All things CoronaVirus

[kramerica.inc]

1. The virus is currently too big for testing and contact tracing to be effective. At these levels, you can't test your way out of this.

That's true on a macro level, but entirely untrue on a micro level. We'll figure that out when we hit flu season, and productivity goes to hell because anyone with so much as the sniffles will be forced to stay home because we can't tell if its Covid or just a cold.

I personally think (as a whole) this is what the US workforce needs. Workers should be able to stay home if they have a little case of the sniffles. Americans as a whole work too hard. For far too long now many employers/companies have expected their people to do more with less people. That needs toc change. There are too many single points of failure at too many places. Think about your own companies and employers - when someone is let go or leaves, how often does that person's tasks get absorbed by others vs hire someone new to replace? It would be a boost for employees and the economy if more companies hired the labor force they actually needed to try and provide their employees a sensible quality of life.

[a fan]

1. The virus is currently too big for testing and contact tracing to be effective. At these levels, you can't test your way out of this.

That's true on a macro level, but entirely untrue on a micro level. We'll figure that out when we hit flu season, and productivity goes to hell because anyone with so much as the sniffles will be forced to stay home because we can't tell if its Covid or just a cold.

Good point. I hope the good doctor meant testing AND contact tracing (i.e., coupled together) and not that the virus is too big for testing alone. I certainly don’t agree with that. (I agree the virus has spread way too much for contact tracing.)

Been telling the forum from the word go that it's flat out stupid to peg the economic damage on the .gov.

You just explained free market principles. Making choices based on health, economic realities, and an inability to test for Covid. Now instead of one person, picture an office setting, or a situation where you have 100 people, or 1000 people working for a company. What do you do?

You shut down, and lose production. It's happened to 3 out of 5 of our production staff, and that's in the middle of the summer. P*ssed away days of economic production because we can't get test results quickly.

Is it allergies, or Covid? Can't tell, so what do you do?

Result....partially, at least? Our GDP is down 31%+, and countries like Germany are around 10.1%. And our citizens refuse to look at that and say "well for F's sake, what did they do that we aren't doing?" For all the boasting we do about capitalism and business prowess....we sure have sucked the big one during this crisis on both counts.

We're doing this to ourselves, and million of Americans----and our leaders----don't want to use reason to get us out of this mess. They, instead want to point fingers, which is what passes as "governance" in America. And it's been like this for, oh, about 30 years now.

[a fan]

I personally think (as a whole) this is what the US workforce needs. Workers should be able to stay home if they have a little case of the sniffles. Americans as a whole work too hard. For far too long now many employers/companies have expected their people to do more with less people. That needs toc change. There are too many single points of failure at too many places. Think about your own companies and employers - when someone is let go or leaves, how often does that person's tasks get absorbed by others vs hire someone new to replace?

I absorb the work myself. That's how we do it here.

You're misunderstanding my point here, and speaking to a larger point. A point I agree with, btw.

What has happened to us is: employee gets sniffles/doesn't feel well. They stay home. That's perfectly normal in our company. We don't want people to get "regular" sick. So they stay home, rest up, get paid, and come back when they feel better.

The problem is that they "feel better", and can't come back in because we can't tell if the problem was Covid or not. So they sit home even though they feel perfectly fine. And I promise you, we'll have that all winter long across America. Testing with rapid results (as in: 2 days) will solve that problem.

[Peter Brown]

I personally think (as a whole) this is what the US workforce needs. Workers should be able to stay home if they have a little case of the sniffles. Americans as a whole work too hard. For far too long now many employers/companies have expected their people to do more with less people. That needs toc change. There are too many single points of failure at too many places. Think about your own companies and employers - when someone is let go or leaves, how often does that person's tasks get absorbed by others vs hire someone new to replace?

I absorb the work myself. That's how we do it here.

You're misunderstanding my point here, and speaking to a larger point. A point I agree with, btw.

What has happened to us is: employee gets sniffles/doesn't feel well. They stay home. That's perfectly normal in our company. We don't want people to get "regular" sick. So they stay home, rest up, get paid, and come back when they feel better.

The problem is that they "feel better", and can't come back in because we can't tell if the problem was Covid or not. So they sit home even though they feel perfectly fine. And I promise you, we'll have that all winter long across America. Testing with rapid results (as in: 2 days) will solve that problem.

The one and only beef I have with most states vis a vis Covid is testing turn times.

As a private employer, we made tests free to all employees, once a month, for as long as we feel it is necessary. LabCorp provides a RT-PCR test which turns around same day. I am not certain why this is not done everywhere. The cost to the employer is $100/test. Take the swab at 8 am, results by 4 pm. Easy peasy.

[youthathletics]

This is why the gov shouldn’t mandate anything.

It needs to be a choice. For the parents, for the teachers.

All schools should offer a simultaneous virtual and in person option. But instead we have governors, school superintendents and teachers unions who all know what’s best for your safety and your child’s safety.

Let people decide.

This is what happens when you rely on the government to think for you.

If it needs to be a choice, then each of the affected constituencies needs to be weighing in from the perspective of the interest they want to advance or the one they believe paramount. Kids' education? Staff health and welfare? Kid health and welfare? The public health ramifications of inadvertently creating spreader events? Umm, holy sh*t.

For better or worse, we have made school a governmental function in this country (while, inexplicably, doing a terrible job in civics education). Government at the municipal level sets budgets, lobbies the state government and State DOEs, accepts state and federal funds, manages curricula mandated elsewhere. I just don't see Government now stepping out of the public health issue of the last century and allowing a chiaroscuro of menu options, from town to town to town.

Be safe for the publics. But infringing upon private schools for is complete bs. The issue becomes when government- now local health depts, (See Montgomery County, MD) stepping in and telling private schools they must go virtual.

Many private schools in MD are currently at capacity. I can tell you from personal anecdotes of 3 local Catholic schools- all were operating with vacancies last year. Well, what vacancies they had were gobbled up by parents who wanted to send their kids to in-person schools.

Cosmo, I confess I was not even thinking of the private schools. Yes, they will have to make their own calls on this, and cannot be regulated easily unless there is some evidence that in consequence of holding in-person school, teaching and associated activities they are causing a public health issue. But even those schools are accredited by the state, right? We are kind of in this together.

Public health emergency trumps normal regulatory processes, so I don't think there's a significant legal impediment to the State controlling situations in which there are gatherings threatening public health, and closing situations that are non-compliant with whatever restrictions are put in place.

But the arguments against Private schools is that they would be super spreaders and opening 100% as business as usual.

That's not the case.

These private schools are still compliant and implementing all CDC regulations. That is- following indoor capacity limits, sanitization, masks, distancing etc. This is not "school as usual." It's school in compliance with CDC guidelines.

The closures may be with good intentions, but there is still government overreach.

Correct. Here in MD, Montgomery County the health officials banned opening private schools, after they had planned to do it "SAFELY". Gov. Hogan then strongly disagreed with their decision. https://wjla.com/news/coronavirus/hogan ... o-pandemic

Hogan issues a new statement today, overriding the MoCo Health department. https://twitter.com/GovLarryHogan/statu ... 46912?s=20

[kramerica.inc]

Nice.
Glad Hogan stopped this overreach and is giving people school options.

[a fan]

LabCorp provides a RT-PCR test which turns around same day. I am not certain why this is not done everywhere. The cost to the employer is $100/test.

You just answered your question in the following sentence.

[kramerica.inc]

Do you want the job done fast, correct or cheap?

You can only choose one.

[ggait]

That's true on a macro level, but entirely untrue on a micro level.

Good point. I hope the good doctor meant testing AND contact tracing (i.e., coupled together) and not that the virus is too big for testing alone. I certainly don’t agree with that. (I agree the virus has spread way too much for contact tracing.

No, I think the Admiral has been pretty clear. Our western peer countries did not test their way out of this jam. They are doing better currently because they depressed their infections through behavior modification. He is saying, rightly imo, that massive volume testing is not the problem or the solution. Although that's what you'd think by watching the news.

The highest per capita test rate among our western peer countries is Denmark at 274k CUMULATIVE tests per million population. Not really as high as you would think. The USA is at 183k -- lower but not by a huge amount. Our 183k is actually many more tests than all our our other western peer countries that are now doing soooo much better than us.

Look at the NBA. They test every single player every day. That level of testing, just in one month, would equal 30 million tests per 1 million of population. 60 million per pop after two months. Same thing that they do at the White House. No country is even in the same galaxy as that.

The Admiral's point is that testing and tracing is inherently a micro tactic. And it is always going to be a volume limited resource. So you have to use your capacity smartly and in a targeted way. But if you depress your infections, then you don't need as many tests. It is actually easier to cut infections by half than it is to double your testing capacity.

Testing and tracing is a way to put out embers to keep the fire from blowing up. He says it is useful primarily in the early stages and the late stages of a pendemic. But before you get to ember control, you have to get the overall forest fire mostly contained. Which is done by masks, no bars, no restaurants, no crowds. Our peers countries have done this; we haven't. That's pretty much it.

We have plenty of test capacity (squirt guns) now to put out embers. But squirt guns (no matter how many you have) will never contain a forest fire. And if we only had embers, the turn around times on those tests would be much faster.

[jhu72]

Do you want the job done fast, correct or cheap?

You can only choose one.

… that is not true. There are places that are doing it fast, cheap and correctly. Just not many.

[Andersen]

kramerica.inc wrote:

Nice.
Glad Hogan stopped this overreach and is giving people school options.

I'm not confident that the Independent Schools in Maryland will open for face to face in 2020. Right now, they're playing a game of chicken, to see who will announce first and the others will follow. Can't really speak to what the Catholic Schools will do.

[Typical Lax Dad]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/03/us/flori ... index.html

[CU77]

I personally think (as a whole) this is what the US workforce needs. Workers should be able to stay home if they have a little case of the sniffles. Americans as a whole work too hard. For far too long now many employers/companies have expected their people to do more with less people. That needs toc change. There are too many single points of failure at too many places. Think about your own companies and employers - when someone is let go or leaves, how often does that person's tasks get absorbed by others vs hire someone new to replace? It would be a boost for employees and the economy if more companies hired the labor force they actually needed to try and provide their employees a sensible quality of life.

Sounds like socialism to me. Why should workers have a good quality of life at the expense of higher profits for the owners of capital?

[CU77]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/03/us/flori ... index.html

Two teenagers in Florida have died from Covid-19 complications, according to data posted by the Florida Department of Health. The teens were between the ages of 14 and 17, the department said.

That's unpossible. PB has assured us that covid only affects old people, especially in Florida.

[njbill]

I disagree somewhat about testing. I agree it is not the only solution to the problem, but it is a key component.

Certainly other measures are important. I said back on March 16 on this forum that we should impose strict lock down measures like Italy. I stand by that. Obviously, neither the politicians nor the citizens in this country would stand for that.

So we have to do the next best thing. Stay at home. If you can’t do that, social distance when you go out. If you can’t do that, wear a mask. When you come home, wash your hands. These are simple steps. Unfortunately, the people of this country simply won’t follow these rules. That is a key reason why we are in the mess we are in.

Testing is an important component of the entire process because it tells you where you are. It is inexplicable to me, a failure of epic proportions, that we in this country have not ramped up testing to be almost ubiquitous. Recently we have been told that that was an intentional decision on the part of the Trump administration. Criminal.

I don’t think you should minimize the importance of testing. Testing is done in every aspect of our lives. We have health testing, safety testing, driver tests, tests to get professional licenses. Testing is important. Certainly it is here.

Testing is a key reason the bubble sports may work. Obviously, the bubble is another key reason. Just in my neck of the woods, Doug Pederson tested positive yesterday. He is asymptomatic. I imagine he would not have known he was infected and would have gone to work this week and potentially infected scores of other people. The fact that he was tested hopefully means he won’t be infecting people.

Testing gives us useful information to help get our arms around this disease. It is not the only tool. It is not the most important tool. But it is an important tool, one that desperately needs to be expanded and improved upon.

[ggait]

Here's what Giroir said yesterday. I think he's totally right.

Testing is not our #1 issue right now. Testing is not how the Euros got their numbers under control. They've done fewer tests than us -- but no problems because they've NEEDED fewer tests than us. Testing matters the most BEFORE the break out (February) or AFTER the fire is contained (hopefully September). Testing does not put out the forest fire.

So, you know, there's no black or white answer here, but in the very early parts of an outbreak or in the very late waning parts, or in selective times like a meat packing, contact tracing could be very effective. When you have a widespread, multi-focal outbreak, where many people are asymptomatic, testing and tracing are of limited utility versus public health policy measures like mask wearing, like closing indoor crowded spaces. So, yes, contact tracing is important, but it's much less important right now than the public policy mitigation measures. Once the virus gets down to very low levels again, then testing and contact tracing become much more important. Where we are right now with the widespread, multi-focal, across many states, just like many other countries, the solution was the mitigation steps, not the contact tracing.

[kramerica.inc]

I personally think (as a whole) this is what the US workforce needs. Workers should be able to stay home if they have a little case of the sniffles. Americans as a whole work too hard. For far too long now many employers/companies have expected their people to do more with less people. That needs toc change. There are too many single points of failure at too many places. Think about your own companies and employers - when someone is let go or leaves, how often does that person's tasks get absorbed by others vs hire someone new to replace? It would be a boost for employees and the economy if more companies hired the labor force they actually needed to try and provide their employees a sensible quality of life.

Sounds like socialism to me. Why should workers have a good quality of life at the expense of higher profits for the owners of capital?

We are already up to our eyes in Socialism. As aFan tells us, Socialism is already abundant in America with schools, colleges, loans, etc. Why not more?! Tax credits for those that employ more people, and help lower unemployment levels.

[wgdsr]

agree testing's very valuable. has to help if followed properly.

haven't seen anything that has said we actually could be pushing much more or how valuable it would be if we could to date.

it wouldn't be wrong to suggest it hasn't been agenda item #1.

behavior... does a collective light switch go on for stuff/opportunities lost or is vaccine hail mary the play for many? we shall see.

[Typical Lax Dad]

I personally think (as a whole) this is what the US workforce needs. Workers should be able to stay home if they have a little case of the sniffles. Americans as a whole work too hard. For far too long now many employers/companies have expected their people to do more with less people. That needs toc change. There are too many single points of failure at too many places. Think about your own companies and employers - when someone is let go or leaves, how often does that person's tasks get absorbed by others vs hire someone new to replace? It would be a boost for employees and the economy if more companies hired the labor force they actually needed to try and provide their employees a sensible quality of life.

Sounds like socialism to me. Why should workers have a good quality of life at the expense of higher profits for the owners of capital?

We are already up to our eyes in Socialism. As aFan tells us, Socialism is already abundant in America with schools, colleges, loans, etc. Why not more?! Tax credits for those that employ more people, and help lower unemployment levels.

Article from January: https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/15/so ... socialism/

[Peter Brown]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/03/us/flori ... index.html

Two teenagers in Florida have died from Covid-19 complications, according to data posted by the Florida Department of Health. The teens were between the ages of 14 and 17, the department said.

That's unpossible. PB has assured us that covid only affects old people, especially in Florida.

I’m tempted to belittle you, because you likely deserve it as I don’t think your motives here are genuine. But I’ll refrain. Let me instead ask you this:

Do you know how many kids die from the flu in America every year?

How about, do you know many kids die in automobile accidents every year in the US?

Do you kvetch about the flu when it kills hundreds of kids every year? Do you demand that kids not ride in automobiles when thousands die annually? If not and based on your Covid fear porn, WHY NOT?!?!!