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Day 71: COVID-19 How Is Your Epidemic Going?
US may be #1 in active cases, but Italy and Spain continue to contend with outbreaks that (except for the NY metropolitan area) is not a reality for this country.
Things at Casa Rodin today are pretty much as they were yesterday, the day before…. We did get a call from one of our medical providers. Mrs. Rodin’s mother had a follow-on appointment from a couple of months back coming up in a week. That office has cut back their office hours and so we moved her appointment up to earlier in the day. That particular office had a “last minute” appointment cancellation charge that they started waiving when the COVID-19 virus hit California. They sent out a note that they would be happier for people to cancel last minute than show up sick.
I had thought I might provide some links today to a series of videos by Matt Galat, an American from Michigan originally, who is living in China with his Chinese wife and three-year-old daughter. I went through the videos this morning. Matt and his family flew to the US from China on February 1, self-quarantined for 14 days in Chicago, then went to his family in Michigan. When COVID-19 got to Michigan mid-March they decided that things were really going to get bad in America given its lack of aggressive action (like the Chinese took) to prevent spread. They flew back to China and are still in their 14-day quarantine until April 2. The videos document their last meal with their family in Michigan, their departure from O’Hare International in Chicago, their 20+ hour layover in Hong Kong, their arrival in Shanghai and busing to Ningbo where they reside permanently, and their quarantine in a hotel in Ningbo.
As you take the journey with them back to China and into quarantine you watch the steps they take to protect themselves from infection on the return journey, because if you get infected then things get really difficult. You see the measures taken at the US airport, the Hong Kong airport, and the Shanghai airport. In Shanghai, the airport workers are swathed in the hazmat gear. Arriving passengers are sorted and sorted over again as they are controlled to their destinations. The bus from Shanghai to Ningbo has the driver sealed off from the passengers. The quarantine hotel for foreigners (that Matt and his family are in) is better than the quarantine hotels that Chinese nationals are quartered in. Matt is in one room and his wife and daughter are another room. (All adults are quarantined separately, except if they have a child or elderly person for whom they provide care that person will be with one of the adults.) They communicate via video chats. The rooms they are in have no HVAC to avoid any spread of contamination between rooms. Their room keys are useable once to get access to their room and afterward if they leave and close the door they cannot get back in. Staff arrives and knocks on doors to take daily swabs for testing, checking for fever, and bringing food.
Because Matt and his wife have her family in Ningbo they are receiving food from her family rather than purchasing the domestic or foreign fare offered by the hotel. They are paying $42/day for each room during their quarantine. Earlier, the government picked up the tab. Then just before Matt and his family returned to China the rules changed so that the individual pays for their quarantine. During Matt’s quarantine, China changed its access policy to exclude all foreigners and only permit returning Chinese to enter the country.
Matt, as you can tell from the family decision to return to China, feels that the government’s actions are appropriate and necessary. He has lived there for several years and seems content living within the system. Whether you agree or disagree with his thinking and motivations the videos do give you a more personal insight into what people are experiencing elsewhere.
If you want to watch these videos, you can find them here. Currently, I am looking for other videos from expatriates living in China because, as I said in the post yesterday entitled China “after” COVID-19, this may at least in part reflect how we will be living our lives for awhile — the precautions we will be taking for public health.
I am awaiting President Trump’s daily briefing to hopefully hear the data and thinking behind deferring the “reopening” until May. Our county order closing businesses was supposed to end April 7 until the Governor issued an indefinite order for the entire state. It is reported that the county order will be extended to May 1. County stats: 187 confirmed cases, 3 deaths, unknown infected.
[Note: Links to all my COVID-19 posts can be found here.]
Published in General
Our family doctor sent out multiple communications today that they are going to schedule appointments with patients through video; the whole Advent Health System will be following this process. It sounds like that will work, except if people need to get lab tests done; I suspect they will send us to a nearby lab for those. All in all, it will save us lots of driving time!
Thanks for the update, Rodin.
I still don’t see any basis for predicting or scheduling a “reopening” in May, or at any other time. What is supposed to change between now and then? Yeah, we will be able to gear up production of medical supplies and equip some additional hospital beds (although staffing those beds may be another matter). And it is possible, but by no means certain, that warmer summer weather may slow the infection rate. But until we have an effective vaccine in widespread use (if that is even possible), I just don’t see an endgame to this quarantine strategy. Does the President? Does anyone?
Yes, I see it. The quarantine strategy can end when the progress of the disease leaves the exponential realm and begins to asymptotically approach some temporary abatement (no new cases.) Don’t despair just because reality is complicated and unpleasant.
Of course, an ill-prepared but intelligent interlocutor would respond “But you must consider the economic cost too! Your analysis is one-sided, you nascent totalitarian!”
So I’ll wearily reply in advance: Sorry, but the quarantine conclusion does consider, and is in fact driven primarily by, the economic cost.
So yes, the President and everyone 1) who can do the math, and 2) who’s hair isn’t on fire and 3) isn’t paid to spread confusion (there are plenty of those) does see the endgame.
Interesting story from UT Austin. It seems 1/3rd of spring breakers in Cabo caught the Wuhan flu. All were tested 4 of the 28 who were positive had no symptoms.
Also interesting that all 8,000 residents of Telluride, CO will be tested for C19 antibodies. That should be informative. In related news there is some town in Germany (can’t remember where) that will give out certificates to the those with antibodies, so they can return to normalcy.
Lastly, a prediction. Mayors in big cities will start requiring people to wear masks when shopping.
And why would it do that? Is the virus going to decide to be less infectious? Are we supposed to reason with it, or something? Even if there had been some kind of fall off in new cases because of the quarantine (and it doesn’t seem that there has – at least not in hot spots like NY), as soon as you stop the quarantines the infection rates will go right back to where they were. Unless something has changed. And I don’t see that anything has.
Well, if you want to go out and find yourself an ill-prepared but intelligent interlocutor you can have that discussion.
DonG: “Interesting story from UT Austin. It seems 1/3rd of spring breakers in Cabo caught the Wuhan flu.”
But…But…..But …Mexico on the Worldometer has only reported like 1000 cases in a country of over 60 million. Perhaps testing and treatment is not going very well across the border or as well as has been claimed. I am so shocked the Mexican government would do such a thing and lie about their cases after being so forthright about so many other things like the Cartel and such! This news also may blow all to hell the theory that hot weather discourages the spread of the virus. Oh Well!
Relax. We will surge hospital space to get past this first bulge. We will develop treatments and they will shorten hospital stays. We will continue to improve testing until everyone is checked and we really do know with what virulence it spreads, hospitalizes, and kills. That knowledge will let us target our quarantines and best apply our resources. Warm weather will probably help slow the spread while we catch our breath.
Sorry you had to shed the blankie of warm certainty, babies. The one thing that I can guarantee you is false is that things will stay the way the are right now.
I am not trying to be difficult, but I am with @larry3435 here. If people start to interact again, they spread the disease again. I guess we might know who has had the disease? I just don’t see what “temporary abatement” accomplishes. I mean… again… Maybe I just don’t understand the strategy.
To buy time. Good things will happen too, but if we crash the system with cases then things go bad. Not just bad like a lot of cases, but bad like social breakdown – trash piles up, grocery shelves really do empty, water and sewer go off, and people go off too. That state puts off all the good things we can make like treatments and vaccines.
The strategy is to buy time and limit the contagion all we can. That strategy has worked since men lived in villages.
so our mortality rate is….0.0020151020705174?
I am hearing/reading (sorry no link) that NYC started using the hydroxychloroquine/Z pak treatment regime and the situation has changed radically in the last 24 hours.
I figure it’s going better than a lot of people expected, mostly because we haven’t heard one single word on the subject since they started testing HCQ+Z on a wider scale.
…although there’s a few comments about “the curve is flattening suddenly” with no explanation offered…
<blockquote cite=”comment-4742037″><strong><a title=”View comment in context.” href=”http://ricochet.com/737888/day-71-covid-19-how-is-your-epidemic-going/#comment-4742037″>Barfly <small>(View Comment)</small></a></strong>:<br /><p>Relax. We will surge hospital space to get past this first bulge. We will develop treatments and they will shorten hospital stays. We will continue to improve testing until everyone is checked and we really do know with what virulence it spreads, hospitalizes, and kills. That knowledge will let us target our quarantines and best apply our resources. Warm weather will probably help slow the spread while we catch our breath.</p><p>Sorry you had to shed the blankie of warm certainty, babies. The one thing that I can guarantee you is false is that things will stay the way the are right now.</p></blockquote><p>Geeze, what a condescending, insufferable [redacted] you are. </p>
With a working antibody test, I think we’re going to find out whether the Imperial Model or the Oxford Model is correct. Should be enlightening.
https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-blood-test-antibodies.html
I have been tracking the death count in Los Angeles, California and New York.
High death counts in certain counties are probably a reflection of ICU bed shortage and refusal to use hydroxychloroquine.
As soon as Trump announced the FDA approved malaria drugs for emergency/compassionate use, every anti-Trumper became an armchair clinical trial biostatistician.
I read a week ago, about how Cuomo ordered the mass implementation of the anti malarial drug.
Where have you heard or read this?
• “High death counts in certain counties are probably a reflection of ICU bed shortage and refusal to use hydroxychloroquine.”
• ” I am hearing/reading (sorry no link) that NYC started using the hydroxychloroquine/Z pak treatment regime and the situation has changed radically in the last 24 hours.”
But….but….but….so many “knowledgeable sources” in the media, Dr. Fauci, the FDA, the CDC, the NIH, and even here at Ricochet warned us about trying this “unproven” drug that had only a 100% success rate in a clinical trial by an eminent lab in France. Yes, I think we need to wait a few more months to wait to see if all the results are all in for all the clinical trials before moving ahead with this “unproven” treatment that has only been successful anecdotally , I mean reputable people in the Medical Industry’s reputation and livelihood are at stake here. These reports of success can’t be trusted. We must believe only the right ‘authorized” sources. So what if thousands die, reputations are at stake!
I wasn’t being contrary just to be contrary… If there really are reports of this working in NY I’d be thrilled. But from what I saw, today was a bit worse than yesterday.
Got some bad news for you Barfly. That strategy has not “worked” since men lived in villages. The strategy that has “worked” for infectious diseases is that the disease rips through the population until the most vulnerable have died and most of the rest of the population has been infected and developed immunity. After that, the herd immunity slows the rate of infection in the future. Just kicking the can down the road does not, by itself, solve the problem.
If the chloroquine drugs or some other treatment can lower the mortality rate, I will be thrilled. And buying time will allow us to stockpile those drugs, which is good. But nothing is going to lower the transmission rate until we have a vaccine. On the other hand, these are (as they say) trying times. So if the “don’t worry, be happy” approach is working for you, feel free.
Can’t remember but we should know in a couple of days. Of course, it would be bad news for the media so it might be hard to find at first.
I dislike this argument, because it’s simply not true. Yes, the media sensationalizes. But guess what? They are also people, and they are just as scared about this virus as anyone else. All those liberals we hate (full disclosure, I’m very conservative, and I work in a liberal field, with lots of liberal friends/coworkers) are still people, however misguided, and they have loved-ones they don’t want to die. It’s just stupid to suggest that they’re all rooting for maximum damage just to harm Trump. They’re not. People who hate Trump or conservatives will spin this regardless of what happens, but at the end of the day, people want to get back to work, and they want to stop being scared to go out of their homes. If there is a treatment that works, it will be very loudly proclaimed. If treatment in NY is actually working, we’re going to hear about it first from all the doctors and nurses and family members of recovered patients. This is one instance where the cynicism and partisanship of mainstream media is simply not controlling.
On 3/14, there were 524 cases in NY STATE and the STATE had its first death.
Today, NYC’s death toll hit 1139. We’ve had more than 500 deaths nationwide in the less than 24 hours since @Rodin put up the OP.
Though Aesop puts it more pungently than the CoC permits, his point is pungent enough:
Where have people been warning about that on Ricochet?
It’s not good for self-medication as it has side effects and it is does not prevent the disease, but we are seeing pretty good results when it is used to stop the disease from progressing. And I believe the FDA cleared it for investigational use. That means use it and gather more data. Doctors can prescribe it off-label.
Anecdotal reports / experimental treatment -> journal article -> investigational use -> clinical trials -> FDA red tape -> approved indication
All throughout the process, doctors can use the medication off-label, except for moronic states that banned it because orangemanbad.
If a hospital is ‘overwhelmed’, why not give hydroxychloroquine to patients in the waiting room or deliver to their homes?
Is lack of hydroxychloroquine use one reason for the spike in NYC, Italy and Spain?
I’m guessing Yes
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/michigan-democrat-governor-begs-feds-hydroxychloroquine-just-days-after-threatening
https://summit.news/2020/03/31/adviser-to-trump-warns-if-dems-win-in-november-theyre-going-to-crush-fox-news/
Speaking privately to Summit, the host was responding to news that fellow Fox commentator Laura Ingraham had been forced under threat of suspension to delete a tweet about the drug Hydroxychloroquine being a potential cure for coronavirus.
“Lenox Hill in New York among many hospitals already using Hydroxychloroquine with very promising results,” Ingraham tweeted on March 20. “One patient was described as ‘Lazarus’ who was seriously ill from Covid-19, already released.”
Ten days later, Twitter forced Ingraham to delete the tweet under threat of suspension, despite the fact that Hydroxychloroquine has been approved by the FDA and has proven successful at treating COVID-19 in several studies.