COVID-19 Talk

[40westwx]

1 minute ago, showmethesnow said:

This article sort of scratches the surface on why I give no legitimacy to any research/info that is coming out of China. Spent roughly a month initially pouring over the numbers/reports/studies and it became evident very quickly that the numbers made absolutely no sense. In fact two studies that I did see that actually were believable quietly disappeared a few days later. The CCP is firmly in control of all this information. So though I might sound like a hypocritical A-Hole for not accepting China data in any of our discussions on here this is for good reason in my mind. After all, how do you debate numbers that more then likely have been drawn out of a hat?

https://www.foxnews.com/world/china-coronavirus-research-block-narrative-documents

100% agree.. CCP is in control of what goes out.. and they direct the narrative.  One of my biggest questions that I have had all along was "How did China more or less eradicate the virus"?  If you look at the daily numbers, they literally fell off the map in mid February:

 

However, if you look at the timeline of what happened and how this all played out, there is actually a much more plausible and realistic explanation of what is going on there.  China began its tight lockdown measures in early February, and they didn't fully close all of the schools until a week or two later.  If you look at the graph above, the number of daily cases peaked in mid January.  I think we can all agree the one day 15K number is simply a cluster in reporting (probably a lag somewhere in the system).   

Therefore, it is fairly safe to assume that China's historic quarantine was enacted after the virus ran its course.  If this is true.. what can be learned from this?

 

 

[showmethesnow]

7 hours ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Meanwhile the vegans are quietly laughing with glee...lol

Think I would be more concerned with possibly contracting corona from fresh foods such vegies and fruits. These don't get cooked liked the meats do where the virus gets killed from the heat.

[40westwx]

12 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

You are talking the seasonal type of flu that waxes and wanes over the different seasons. We see breakouts of it during the colder/drier months and it dies out with an increase in temps and humidity. These virus do not like the higher humidities. 

yes.. I have seen various studies that talk about humidity.. so that would be a direct environmental action against the virus verses what is more or less a "social distancing" argument in that when people spend more times outdoors, viruses do not spread as much.  I think this should be looked at in greater detail.. which one is it? Maybe a mix of both.. our forum and our collective minds offer a great platform to discuss and shed light on questions like this.. 

[showmethesnow]

25 minutes ago, 40westwx said:

100% agree.. CCP is in control of what goes out.. and they direct the narrative.  One of my biggest questions that I have had all along was "How did China more or less eradicate the virus"?  If you look at the daily numbers, they literally fell off the map in mid February:

 

 

However, if you look at the timeline of what happened and how this all played out, there is actually a much more plausible and realistic explanation of what is going on there.  China began its tight lockdown measures in early February, and they didn't fully close all of the schools until a week or two later.  If you look at the graph above, the number of daily cases peaked in mid January.  I think we can all agree the one day 15K number is simply a cluster in reporting (probably a lag somewhere in the system).   

Therefore, it is fairly safe to assume that China's historic quarantine was enacted after the virus ran its course.  If this is true.. what can be learned from this?

 

 

That has been the problem since day 1. The numbers/graphs made no sense to me with what you would see as far as how a virus evolves. None. Even considering the draconian measures (far too many reports of them welding people into their homes to discount this possibility) that were put into place. Their numbers suggest that they were well into the curve on infections/deaths from virtually day one and that they dropped from the peak to the tail end of the breakout in far to short a period of time. All the numbers in between are for the most part nonsense as well and don't fit a viruses growth and dissipation (though as you said there could have been a clustering of reporting that they didn't differentiate when these cases in fact occurred). The numbers involved on the life cycle of a virus just don't lie. And nothing they threw up came even close to what I would have expected to see.

[40westwx]

22 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

That has been the problem since day 1. The numbers/graphs make no sense with what you would see as far as how a virus evolves. None. Even considering the draconian measures (far too many reports of them welding people into their homes to discount this possibility) that were put into place. Their numbers suggest that they were well into the curve on infections/deaths from virtually day one and that they dropped from the peak to the end of the breakout in a matter of days where they were claiming no new infections. All the numbers in between are for the most part nonsense as well and don't fit a viruses growth and dissipation. The numbers involved on the life cycle of a virus just don't lie. And nothing they threw up came even close to what we should have seen.

Maybe the China numbers are real (or at least indicative of ground truth).. this is comes from a scientific article and shows how pandemics more or less "eradicate themselves" over a period of 45-90 days.  

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340325643_The_first_three_months_of_the_COVID-19_epidemic_Epidemiological_evidence_for_two_separate_strains_of_SARS-CoV-2_viruses_spreading_and_implications_for_prevention_strategies

 

Give the graph above, and the associated article, it appears that pandemic respiratory illness will more or less "disappear"  after roughly 80% of the population becomes immune and that the natural curve will not (but more importantly should not) be flattened. 

[showmethesnow]

2 minutes ago, 40westwx said:

Maybe the China numbers are real (or at least indicative of ground truth).. this is comes from an article from scientific article and shows how pandemics more or less "eradicate themselves" over a period of 45-90 days.  

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340325643_The_first_three_months_of_the_COVID-19_epidemic_Epidemiological_evidence_for_two_separate_strains_of_SARS-CoV-2_viruses_spreading_and_implications_for_prevention_strategies

 

 

Give the graph above, and the associated article, it appears that pandemic respiratory illness will more or less "disappear"  after roughly 80% of the population becomes immune and that the natural curve will not (but more importantly should not) be flattened. 

You are referring to the herd immunity approach to dealing with a virus. Allowing the virus to play out naturally without any outside interference. You could do that but then you have to deal with the casualties in the wake. And when you have a virus with a fairly high mortality rate that is an awful lot of bodies to bury if we are talking 80% of a population. About the only time I can see this approach being reasonable is if we are dealing with a virus that has an extremely low mortality rate. 

As far as the ground truth with China's numbers and their accuracy? The way I am seeing it through crunching some numbers they are substantially under playing what we in fact saw. And consensus is growing that this is in fact the case. We could very well be talking 5x, 6x maybe even 10x is the actual ground truth. There is really no way to truly know when they are controlling all the information. All we can do is try to glean an idea from secondary sources.

[gunny23]

44 minutes ago, 40westwx said:

yes.. I have seen various studies that talk about humidity.. so that would be a direct environmental action against the virus verses what is more or less a "social distancing" argument in that when people spend more times outdoors, viruses do not spread as much.  I think this should be looked at in greater detail.. which one is it? Maybe a mix of both.. our forum and our collective minds offer a great platform to discuss and shed light on questions like this.. 

Look at what is going on in Ecuador; humidity does not appear to be a factor w Covid 19.

 

[40westwx]

3 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

You are referring to the herd immunity approach to dealing with a virus. Allowing the virus to play out naturally without any outside interference. You could do that but then you have to deal with the casualties in the wake. And when you have a virus with a fairly high mortality rate that is an awful lot of bodies to bury if we are talking 80% of a population. About the only time I can see this approach being reasonable is if we are dealing with a virus that has an extremely low mortality rate. 

As far as the ground truth with China's numbers and their accuracy? The way I am seeing it through crunching some numbers they are substantially under playing what we in fact saw. And consensus is growing that this is in fact the case. We could very well be talking 5x, 6x maybe even 10x is the actual ground truth. There is really no way to truly know when they are controlling all the information. All we can do is try to glean an idea from secondary sources.

Agree.. the number are not accurate... there is probably some multiplier.. but when you multiple that number by zero new case.. you still get zero. 

That being said, can we agree that the Pandemic more or less ended in China in mid to late February (the same time that they closed schools)?

[showmethesnow]

45 minutes ago, 40westwx said:

Agree.. the number are not accurate... there is probably some multiplier.. but when you multiple that number by zero new case.. you still get zero. 

That being said, can we agree that the Pandemic more or less ended in China in mid to late February (the same time that they closed schools)?

I am not so sure that may be the case.

They locked down Jia County (600,000 people) roughly 2 weeks ago and just shut down this past Wed. Suifenhe City, Heilongjang (100,000 residents).

China is such a massive country with many remote regions. It is to be expected that maybe some of these regions will be several weeks if not longer beyond the curve we were seeing in the more populous regions. So when they were claiming victory several weeks ago I had to laugh. There was really no way in Hell that I could see that they had achieved it just for the more populous ares let alone for the more remote regions.

eta: Also wanted to add at roughly the same time they were claiming victory there were reports that they were actually refusing to test for the virus. There were far too many reports of this just to ignore this possibility.

[40westwx]

15 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

I am not so sure that may be the case.

They locked down Jia County (600,000 people) roughly 2 weeks ago and just shut down this past Wed. Suifenhe City, Heilongjang (100,000 residents).

China is such a massive country with many remote regions. It is to be expected that maybe some of these regions will be several weeks if not longer beyond the curve we were seeing in the more populous regions. So when they were claiming victory several weeks ago I had to laugh. There was really no way in Hell that I could see that they had achieved it just for the more populous ares let alone for the more remote regions.

eta: Also wanted to add at roughly the same time they were claiming victory there were reports that they were actually refusing to test for the virus. There were far too many reports of this just to ignore this possibility.

Didn't china employ an antibody test early in the game?

[aldie 22]

New cases popping up in Asia. There's only two choices in my mind. Get as many people tested and traced or be ok with it coming back in a real way

[showmethesnow]

Just now, 40westwx said:

Didn't china employ an antibody test early in the game?

Yeah. pretty sure they had testing though I would have to go back and check. Doesn't do you any good though if China decides they are no longer going to do the testing. They have also been destroying records as well. We may never truly know exactly when/where this virus originated and our patient zero. Far too many secondary sources have come out that claim that the CCP have for the most part destroyed the records concerning these earlier cases. Really, everything that we are seeing is indicative of a massive cover-up. The question is, will the world allow it and move on its merry way. Sadly, this is research that is vitally important on understanding virus spread at onset and yet none of the research that they have thrown out should realistically be used. If it is used in future studies we are potentially talking a virus model/response that is fatally flawed and could cost us lives, potentially a substantial number on any future outbreak.

[SomeguyfromTakomaPark]

4 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said:

New cases popping up in Asia. There's only two choices in my mind. Get as many people tested and traced or be ok with it coming back in a real way

Yep, and if history is any guide all levels of government will move too slow and this will take longer than it should to come back online. 

[40westwx]

16 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Yeah. pretty sure they had testing though I would have to go back and check. Doesn't do you any good though if China decides they are no longer going to do the testing. They have also been destroying records as well. We may never truly know exactly when/where this virus originated and our patient zero. Far too many secondary sources have come out that claim that the CCP have for the most part destroyed the records concerning these earlier cases. Really, everything that we are seeing is indicative of a massive cover-up. The question is, will the world allow it and move on its merry way. Sadly, this is research that is vitally important on understanding virus spread at onset and yet none of the research that they have thrown out should realistically be used. If it is used in future studies we are potentially talking a virus model/response that is fatally flawed and could cost us lives, potentially a substantial number on any future outbreak.

once you have a reliable antibody test it doesnt take much of cross section to figure how many people in the population are immune.. you have to remember the entire argument for social distancing is the "lessen the blow".  If you test 1% of the population randomly and find 80% of has already reached immunity.. then social distancing no longer applies.. we already won. 

The funny thing is that having the anitbody test would probably lead to lifting lockdown measures in places like NYC first because the clearly have already spread the virus around its population sufficiently to produce the immune response.

[showmethesnow]

10 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said:

New cases popping up in Asia. There's only two choices in my mind. Get as many people tested and traced or be ok with it coming back in a real way

Not really sure a massive testing and tracing is even feasible. Might have to rely on testing and tracing for future cases to try to contain with a healthy dose of Social Distancing thrown in as well. Depending on how many actually were infected in the first round will play a big part as you do start seeing a somewhat significant impact on the limiting of spread with the larger number of those that have already contracted it.

[ErinInTheSky]

8 minutes ago, 40westwx said:

once you have a reliable antibody test it doesnt take much of cross section to figure how many people in the population are immune.. you have to remember the entire argument for social distancing is the "lessen the blow".  If you test 1% of the population randomly and find 80% of has already reached immunity.. then social distancing no longer applies.. we already won. 

The funny thing is that having the anitbody test would probably lead to lifting lockdown measures in places like NYC first because the clearly have already spread the virus around its population sufficiently to produce the immune response.

There is no evidence that we have even gotten close to herd immunity and this is just speculation. Right now the CDC site estimates about 25% of cases are asymptomatic. Studies (believe them or don’t) show 15-25% asymptomatic). Even if 50% are asymptomatic (I do not believe this but just for sake of argument), then NYC is still less than 1% infected. Herd immunity isn’t happening anytime soon.

[ErinInTheSky]

23 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said:

New cases popping up in Asia. There's only two choices in my mind. Get as many people tested and traced or be ok with it coming back in a real way

A number of countries have gotten this under control with testing and tracing. We waited too long with lockdowns (or really, we didn’t adequately test/trace early) so it’s going to take us a while until we can use test and trace as our mechanism of control.

[aldie 22]

6 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Not really sure a massive testing and tracing is even feasible. Might have to rely on testing and tracing for future cases to try to contain with a healthy dose of Social Distancing thrown in as well. Depending on how many actually were infected in the first round will play a big part as you do start seeing a somewhat significant impact on the limiting of spread with the larger number of those that have already contracted it.

Define massive because aren't we still under 1% of the population? Feels like a ball dropped to me.

[showmethesnow]

6 minutes ago, 40westwx said:

once you have a reliable antibody test it doesnt take much of cross section to figure how many people in the population are immune.. you have to remember the entire argument for social distancing is the "lessen the blow".  If you test 1% of the population randomly and find 80% of has already reached immunity.. then social distancing no longer applies.. we already won. 

Though I do believe we saw a much higher infection rate then is currently believed I see no way we are even sniffing an 80% rate. Right now I am thinking we may see 15-20% of the population after this first go round. That in its own right will help somewhat to make containment easier on any future outbreaks. Where it really comes into play though is the higher rates will be seen in the cities where I am thinking we will see 30-35%, possibly even 40 on some of the harder hit ones. Considering the cities are pretty much the breeding grounds for this virus to see the rates I just stated come into play will have a significant impact on any future outbreaks. This is one of the reasons I feel that if we have to endure a second wave this fall/winter it will be of far less significance then we are currently seeing.

[showmethesnow]

7 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said:

Define massive because aren't we still under 1% of the population? Feels like a ball dropped to me.

We are well into community spread. At that point there is really no way to do tracing to find out those that have been infected. The only way at this point is to test everyone (or at least a very significant portion). 

eta: As far as the under 1%. Not so sure that is the case. We have seen several studies come out in recent days that say we are looking at a far bigger spread. One suggest the possibility of 8x what they are currently stating.

[ErinInTheSky]

6 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

Though I do believe we saw a much higher infection rate then is currently believed I see no way we are even sniffing an 80% rate. Right now I am thinking we may see 15-20% of the population after this first go round. That in its own right will help somewhat to make containment easier on any future outbreaks. Where it really comes into play though is the higher rates will be seen in the cities where I am thinking we will see 30-35%, possibly even 40 on some of the harder hit ones. Considering the cities are pretty much the breeding grounds for this virus to see the rates I just stated come into play will have a significant impact on any future outbreaks. This is one of the reasons I feel that if we have to endure a second wave this fall/winter it will be of far less significance then we are currently seeing.

15-20% of the population would mean something like 96% of cases go untested.

This isn’t even true in Iceland where they do sentinel testing.
 

I think hoping for significant population immunity right now and for much much much larger numbers than what we see in the testing reports is wishful thinking.

Side note - there’s another way you actually see what under testing looks like. It’s positive rate. It appears that when your positive rate approaches 5-7%, you are testing enough to capture the majority of infections. Generally we are at 10-15% in the US right now. It seems we are probably missing about 50% of infections by not testing. That still puts us way under 1% infected right now unfortunately. These cases aren’t asymptomatic, they are usually just family members of an infected person who can’t get tested because of shortages.

[aldie 22]

7 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

We are well into community spread. At that point there is really no way to do tracing to find out those that have been infected. The only way at this point is to test everyone (or at least a very significant portion). 

eta: As far as the under 1%. Not so sure that is the case. We have seen several studies come out in recent days that say we are looking at a far bigger spread. One suggest the possibility of 8x what they are currently stating.

1% tested

[ErinInTheSky]

New study shows coronavirus transmission distance is 13 feet and spreads on shoes:

 

https://www.ibtimes.com/coronavirus-transmission-distance-13-feet-spreads-through-shoes-cdc-report-2957363

[ErinInTheSky]

9 minutes ago, showmethesnow said:

We are well into community spread. At that point there is really no way to do tracing to find out those that have been infected. The only way at this point is to test everyone (or at least a very significant portion). 

eta: As far as the under 1%. Not so sure that is the case. We have seen several studies come out in recent days that say we are looking at a far bigger spread. One suggest the possibility of 8x what they are currently stating.

What study shows 8x? I haven’t seen anything reputable. I’ve seen musings but I’ve seen musings about all kinds of numbers. Until we get some pretty intense testing I find that highly unlikely. No study with any modicum of validation has verified that in the least as far as I have read and I’ve read several.

[aldie 22]

To be clear I have zero clue how to get out of this or when to start back up. My thoughts are my own opinions and I simply believe the ball was dropped hard and the hard decisions that need to be made now are in suspect hands

[ErinInTheSky]

1 minute ago, leesburg 04 said:

To be clear I have zero clue how to get out of this or when to start back up. My thoughts are my own opinions and I simply believe the ball was dropped hard and the hard decisions that need to be made now are in suspect hands

Agreed

[Ralph Wiggum]

More and more scientist studies reporting online and various news sources such as reuters and usa today that they are starting to get data that supports once you get covid19 it never leaves.  Few reports now of triple infections in S Korea! I've seen comparisons to a herpes or aids type virus where it stays in the system but goes dormant at times even so as much to provide a negative test result. They are learning more and more about this every day. 

Scary part is, it will continue to beat down the immune system and lungs. Reports are showing lung scarring on those who have 'recovered'. If these reports are true, this isnt good. Imagine aids being spread via respiratory droplets?

[Ralph Wiggum]

14 minutes ago, leesburg 04 said:

To be clear I have zero clue how to get out of this or when to start back up. My thoughts are my own opinions and I simply believe the ball was dropped hard and the hard decisions that need to be made now are in suspect hands

There is much the scientists arent making widely known but some findings abroad are now beginning to leak out. There is a reason Fauci is saying there will be repeated flareups and to keep things shut down.

[ErinInTheSky]

Just now, Ralph Wiggum said:

More and more scientist studies reporting online and various news sources such as reuters and usa today that they are starting to get data that supports once you get covid19 it never leaves.  Few reports now of triple infections in S Korea! I've seen comparisons to a herpes or aids type virus where it stays in the system but goes dormant at times even so as much to provide a negative test result. They are learning more and more about this every day. 

Scary part is, it will continue to beat down the immune system and lungs. Reports are showing lung scarring on those who have 'recovered'. If these reports are true, this isnt good. Imagine aids being spread via respiratory droplets?

Yup. That would be terrifying and is one of the things we don’t know about the long term effects of the virus.

 

This is why I’ve been practicing hardcore disinfection procedures in my home.

[showmethesnow]

8 minutes ago, supernovasky said:

15-20% of the population would mean something like 96% of cases go untested.

This isn’t even true in Iceland where they do sentinel testing.
 

I think hoping for significant population immunity right now and for much much much larger numbers than what we see in the testing reports is wishful thinking.

Side note - there’s another way you actually see what under testing looks like. It’s positive rate. It appears that when your positive rate approaches 5-7%, you are testing enough to capture the majority of infections. Generally we are at 10-15% in the US right now. It seems we are probably missing about 50% of infections by not testing. That still puts us way under 1% infected right now unfortunately. These cases aren’t asymptomatic, they are usually just family members of an infected person who can’t get tested because of shortages.

Really not sure we can use Iceland as an example in this regard. The differences in numbers involved are of many magnitudes greater here. Much easier to control a virus through mediation when you are dealing with such small numbers.

That said, I could very well be wrong as far as my thoughts on total spread. Will not deny that. I had my questions as far as the impacts of Social Distancing and I error-ed on the low side for various reasons when I crunched the numbers about a month ago. But I do believe the numbers they are projecting now are off the mark by a good bit (below 2% infection rate last I saw?). So though we may not see the 15% (which I favored over the 20%) I do believe we will approach 8-10% minimum.