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Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

newyorker.com

51–60 of 169 posts

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#51
it's more or less unforgiveable that our american healthcare workers don't have the PPE they need to protect themselves. attrition among our healthcare workers is going to be very high, especially because unlike singapore, we use the most inefficient quarantine guidelines when we suspect that they have been exposed.

people are sewing masks to make up the difference between what is needed and what we can supply. the federal government can't seem to supply the states with much of anything. and purchasing domestically-produced masks is becoming rapaciously expensive, with some manufacturers charging $7 per mask. allegedly our domestic manufacturers are ramping up production. but let's face it, that takes time. and we don't have time, because once one of our healthcare workers gets sick, they're out of commission for weeks.

i will not abide by this disaster for our heathcare workers. i am working with an established charity to raise money to purchase thousands of n95 respirator masks from chinese manufacturers so that those masks can be shipped and donated directly to hospitals in epicenters like new york.

i'm calling it the million mask campaign because i hope that we can eventually donate at least a million masks to hospitals in need. in reality, we will need many millions of masks if we want to protect our healthcare workers, but everything we can bring to bear on their behalf will be beneficial.

please consider contributing to our campaign: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-million-mask-campaign?utm_sou...

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#52
post #7

The shameful lies about masks not working for civilians will kill thousands. Evidence based medicine (over the modern Bayesian Science-based medicine) has paralyzed our health officials from making common sense calls off priors. Homemade masks appear to be reasonably effective. The official response should be to make some form of improvised mask required when out of home, and ration regular mask for health care worke…

You can’t reduce the basic reproduction number (R0) of a pathogen. You can reduce doubling time and similar metrics of the actual spread, but R0 is a fixed number. What you are referring to is the effective reproduction number, which is the rate of spread in a population at it’s current state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

Huh?

"R0 is not a biological constant for a pathogen as it is also affected by other factors such as environmental conditions and the behaviour of the infected population."

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#53
post #7

The shameful lies about masks not working for civilians will kill thousands. Evidence based medicine (over the modern Bayesian Science-based medicine) has paralyzed our health officials from making common sense calls off priors. Homemade masks appear to be reasonably effective. The official response should be to make some form of improvised mask required when out of home, and ration regular mask for health care worke…

For reference, the government of Czech Republic made masks (of any type, including self made or even scarfes) mandatory while out of home. This has been in force for a few days & is actively enforced wit a couple people already getting hefty fines.

IMHO this is a really good idea, especially because people who are infected and dont know that yet are less likley to infect others. How good the mas is at protecting you is pretty much secondary concern at this point in time.

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#54
post #7

The shameful lies about masks not working for civilians will kill thousands. Evidence based medicine (over the modern Bayesian Science-based medicine) has paralyzed our health officials from making common sense calls off priors. Homemade masks appear to be reasonably effective. The official response should be to make some form of improvised mask required when out of home, and ration regular mask for health care worke…

You can’t reduce the basic reproduction number (R0) of a pathogen. You can reduce doubling time and similar metrics of the actual spread, but R0 is a fixed number. What you are referring to is the effective reproduction number, which is the rate of spread in a population at it’s current state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

Change in behavior can change basic reproduction number. That is what happened with SARS. Making basic reproduction number smaller is whole point of those curfew laws and of closing shops we now have. It is also the point of washing hands often and keeping distance.

It is defined as "expected number of cases directly generated by one case in a population where all individuals are susceptible to infection". And that is possible to influence by behavior. If no one even meets anybody, no sick person can generate next case. If people live in over-crowded houses, one person will infect many more.

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#55
post #28
post #4

Can we all agree that outsourcing the production of critical medical supplies to China over recent decades was a bad idea? I understand the “golden arches” theory, and the intent if globalism, but I feel that COVID19 has revealed what a short sighted, deeply flawed view the globalists have.

I would argue the opposite is the case. The disease affects basically all countries, so what matters is the global supply of these goods. So we are better off if countries can specialize on their respective competitive advantages. In the scenario you propose, every country would have their own very inefficient mask industry which would now be just as or even more overwhelmed.

The problem is that each individual country will (reasonably!) not allow critical medical supplies to be exported during a crisis. It worked out mostly okay this time, because the countries with large domestic mask production all got their crisis under control before the rest of the world got it. If the next pandemic happens in China and the US simultaneously, we're not going to have any masks at all.

And note that "mostly okay" here doesn't mean we have anywhere close to enough masks. Just that, with extreme rationing, we can ensure most but not all doctors have the absolute bare minimum of protective gear.

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#56
post #7

The shameful lies about masks not working for civilians will kill thousands. Evidence based medicine (over the modern Bayesian Science-based medicine) has paralyzed our health officials from making common sense calls off priors. Homemade masks appear to be reasonably effective. The official response should be to make some form of improvised mask required when out of home, and ration regular mask for health care worke…

You can’t reduce the basic reproduction number (R0) of a pathogen. You can reduce doubling time and similar metrics of the actual spread, but R0 is a fixed number. What you are referring to is the effective reproduction number, which is the rate of spread in a population at it’s current state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

Read the first sentence of the second paragraph.

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#57
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the parent's point was that we ignore evidence but that in the absence of evidence (as opposed to evidence suggesting the contrary), we should use priors to guide what we do. In this case, while there are no double blind randomised studies that suggest that widespread mask use reduces R0, priors tell us that masks use protect against infection in other settings. If we were to weigh the priors, the exist…

How can you rule out the possibility that mask use has a net negative effect so easily?

Also, how does "what we know" make this unlikely?

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#58

China has half the world’s manufacturing ability, a civil service selected strongly for cognitive ability, a much more diligent and capable people, and a large population. Not to mention experience in pandemics of this type. China will become zeroth world shortly. We will have to get used to them surpassing us.

There is no evidence the average Chinese person is "much more capable" than the average American. And the Chinese were evidently not "diligent" enough to shut down wet markets despite years of repeated warnings from epidemiologists, nor were these civil servants forthright enough about what was happening fast enough to prevent spreading this illness to other countries.

Stereotypes in either direction are dangerous, unfounded, and unproductive.

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#59
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How widespread is widespread? Japan, South Korea, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan… these are countries in which people wear masks in large numbers on a normal day. They all still have an R0 above 1.

Does Japan? Last I saw, they had an inexplicably low curve. Despite not really testing or doing other measures.

I think the reason it's inexplicably low is that they haven't really been testing.

Re: Keeping the coronavirus from infecting healthcare workers

#60

China has half the world’s manufacturing ability, a civil service selected strongly for cognitive ability, a much more diligent and capable people, and a large population. Not to mention experience in pandemics of this type. China will become zeroth world shortly. We will have to get used to them surpassing us.

There is no evidence the average Chinese person is "much more capable" than the average American. And the Chinese were evidently not "diligent" enough to shut down wet markets despite years of repeated warnings from epidemiologists, nor were these civil servants forthright enough about what was happening fast enough to prevent spreading this illness to other countries. Stereotypes in either direction are dangerous, u…

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