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News Coronavirus Pandemic Information and Support Group

@crookeddy Please don't post figures from dubious sources. Have a look at the WHO's worldwide statistics instead. They are reliable.
Their figures for today:
These are the figures for
1) a country where the virus propably has spread for some time without detection. (10.13%)
2) a country where it just starts (and which might have reacted late) (1.45%)
3) a country that started isolation 9 days ago. (0.60%)
All rounded to 2nd digit.

I'd say those figures speak for themselves. Now, please, try to pull yourself together. The thing both you and everyone else need most now is composure.
You panicking helps nobody, yourself the least. Don't make the work of the medical staff even harder than it already is. Try to control your fears and think of those who are actually facing that virus every day, using all their strength and knowledge to protect you and your family. Think of a way to help them, rather than hampering them by spreading disinformation.

That you are scared it is perfectly natural and nothing to be ashamed of. But that's where we come into play: on TrekBBS there are people online 24/7. Talk to us! Give us a chance to help you. You have the world's largest assortent of therapeuts a mouseclick away. Make use of that. Act, instead of just reacting, that is the best remedy against the fear (suffering from panic attacs I know what I'm talking about).
Please feel free to PM me if you need a little pep talk or if you are curious to learn what day 9 of nation-wide quarantine feels like. My time zone is UTC+1, so a reply might take a few hours but there will definitely be one.
Which post of mine did you quantify as "disinformation"? My sources are sound (cnn, john hopkins, etc) while that WHO statistics site is outdated. I am also not clear as to what point you're making about Italy.
 
Any theories on how the USA has 100k+ cases while Australia only has ~4,000? Perhaps there is something to seasonality after all?
 
Based on what I am reading online, GB has had one of the worst responses to the pandemic in the whole first world so far? Would that be accurate based on what you're seeing and reading about other places?

The USA has been doing pretty bad overall, but some states have stepped up. California locked down pretty early, so I am hopeful we might flatten the curve faster than New York has...

The lockdown has not been as harsh and with much lesser penalties for rulebreakers. I think this should have maybe happened a week before it did, but then you could argue that all flights from China should have been grounded months ago and they weren't. The world hasn't been prepared for this full stop. Certain governments have responded in some ways better than others and some worse. I don't think anyone expected this.

One thing I won't knock the UK government for is the financial rescue they've provided. Had they not done this I would have already lost my job and be looking at losing my house in the next couple of months.
 
Or they have like less than a 10% of the people, & aren't nearly as heavily trafficked by international travel? :shrug:
I guess we'll have to wait until Austalia is in winter and USA in summer to compare, but hopefully by then social distancing measures will be in play.
 
So this pretty much confirms that lockdowns don't work, right? This nightmare just has no ending!

You see a number and assume "it's not working" when in reality the answer is "this is bad, but if we did nothing it would be far worse". A lockdown literally can't "not work". Even if only half the people obey it, that's still taking half the potential infected off the board for a period of time. That's half as many people we have to find doctors, beds and equipment for. Sure, the system might still be overwhelmed by the half that's not quarantining, but it could be worse.

This is easily the biggest thing since 911, it's obviously an apples to oranges comparison but the sheer scale of what's happening and the effects on everyday life is absolutely insane. It still doesn't seem real.

This is far bigger than 9/11 in terms of scale and effect on life. We'll see if it has the cultural impact. People lost their got-damned minds after 9/11. We're still living with the aftermath of that.

Any theories on how the USA has 100k+ cases while Australia only has ~4,000? Perhaps there is something to seasonality after all?

Case numbers are still not reliable. It's still more accurate to take the death count, divide that by mortality rate, then project it out 3 weeks (since people dead now were infected (on average) 3 weeks ago. You're going to get an answer in the 7 figure range. Ultimately, though, that number isn't relevant anymore. This thing has escaped all hope of containment.

Hell, someone in my household has all but one of the symptoms, was told by two doctors she probably has COVID. She was told to not bother with a test, because unless you're dying they really don't have the bandwidth to care right now. I'd probably test positive myself, but I am so far asymptomatic aside from light fatigue which might also be due to me cutting back on my caffeine intake.
 
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I was actually stunned at how sensible the UK economic response was. I'm used to thinking of conservatives as crazy free-market ideologues, I guess.
Yes under Thatcher, they were. But Boris Johnson is a populist. Different kind of politican altogether.
 
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And under Heath the Tories were largely supportive of a large nationalized sector of the economy and didn't push privatization. Ted Heath was in some ways even more radical than Harold Wilson when it came to government intervention in the economy and using the power of the state to push industrial production.
 
Which post of mine did you quantify as "disinformation"?
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/this-is-very-important-from-italy-please-read
Italy's apocalyptic death toll is actually grossly underreported.
^that one. Such a lurid headline is always an alarm sign. No reliable source would use a phrase only too familiar to us from gazillions of scam mails.

Mojochi said:
Or they have like less than a 10% of the people, & aren't nearly as heavily trafficked by international travel? :shrug:
I guess we'll have to wait until Austalia is in winter and USA in summer to compare, but hopefully by then social distancing measures will be in play.
I fail to see how Australia might be as densely populated as the US in a different season. Tourism isn't that extreme in Australia that in Winter there are as many guests there to push the population to a level comparing to the US. According to Mojochi's figures that'd require more than 9 tourists to one Aussie, and all at the same time.

However, with mentioning a possible seasonality you are making a very important and interesting point. And according to a somewhat careful statement by the German Ministery for Health, statistic analysis and observation of the virus' spreading patterns seem to show (seem, as it's only a theory and not yet prooved) that the virus appears to prefer a colder climate and to not be fond of a high air moisture. That would account for it not being so violent in tropical Asia and South America.
Personally - and that's really only my personal view as a biologist - I don't quite trust this evaluation since Italy is a narrow country with a long coast and thus a comparatively moist air.
I am more comfortable (still with some scepticism) with the theory that the raising UV levels in Summer might kill it off. This estimation is based on the fact that this virus is closely related to the "SARS" virus* we had a few years ago and which proved to be very sensitive to UV radiation and die within an hour exposition.

However, this new virus is very prone to mutations and under stress it might play that card. We have no choice but to wait and see.

For those who would like to read the scientific studies made so far: the topmost desease management in Germany has published a literature list on their info site for scientists:
https://www.rki.de/DE/Content/InfAZ/N/Neuartiges_Coronavirus/Steckbrief.html#doc13776792bodyText23

For lay persons, I recommend their daily report in English. The figures cover only Germany but there is a lot of backgroud info on the virus and a list of most endangered countries worldwide (including single US states).
https://www.rki.de/DE/Content/InfAZ...us/Situationsberichte/Gesamt.html?nn=13490888
The report is in pdf-format and an update is published every day.

-----------------------------------------
*SARS-Virus = SARS-CoV-1
current Virus = SARS-CoV-2
Their relation (phylogenetic tree) is visualised here: https://nextstrain.org/groups/blab/sars-like-cov?c=host
 
My point about Australia in winter and USA in summer is that it'll be interesting if Australia's outbreak picks up in cold weather and the USA's slows down. Thing is we'll be so deep into this thing by then that social distancing will probably be the main factor, and not the weather.
 
So one thing I don't understand are the low recovery numbers everyone but China has... I thought 80% of cases were mild and people recover in 2 weeks or less? Is that actually not the case?
 
So one thing I don't understand are the low recovery numbers everyone but China has... I thought 80% of cases were mild and people recover in 2 weeks or less? Is that actually not the case?
It probably takes longer to count the recovered people. It's at least 2 weeks to clear this from your system, then testing negative has its own time delay, and then getting the information out takes time too. I'd guess about 1 month lag, maybe more. There are likely very many people who got this, then recovered and then went on with their lives, and never went near a hospital or any other place where they could be counted.
 
I guess I shouldn't be too surprised that people can be total dicks in all this, but a McDonald's Employee in Canada was arrested and brought up on fraud charges for, get this... faking a doctor's note saying they had Covid-19. That's beyond awful :( As a result, the location had to close and they had to sanitize everything and they told all employees to go home and stay in isolation. WTF is wrong with people?!

https://nationalpost.com/news/covid...e-used-fake-doctors-note-saying-she-had-virus

In other news, the Ontario Government has now restricted gatherings to a maximum of 5 people.
 
I'm always hearing about masks... should we wear them, shouldn't we, etc... Hey, wear whatever makes you happy, but unless it's a sealed validated filter, it's not really protecting you much. Better than nothing? Yeah maybe, but that is what the social distancing is about. Don't be in prolonged close proximity with others, where you might share their expellants.

What I don't hear about much is gloves. Contact protocol people. That's the ticket. The primary transmission method is surface to hand & then hand to face/soft tissues. I'm wearing rubber gloves whenever I leave my home for somewhere else now. If I handle a lot of foreign surfaces, I might wash or sanitize my gloved hands before I handle any of my own things (Wallet, keys, car surfaces etc...) & then I might even sanitize those things after the fact. Then, when I get home again, discard gloves, wash hands, & I'm good until I leave again
 
Word on Twitter is that Italy and France, along with the United States are underreporting the death toll by a factor of approximately 4. If true, we really are facing a cataclysm of epic proportions.
 
I was actually stunned at how sensible the UK economic response was. I'm used to thinking of conservatives as crazy free-market ideologues, I guess.

They are but even they understand if you don't have a population you can't have a society, economy or a country.....and i hope after we get through this the NHS is put into a safe reserved zone and out of politicians hands for good, it needs to be a walled service that is treated with a bit more respect than it has been over many years.
 
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