Covid19

[thollandpe]

Leftover from my cut and paste to the political thread, my apologies.

[David Tollefson]

Washington state has closed all K-12 schools state-wide until April 24th, and has expanded the 3-county ban on any gathering of 250 or more to the entire state for the same period.

[vertical_doug]

Washington state has closed all K-12 schools state-wide until April 24th, and has expanded the 3-county ban on any gathering of 250 or more to the entire state for the same period.

I always thought the schools needed to this more for the faculty who are probably at higher risk, than the pupils both for K-12 and particularly colleges.

[WFSTEKL]

I always thought the schools needed to this more for the faculty who are probably at higher risk, than the pupils both for K-12 and particularly colleges.

Protecting faculty is certainly a part of the decision making process. It is also an inconvenience to have prospective students who visit campus for a college tour trip over body bags.

[Too Tall]

I need a little Jonathan Winter or Soupy Sales right about now.

[crumpton]

I need a little Jonathan Winter or Soupy Sales right about now.

How about some Edgar Winter?

[jclay]

If you go here: Operations Dashboard for ArcGIS

Click the full screen icon for the graphic in the lower right and look at the "other" curve - one curve is for China, one of the two remaining for everybody else. Italy and Iran are doing a lot to drive that curve right now but we're in it too and it's definitely not the characteristic shape you want to see.

You can see that China has managed to pretty much halt the new confirmed case growth rate. Since they've been doing a lot of testing, and not just of suspected cases, their "confirmed" case count should be much closer to the "actual" than it is for countries that haven't been; like us. Their attenuation of contagion growth has been accomplished via Herculean efforts at quarantine and isolation that I can't imagine here at anything even remotely like that scale.

On Coronavirus: Why You Must Act Now - Tomas Pueyo - Medium

If you look at Chart 7 you can see that on Jan 21, ~100 cases had been confirmed (orange bars) but there were actually ~100 cases about two weeks prior, around Jan 8 (blue bars). In reality there were over 1,500 cases on Jan 21; what is show though is the number of confirmed cases; but what seems likely in the US is that the ratio of known to unknown infections is a fraction of the ratio that it was in China once they got serious about response. If that's the case, and based on the estimated rate of doubling explained later in the text, then the actual number of infections in the US should be far larger than the person in the street realizes and the rate of growth will be increasing exponentially unless we can seriously hinder it. Thankfully I'm starting to see some movement in that direction; nothing at all like China's,but...something.

The next two or three weeks are going to add a lot of clarity to whatever the actual situation is.

[vertical_doug]

John,

At the end of the day, people either behave responsibly or not. While the President has not admitted he made a mistake (I think he is incapable of that) at least they are now admitting this is more dangerous than the flu. So instead of people not taking self-isolation seriously, maybe more will. Once a society does that, the growth in new infections can decay quickly (21 days) with a long tail.

I really applaud the NBA for postponing the season after Rudy Gobert tested positive. Now add TV showing the clip of him being an idiot and touching all the audio mikes at the press conference not being afraid of the disease a few days before, and you have the perfect poster child of irresponsibility (I wonder if Rudy is a flat earther). NCAA follows after Duke and Kansas suspend all sports. I think Trump really could no longer deny, and had to lead from behind.

I can see US being in a good place by Easter. The risk then will be complacency too soon. Even now, China still has a long tail of new infections which is why they are not back to normal 8 weeks after going hard contain.

[Rich Beaudoin]

My employer sent company-wide email today saying in-person customer meetings are banned until further notice.
As a remote employee whose role is to meet with customers, I am in a holding pattern.
Virtually all of my competitors are doing the same.
If this goes for more than a few months, will layoffs be needed?

[sk_tle]

My employer sent company-wide email today saying in-person customer meetings are banned until further notice.
As a remote employee whose role is to meet with customers, I am in a holding pattern.
Virtually all of my competitors are doing the same.
If this goes for more than a few months, will layoffs be needed?

Well I know it is not as humane and friendly and all but in those time I guess you can "meet" your customers through video conferencing no ?

I'm more concerned for small trade/shops, restaurants, bars employees and owners who will face 0 income during the lockdown.

[acorn]

I’m afraid to go for a ride. I’m afraid to really exert my lungs. I know that it’s been said that if you practice social distancing and stay far away from others, then your risk of getting the virus is minimal. That still doesn’t comfort me because there’s so much that we don’t know about this virus. I’m afraid to go ride and start breathing heavily. That’s when you’re just inhaling everything around you.

Even if it’s a low risk that I get the corona virus, it would be disastrous for my family. I am relatively healthy, but my parents are elderly. If I get the corona virus I might get minimal symptoms, but if I transmit the virus to my parents... that could be fatal! That’s why I’m scared to just go outside for a simple bike ride.

[Too Tall]

Acorn, my unqualified advice to you is ride your d@mn bike. As a caregiver you have a responsibility to be available for support. Your mental and physical well being are important. That said, riding your bicycle outside in the fresh air is (very) low risk.

On the other hand, I'm not going to heated Yoga today and it's killin' me.

The Atlantic has a light read on this. More of a thought piece than real data, which I adore (swoon) :
What Does ‘Social Distancing’ Mean? - The Atlantic

[Lionel]

I did a group ride this morning in France. It was fully attended (40+). I did practice social distancing on the climbs though. We also stop for a coffee and the place was packed inside, saw many people kissing on the cheek. Bottom line I am not sure people are taking this seriously here. At least not yet. I can see how we are heading into an Italian type lock out pretty soon. It seems like mountain biking is probably a better way to go these days.

[cny rider]

Well I know it is not as humane and friendly and all but in those time I guess you can "meet" your customers through video conferencing no ?

I'm more concerned for small trade/shops, restaurants, bars employees and owners who will face 0 income during the lockdown.

We went and had dinner at our local brew-pub last night because we were worried they would have no business.
We were pleasantly surprised to see the number of people that came out to support them.
I think it's important to support local businesses while still being reasonably cautious.

[KonaSS]

Looking for advice from the hive. Family supposed to go on Spring Break beginning this coming Wednesday to Hollywood Florida (which by the way has the highest number of cases in FL as of this morning) for 1 week.

This would be my wife and I and 2 teenage girls. Taking a domestic flight to Fort Lauderdale and staying in an Airbnb high rise condo unit. Our plans for the week were really to hang out on the beach, probably go out to eat once per day, make some meals in the condo, and maybe do 1 or 2 other tourist activities during the week.

My lovely wife works really hard, loves the beach, hates the winter and has been looking forward to this vacation for some time. She deserves it.

I don't think it is a good idea to go and am ready to cancel. Besides the risk of infection that we would be putting ourselves in and the greater public good of social distancing, I worry about what could happen as the situation escalates during the week we are there. I don't want to be quarantined in some high rise condo for a couple of weeks, or have domestic flights shut down (although we could always drive back home to IL).

But I am not really a sit on the beach for a week type of person. I go on this vacation for my family, and try my best to keep myself occupied for a week. So I worry that I am biased in this decision on whether to go or not.

As far as I have seen, no official sources has recommended that you suspend domestic travel. But please share any official, non-biased recommendations that you have seen to help my family make the appropriate decision in regards to this trip.

[SlowPokePete]

I love the beach.

I would not go...would definitely be more interested if it didn't involve a plane ride/airport.

Or an Air BnB for that matter...

Must be something else you can do for a week...jump in the car and go camping?

SPP

[Bobonli]

....
As far as I have seen, no official sources has recommended that you suspend domestic travel. But please share any official, non-biased recommendations that you have seen to help my family make the appropriate decision in regards to this trip.

It’s just a matter of time before that happens. It probably should have been imposed already. What if it’s imposed while your vacationing?
The risk is you get exposed and get sick. The benefit is a vacation. Can you do a stay-cation and issue a rain check for the trip?
I work in healthcare so maybe my perspective is unique but I see things escalating minute by minute. We’re now at everyone should wear a mask all the time even if you’re running the laundry machine. That’s a dramatic change from ‘you don’t need a mask’
Other than going for a hike or ride, I’m limiting my contact with the rest of society. Ordering take out rather than entering the restaurant, no play dates for the kids etc. I believe we still dont understand the complete scope of this virus and how it’s attacking people. The uncertainty should prompt extra caution.

Also...what happens when you get there and things are shut down?

[Saab2000]

I’m afraid to go for a ride. I’m afraid to really exert my lungs. I know that it’s been said that if you practice social distancing and stay far away from others, then your risk of getting the virus is minimal. That still doesn’t comfort me because there’s so much that we don’t know about this virus. I’m afraid to go ride and start breathing heavily. That’s when you’re just inhaling everything around you.

Even if it’s a low risk that I get the corona virus, it would be disastrous for my family. I am relatively healthy, but my parents are elderly. If I get the corona virus I might get minimal symptoms, but if I transmit the virus to my parents... that could be fatal! That’s why I’m scared to just go outside for a simple bike ride.

I went out for a solo ride yesterday. Zero, and I mean zero, anxiety. I saw only a few people on my ride and they were either dog walkers or a couple folks on bikes. It is said that this virus travels about 6'/2m in the air. I don't know if it lives in suspension in the air, but I doubt it.

Going for my morning walks and afternoon spins are the sources of happiness in my life and I'm not quitting them until I can't move.

As for my industry, some airlines are massively cutting capacity. I wonder if we'll just see airplanes parked for a month. I'm sure no eventuality is off the table. It's hard to imagine anything worse for spreading the disease than airplanes that can move dozens of infected people hundreds of miles to infect hundreds more people.

Eventually, tens of millions of people will get it and the vast majority will survive.

I do wonder how long until nature takes its course and this burns out naturally.

[WFSTEKL]

It’s just a matter of time before that happens. It probably should have been imposed already. What if it’s imposed while your vacationing?
The risk is you get exposed and get sick. The benefit is a vacation. Can you do a stay-cation and issue a rain check for the trip?
I work in healthcare so maybe my perspective is unique but I see things escalating minute by minute. We’re now at everyone should wear a mask all the time even if you’re running the laundry machine. That’s a dramatic change from ‘you don’t need a mask’
Other than going for a hike or ride, I’m limiting my contact with the rest of society. Ordering take out rather than entering the restaurant, no play dates for the kids etc. I believe we still dont understand the complete scope of this virus and how it’s attacking people. The uncertainty should prompt extra caution.

Also...what happens when you get there and things are shut down?

I would heed every word of this.

[Tom]

Can't edit on my phone. Wording above was meant to say I want to do something real and help people help the kids that'll miss meals because school is closed.