Coronavirus

[IWXwx]

36 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

Getting a little too political here.  Yes, I know it is the elephant in the room and hard to divorce it from this situation, but overall we have been doing a pretty good job keeping things focused on what the virus is doing.

So on that note, some good news and bad news from a country that has gotten a lot of attention -- Italy.  New case numbers are trending down but unfortunately the deaths are staying over 500 per day.  

Sorry Hoosier, that was my fault. I know 4 people who have contracted Covid and three of the four may not make it. Then Jack's post upset me. I'm trying to stay neutral and do my job of helping those in need, but it has hit really close to home. Our agency's work right now involves trying to get our frontliners the PPE to do the job safely, as well as keep residents in long-term health care facilities safe. That's close to home too, because I have several friends working with these high-risk residents.

This is not official, but I can foresee the stay-at-home declaration remaining in Indiana until at least the first full week of May and maybe the second week. Once again, I didn't mean to inject politics into this, I'm just frustrated by how slow the wheels sometimes turns.

[Stebo]

4 hours ago, nwohweather said:

If that's the line of thinking our country has I'd rather the coronavirus wipe us all out.  Just because there is a catastrophic pandemic does not mean you can tell me I cannot paint my bedroom while having to sit inside.  Or plant flowers and lay mulch around the house. You can take something seriously without giving up everything, yet Michigan has done just that.

Meanwhile Ohio has spearheaded the response in this country, has much more reasonable rules, and a much lower case count.  Governor Whitmer will likely, and deservedly lose re-election based on what she has done.  It does not shock me to see a Democrat go overboard on the rights of individuals, but it does sadden me.  What do you expect out of the same place where droves of people willingly give money to unions though.

I and many in this state disagree, yes there have been a few missteps as noted with the gardening aspect for example but this is an unguided time and she like others is doing the best that she can. I would rather err on the side of caution than not. Should lottery go to online only, yes. Should marijuana/liquor stores close, no because that could potentially lead to other issues and rehab facilities are not available should things get worse. It is easy to say "hey don't drink" to an addict but until you walk in those shoes you don't know and there is very limited resources for addiction right now. No this isn't meant to enable but I could it being worse if alcohol sales were eliminated. As for marijuana, there is medicinal purposes to it and in a highly stressed environment, if someone wants to smoke to calm themselves as long as it is legal I see no issue there.

[chances14]

6 minutes ago, Stebo said:

I and many in this state disagree, yes there have been a few missteps as noted with the gardening aspect for example but this is an unguided time and she like others is doing the best that she can. I would rather err on the side of caution than not. Should lottery go to online only, yes. Should marijuana/liquor stores close, no because that could potentially lead to other issues and rehab facilities are not available should things get worse. It is easy to say "hey don't drink" to an addict but until you walk in those shoes you don't know and there is very limited resources for addiction right now. No this isn't meant to enable but I could it being worse if alcohol sales were eliminated. As for marijuana, there is medicinal purposes to it and in a highly stressed environment, if someone wants to smoke to calm themselves as long as it is legal I see no issue there.

I think whitmer needs to do a better job of communicating and explaining to the public exactly why some businesses have been deemed essential while others are being required to close. The whole weed/liqueur stores issue is a perfect example of this. Communication between the government and the public is key, especially the longer this drags on. 

[Stebo]

1 minute ago, chances14 said:

I think whitmer needs to do a better job of communicating and explaining to the public exactly why some businesses have been deemed essential while others are being required to close. The whole weed/liqueur stores issue is a perfect example of this. Communication between the government and the public is key, especially the longer this drags on. 

I don't disagree there that things should be communicated better. Some may not be able to parse why they need to be open.

[nwohweather]

Cause and effect. Ohio has much more reasonable rules because there’s a much lower case count. Had Whitmer rolled out these strict guidelines from the very beginning, you’d have a point. Thing is, Ohio and Michigan rolled out the same regulations at the same time in March, and yet the impact of the virus is more severe here.
 
And you don’t think there’s something seriously sociopathic about preferring everyone be dead over a *temporary* suspension of some of your liberties? When everything resumes back to normal, you know who won’t be mulching and planting and going on with life? People who’ve died so that others could get a bucket of paint or a bag of mulch at Meijer. I fail to see how your scale of morality tips towards the *permanency* of death over the *temporary* suspension of the *non-essential*.
I can only assume you live in a rural area where you’re not at high risk and can’t possibly appreciate or fathom the ramifications that a small trip outside your home has on the survivability of you or those around you. I don’t think you understand what it’s like to hear sirens whirring by a dozen times a day when before it’d been just once or twice.
And I don’t think you appreciate the exhaustion and the REAL SACRIFICE (not being able to paint and mulch for a month or two are not REAL SACRIFICES) that our hospital staff are going through during this extremely stressful period, and why they’re pleading for people to just stay the f*ck home. 

Nah I live in suburban Charleston, SC. I golf 3 times a week and swim daily because our government has not gone overboard on things.

But regardless these extreme rules are going to destroy the economy of Michigan. So yes telling people they cannot buy a bag of mulch or a gallon of paint is bad because that means less people going to work.

That’s the thing, many factories and companies are still running where it’s really going to spread, not a damn Home Depot. So what is going to happen is tons of people are going to be laid off at those stores, and then tons of people who make the product will be as well since only “essential” things can be sold.

It is a fine balance needed to get through this, because especially Michigan is going to be gutted by this as the auto industry is destroyed

[RobertSul]

5 minutes ago, nwohweather said:

Nah I live in suburban Charleston, SC. I golf 3 times a week and swim daily because our government has not gone overboard on things.

But regardless these extreme rules are going to destroy the economy of Michigan. So yes telling people they cannot buy a bag of mulch or a gallon of paint is bad because that means less people going to work.

That’s the thing, many factories and companies are still running where it’s really going to spread, not a damn Home Depot. So what is going to happen is tons of people are going to be laid off at those stores, and then tons of people who make the product will be as well since only “essential” things can be sold.

It is a fine balance needed to get through this, because especially Michigan is going to be gutted by this as the auto industry is destroyed

Meat processing plants have stayed open, and they're starting to close down as a result of COVID spreading through the workers. So in those cases, not only are you having to close them off anyway, but people are unnecessarily sick and dying. 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/13/south-dakota-pork-plant-closes-after-200-workers-contract-covid-19

 

 

 

[Stebo]

1 minute ago, nwohweather said:

Nah I live in suburban Charleston, SC. I golf 3 times a week and swim daily because our government has not gone overboard on things.

But regardless these extreme rules are going to destroy the economy of Michigan. So yes telling people they cannot buy a bag of mulch or a gallon of paint is bad because that means less people going to work.

That’s the thing, many factories and companies are still running where it’s really going to spread, not a damn Home Depot. So what is going to happen is tons of people are going to be laid off at those stores, and then tons of people who make the product will be as well since only “essential” things can be sold.

It is a fine balance needed to get through this, because especially Michigan is going to be gutted by this as the auto industry is destroyed

The gardening thing doesn't make sense but the construction and paint does. Those are two groups who buy masks at high quantity, we are already limited as it is, if you put all those crews out there we would not have masks for the general public. This is a temporary thing. As for the auto industry, I disagree, they have a 4 week shut down in summer every year and that doesn't gut them. Plus those factories hold thousands of people, I wouldn't want this to run rampant through them.

[Hoosier]

Some of this is probably a lag in reporting from the weekend but over 2300 new US deaths.  Averaging the 12th-14th comes out to about 1800/day.  

[Hoosier]

My construction buddy hooked me up with an N95.  Only one, but better than nothing.

[sokolow]

On 4/13/2020 at 7:23 PM, WestMichigan said:

What makes a government clerk any more important than a construction worker. Without either our society wouldn’t function like it does. The problem with unemployment is it doesn’t pay the bills. And where are they getting the money?  People aren’t working so it isn’t income taxes. We are just mortgaging our future. I know you want to get in a fight with me but all I want is common sense restrictions that are equally applied. This isn’t a disease to ignore. I am not saying that. Lots of people have it and many have died. I am not disputing that but how does a single self employed construction worker have to quit working when he is working by himself in an unoccupied home?  Like I said apply common sense and people will be less irritated. 

 

On 4/13/2020 at 10:36 PM, Stebo said:

Look I get it but you are talking about a very specific scenario in the grand scheme of things and honestly having construction work slow down is good because it allows for the n95 masks to be available. Most construction workers use them as well, same with painters, drywallers, etc.

construction in IL has been largely exempt from the SaH order and honestly it has been very uncomfortable because the majority of current projects are nonessential. In the sense that it doesn’t matter if society takes delivery of a condo block or a new subdivision a month later than planned, regardless of what the governor says; its not critical infrastructure. 

Its has been uncomfortable because everyone has had to patch together an industrial hygiene plan on the fly for environments when most OTS PPE is rightly committed elsewhere, but lots of tasks need two sets of hands, and require men & women to work close together in tight spaces.

PPE is a mitigation measure you implement not first, but third, after avoiding or abating the hazard in the first place.  PPE is part of a cost benefit analysis that recognizes no job can be 100% safe, but another part of that analysis is “why does this need to get done right now? why not wait until we can do this a different way?

[sokolow]

no-one likes that part because instead of putting the responsibility on the tradespeople to individually “work safe”, it places the responsibility on contractors to design a safer workplace and bid with schedules that allow for stopping to think about what they are doing, and to bring in & install appropriate material / equipment / temporary structures / whatever

or to just wait, to wait out a couple days of inclement weather rather than working in flooded trenches and muddy excavations

[A-L-E-K]

16 minutes ago, sokolow said:

PPE is a mitigation measure you implement not first, but third, after avoiding or abating the hazard in the first place.  PPE is part of a cost benefit analysis that recognizes no job can be 100% safe, but another part of that analysis is “why does this need to get done right now? why not wait until we can do this a different way?

a classic

 

[sokolow]

probably not productive, nevermind

[sokolow]

edit unnecessary

[SchaumburgStormer]

1 hour ago, sokolow said:

 

construction in IL has been largely exempt from the SaH order and honestly it has been very uncomfortable because the majority of current projects are nonessential. In the sense that it doesn’t matter if society takes delivery of a condo block or a new subdivision a month later than planned, regardless of what the governor says; its not critical infrastructure. 

Its has been uncomfortable because everyone has had to patch together an industrial hygiene plan on the fly for environments when most OTS PPE is rightly committed elsewhere, but lots of tasks need two sets of hands, and require men & women to work close together in tight spaces.

PPE is a mitigation measure you implement not first, but third, after avoiding or abating the hazard in the first place.  PPE is part of a cost benefit analysis that recognizes no job can be 100% safe, but another part of that analysis is “why does this need to get done right now? why not wait until we can do this a different way?

Luckily for me, construction was allowed to continue at my new house. I was in an interesting position when my current dwelling was under contract to sell (April 24 close), but my new home was no where near ready to be inhabited. Had all construction work been prohibited, I would have been in the interesting position of deciding to violate the stay at home order, violate the construction prohibition, or whatever legal consequence may occur from failing to sell my home as contractually agreed. 
 

Due to this, I have had to make a couple trips to my local hardware store to grab some life/safety stuff for my new home. Handrails, electrical boxes, etc. It is insane how many people are there buying things which would be tough to consider essential, like flowers, mulch, etc. It seems that people are slowly getting back to normal. I even heard one person mention “cases are slowing down in Illinois so I decided to venture out”. 
 

This is the equivalent of stopping your antibiotic course halfway through because you feel better. I firmly believe, and you can here Lightfoot and Pritzker laying the groundwork, that this stay at home order will be extended again into mid-late May. While some of these orders may be confusing or dubious in execution (looking at you Michigan), I don’t think that this is the “beginning of the totalitarian state” as some of my friends Facebook posts would lead you to  believe.
 

I am frustrated like everyone, and I have a hard time justifying the fact that I cannot walk 18 holes by myself, but can contact 15 people in a liquor store. But I get it. I can walk 18 holes by myself and be confident I will be responsible. However the general public as a whole is stupid, and if you give them an inch, they will take a mile. 

[SchaumburgStormer]

26 minutes ago, sokolow said:

It is all very depressing; a wave of tragedies for tens of thousands of families coupled with, for lack of a better term, a nervous breakdown on the part of the national economy that will cause immense upheaval and probably permanently cripple the earnings and financial stability of the zoomer and late millenial generations.  That’s not a trivial thing.  That’s burdening those generations with decades of anxiety, hardship, instability in housing and healthcare, in relationships, in whether or not they can afford to have kids, raise a family.

That latter part is particularly disgusting because it seems that our political and business leadership has spent the last four decades in a cooperative bipartisan effort creating a legislative and financial framework that supports an economic way of life that seizes up and threatens to die if we stop clapping for Tinkerbell for even four weeks.  We haven’t lost a third of our economy to an attack on infrastructure, no-one has bombed the electrical grid or pipeline network, sabotaged bridges and railroad yards.

Instead we lost a third of the economy because our leadership for the last two generations, Blue and Red, tech and petro, real estate and finance, manufacturing and agriculture, have all committed us to way of life that is not just “not crisis resistant” or “vulnerable to crisis” or even “crisis-prone” but indeed such a precarious shambles that the prospect of everyone whose job isn’t to be out there keeping the lights on basically going on staycation for a month has caused us to turn on each other like rats.  There’s interconnected and just-in-time, yes, but this more like all of us normal people are realizing we’ve bet the house on a pyramid scheme

I think if there is any light in the darkness that is this dark cavern of our economy, it’s that this crisis will show average Americans that small business is important and vital to our way of life. Problem being, many many many small businesses won’t survive to see the other side. 

[sokolow]

In re the IHME model, here is an interesting discussion of side effects that arise from it having been designed as a resource-use forecasting tool for healthcare institutions & response planning, but then being employed “off label” as it were in a broader context

 

 

[IWXwx]

26 minutes ago, sokolow said:

probably not productive, nevermind

I read them and agree. Unfortunately for my wife, I have been privately voicing the same thoughts, albeit not so eloquently, for a few years now.

[sokolow]

I thought the whole IHME epidemiologist mutual discussion / analysis was good for this thread because I really enjoy reading this community of professionals and informed laypeople discuss the tools available in the meteorology community, and which from the model suite is appropriate for which application, and with what caveats.  Different forecasting, similar advisory mission. This guy who is tagged in the first tweet in that thread has made a tool to track changes in the IHME projections over time

 

 

[Baum]

another socio-economic side effect:

https://www.wfaa.com/article/news/local/tarrant-county/3-year-old-fort-worth-boy-fatally-injured-easter-morning/287-f05393af-f696-4488-9df9-b9140b4e7600

[nwohweather]

The gardening thing doesn't make sense but the construction and paint does. Those are two groups who buy masks at high quantity, we are already limited as it is, if you put all those crews out there we would not have masks for the general public. This is a temporary thing. As for the auto industry, I disagree, they have a 4 week shut down in summer every year and that doesn't gut them. Plus those factories hold thousands of people, I wouldn't want this to run rampant through them.

No lol shut down is only Fourth of July week. And then Christmas week thru New Years is shut down.

Again though all of these arguments are cancelled by the fact basically every manufacturing business is somehow essential. That’s my point, why is the government telling us what we can and can’t buy but then allowing all factories to run as is. Mask wise the demand is so high because every company is buying them in bulk it doesn’t really matter if construction people are using them, right now everyone is.

But believe me the auto industry will be decimated by this. Sales will plummet from this and companies will be so loaded with debt they won’t buy fleet trucks for business purposes.

This nation is driven by automotive, defense, heavy duty machinery (Caterpillar) and most of all aerospace manufacturing. Having these industries falter will rattle supply chains and wallets across America.

[Stebo]

1 hour ago, nwohweather said:

No lol shut down is only Fourth of July week. And then Christmas week thru New Years is shut down.

Again though all of these arguments are cancelled by the fact basically every manufacturing business is somehow essential. That’s my point, why is the government telling us what we can and can’t buy but then allowing all factories to run as is. Mask wise the demand is so high because every company is buying them in bulk it doesn’t really matter if construction people are using them, right now everyone is.

But believe me the auto industry will be decimated by this. Sales will plummet from this and companies will be so loaded with debt they won’t buy fleet trucks for business purposes.

This nation is driven by automotive, defense, heavy duty machinery (Caterpillar) and most of all aerospace manufacturing. Having these industries falter will rattle supply chains and wallets across America.

Stop thinking about money over lives, this isn't that hard. We have over 30k people dead in this country in a month and a half with many actions done to prevent the spread, what do you think would happen if none of those actions happened? You could easily take that number and triple it or even more.

[Hoosier]

Looks like a decent sized protest in Michigan.  Streets are clogged.  

Hopefully the people out there will be understanding whenever the next protest occurs for a cause they may not agree with.

[WestMichigan]

46 minutes ago, Stebo said:

Stop thinking about money over lives, this isn't that hard. We have over 30k people dead in this country in a month and a half with many actions done to prevent the spread, what do you think would happen if none of those actions happened? You could easily take that number and triple it or even more.

Speculation at best.  I know there have been many wild predictions but we have no idea what really would have happened.  We can all agree it would have been different for sure.

[wisconsinwx]

32 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

Looks like a decent sized protest in Michigan.  Streets are clogged.  

Hopefully the people out there will be understanding whenever the next protest occurs for a cause they may not agree with.

I thought they were going to do a drive-in protest  (with some popcorn)

[Baum]

this looks like decent news. can't vouch for the validity, but it is a New York news site:

 

 

Spectrum News NY1

 

@NY1

· 58m

Cuomo says New York will be sending 100 ventilators to Michigan and 50 to Maryland.

[nwohweather]

3 hours ago, Stebo said:

Stop thinking about money over lives, this isn't that hard. We have over 30k people dead in this country in a month and a half with many actions done to prevent the spread, what do you think would happen if none of those actions happened? You could easily take that number and triple it or even more.

Again though that is easy for you and me to say. I'm guessing you are salaried as a meteorologist, I am salaried in the supply chain field.  But my sister (23) is a manager at Marriott and has been furloughed, her fiance (27) is a line worker at an appliance factory who is down to 3 days a week.  They've been decimated by this and may have to resort to moving in with my father due to this.  Sure we've prevented many deaths, but regardless entire livelihoods and personal incomes are being destroyed en masse by this pandemic.

So while I commend many of the actions, some such as in the state of Michigan, have seemed to go too far with their reaction to it.  And a perfect example is my sister's fiance who now is living on 60% of his wage because a washer & dryer is not an essential product.

 

[sokolow]

I think a positive step going forward should be ensuring every state has UI that is focused on providing lost income replacement to 85% or better, system which has streamlined and automatic payout, and which operates on the presumption of good faith on the part of the claimant, which has minimal red tape and which is focused on ease of access, speed, and claimant support.  If we want to nail serial fraudsters we can do it with actual investigators.

We didn’t need to read the article about Florida to understand that in many states UI is is not set up to provide unemployment relief, it is set up to deter people from claiming UI.

[Stebo]

1 hour ago, nwohweather said:

Again though that is easy for you and me to say. I'm guessing you are salaried as a meteorologist, I am salaried in the supply chain field.  But my sister (23) is a manager at Marriott and has been furloughed, her fiance (27) is a line worker at an appliance factory who is down to 3 days a week.  They've been decimated by this and may have to resort to moving in with my father due to this.  Sure we've prevented many deaths, but regardless entire livelihoods and personal incomes are being destroyed en masse by this pandemic.

So while I commend many of the actions, some such as in the state of Michigan, have seemed to go too far with their reaction to it.  And a perfect example is my sister's fiance who now is living on 60% of his wage because a washer & dryer is not an essential product.

 

I am not salaried and most people have the ability to be on unemployment right now. If this is ongoing 6 months from now then we can have the discussion again then. Right now though everyone that can be on unemployment should be.

[Stebo]

That protest in Lansing was so fruitful. Idiots