.com/2018/07/02/news/companies/auto-tariffs... [2]: https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.dot.gov/files/documents/20...

Re: California’s Roadmap to Modify the Stay-at-Home Order [pdf]

#340

Post by tomerico » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 7:45 AM UTC

prawn wrote: post #338

tomerico wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What bothers me the most is that the comparison is always against a hypothetical "do nothing" strategy, ignoring the fact that different countries have employed different strategies, some of them have been highly successful in containing the disease without any lock down (Korea, Taiwan, and Australia) come to mind.

"some of them have been highly successful in containing the disease without any lock down (Korea, Taiwan, and Australia) come to mind." How are you defining lock down here? I live in Australia and most people I know have been working from home for weeks and have had kids out of school during that time. All restaurants have been closed for a while now. There are stops/checks at border entry points between states, even…

I wish this was the situation here. The limitations in most of Europe and united states are much much harsher, including no schools and mandatory closure of all non-essential business.