LaxPower Back-Up Stick

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:24 am

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

They are nowhere near herd immunity. Need >65%, maybe at 15%. Long way to go for that. And that is true everywhere in US.

RedFromMI wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:32 am

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:24 am

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

They are nowhere near herd immunity. Need >65%, maybe at 15%. Long way to go for that. And that is true everywhere in US.

Ok stay at home and wait for the government to tell you what to do. The rest of us will move on without you and get on with our lives. Democrats love what’s happening right now because it increases their tyranny of the population. Which is straight from the playbook. Death rate given recent data is around .01. Time to open things back up. Democrat fascism is a scary thing to behold.

Brooklyn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 8:51 am

Typical Lax Dad wrote:


Yes. It remains to be seen. The philosophy seems to be, "we will let some of these old people die off and hopefully the younger people will develop some immunity". The question seems to be what is an acceptable number of deaths?... for the greater good.

That will be the ever lasting legacy of the so called "pro life" Republicans:

I wonder how often you two or the artist of that picture actually visit a nursing home?

Cooter wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:39 am

Brooklyn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 8:51 am

Typical Lax Dad wrote:


Yes. It remains to be seen. The philosophy seems to be, "we will let some of these old people die off and hopefully the younger people will develop some immunity". The question seems to be what is an acceptable number of deaths?... for the greater good.

That will be the ever lasting legacy of the so called "pro life" Republicans:

I wonder how often you two or the artist of that picture actually visit a nursing home?

Like I said, there is some risk reward calculus to be determined. I last visited a nursing home 2 years ago. I was probably in there 2-3 times a quarter for a couple of years. It was awful. I have not looked but I am sure they have had deaths. It just smelled of sickness. You married Cooter?

RedFromMI wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:32 am

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:24 am

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

They are nowhere near herd immunity. Need >65%, maybe at 15%. Long way to go for that. And that is true everywhere in US.

Couple studies out there (Stanford one of them) suggest 50—85 TIMES as many people have had the virus as counted. They're a lot closer than we think.

Typical Lax Dad wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:42 am

Cooter wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:39 am

Brooklyn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 8:51 am

Typical Lax Dad wrote:


Yes. It remains to be seen. The philosophy seems to be, "we will let some of these old people die off and hopefully the younger people will develop some immunity". The question seems to be what is an acceptable number of deaths?... for the greater good.

That will be the ever lasting legacy of the so called "pro life" Republicans:

I wonder how often you two or the artist of that picture actually visit a nursing home?

Like I said, there is some risk reward calculus to be determined. I last visited a nursing home 2 years ago. I was probably in there 2-3 times a quarter for a couple of years. It was awful. I have not looked but I am sure they have had deaths. It just smelled of sickness. You married Cooter?

Nope.
That is perhaps why I visited my Mother everyday for 2.6 years in a nursing home. I also visited my Father a large number of times when he was in the nursing home for 9 months several years earlier.
Yes it is rather disgusting in the nursing home. Many people imprisoned by their infirmities. It is also the mental outlook of many of the patients there that I am considering.

Bandito wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:35 am

RedFromMI wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:32 am

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:24 am

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

They are nowhere near herd immunity. Need >65%, maybe at 15%. Long way to go for that. And that is true everywhere in US.

Ok stay at home and wait for the government to tell you what to do. The rest of us will move on without you and get on with our lives. Democrats love what’s happening right now because it increases their tyranny of the population. Which is straight from the playbook. Death rate given recent data is around .01. Time to open things back up. Democrat fascism is a scary thing to behold.

Death rate is about 1%. Ten times that of the flu. And many states are still on the upslope of cases (including some of the ones "opening" up). Keeping the country healthy is not fascism.

I don't need the government to tell me to stay home as much as possible. I have enough sense to on my own.

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:14 am

RedFromMI wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:32 am

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:24 am

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

They are nowhere near herd immunity. Need >65%, maybe at 15%. Long way to go for that. And that is true everywhere in US.

Couple studies out there (Stanford one of them) suggest 50—85 TIMES as many people have had the virus as counted. They're a lot closer than we think.

Stanford study is not to be trusted - their solicitation of data skewed the results (wife of guy running study was sending email to her wealthy friends through her son's middle school email system to solicit volunteers for the study - guaranteeing a population that has traveled recently much more than the average person and more likely to have experienced COVID). Highest reasonable estimates are in the 15-20% range for NYC. Miami at maybe 14%. SF area of CA similar. Factor of 3.5-4 below herd immunity.

And almost all the US outside of the urban hot spots have likely exposure rates in the low single digits.

You also are now seeing people in their 40s and 50s in NYC with no comorbidities having strokes normally seen in 70+ population due to blood clotting issues - and COVID seems to be what is causing it (with some of these people asymptomatic).

This disease is nasty...

Cooter wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:19 am

Typical Lax Dad wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:42 am

Cooter wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:39 am

Brooklyn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 8:51 am

Typical Lax Dad wrote:


Yes. It remains to be seen. The philosophy seems to be, "we will let some of these old people die off and hopefully the younger people will develop some immunity". The question seems to be what is an acceptable number of deaths?... for the greater good.

That will be the ever lasting legacy of the so called "pro life" Republicans:

I wonder how often you two or the artist of that picture actually visit a nursing home?

Like I said, there is some risk reward calculus to be determined. I last visited a nursing home 2 years ago. I was probably in there 2-3 times a quarter for a couple of years. It was awful. I have not looked but I am sure they have had deaths. It just smelled of sickness. You married Cooter?

Nope.
That is perhaps why I visited my Mother everyday for 2.6 years in a nursing home. I also visited my Father a large number of times when he was in the nursing home for 9 months several years earlier.
Yes it is rather disgusting in the nursing home. Many people imprisoned by their infirmities. It is also the mental outlook of many of the patients there that I am considering.

I don’t disagree. Many are for profit and the further down the economic spectrum you slide, the nastier it is. My parents did like long enough to make to a nursing home. Not sure they would have gone to one. My grandmother did for a short time but she had really bad Alzheimer’s and finally had to go. I thought earl on that we should just isolated the old people and that was before I realized about 1/3 to 40% of the people in the hospital are less than 55. That’s with social distancing. I believe if we get a really effective therapy, try best to shield the most vulnerable and let everyone else move about and monitor for outbreaks and when there is one, ring isolation is what has worked for years. We let this one get away from us as we have been learning on the go. AI will be helpful as well.

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:14 am

RedFromMI wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:32 am

6ftstick wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:24 am

kramerica.inc wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:20 am What happened was no one was paying attention.
Corona already came through CA and was classified as a “bad flu season” in Dec-Feb.

And the weather- the temps there have been in the 100s there.

Herd Immunity and no one knew it.

They are nowhere near herd immunity. Need >65%, maybe at 15%. Long way to go for that. And that is true everywhere in US.

Couple studies out there (Stanford one of them) suggest 50—85 TIMES as many people have had the virus as counted. They're a lot closer than we think.

Not even remotely true.

Stanford University researchers conducted blood tests in Santa Clara county to reveal the prevalence of antibodies to the pandemic coronavirus.
Antibody surveys suggesting vast undercount of coronavirus infections may be unreliable
By Gretchen VogelApr. 21, 2020 , 6:30 PM
Science’s COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Pulitzer Center.

Surveying large swaths of the public for antibodies to the new coronavirus promises to show how widespread undiagnosed infections are, how deadly the virus really is, and whether enough of the population has become immune for social distancing measures to be eased. But the first batch of results has generated more controversy than clarity.

The survey results, from Germany, the Netherlands, and several locations in the United States, find that anywhere from 2% to 30% of certain populations have already been infected with the virus. The numbers imply that confirmed COVID-19 cases are an even smaller fraction of the true number of people infected than many had estimated and that the vast majority of infections are mild. But many scientists question the accuracy of the antibody tests and complain that several of the research groups announced their findings in the press rather than in preprints or published papers, where their data could be scrutinized. Critics are also wary because some of the researchers are on record advocating for an early end to lockdowns and other control measures, and claim the new prevalence figures support that call.

Some observers warn the coronavirus’ march through the population has only just begun, and that even if the antibody results can be believed, they don’t justify easing controls. “You would have hoped for 45% or even 60% positive,” says Mark Perkins, a diagnostics expert at the World Health Organization. “That would mean that there is lots of silent transmission, and a lot of immunity in the population. It now looks like, sadly, that’s not true. Even the high numbers are relatively small.”

The many different academic and commercial tests for coronavirus antibodies are still being refined and validated. They can show whether someone’s immune system has encountered the virus. But because no one knows what level of antibodies, if any, confers protection against the new virus, the tests can’t tell whether a person is immune to a future infection. And no one knows how long such immunity might last.

A German antibody survey was the first out of the gate several weeks ago. At a press conference on 9 April, virologist Hendrik Streeck from the University of Bonn announced preliminary results from a town of about 12,500 in Heinsberg, a region in Germany that had been hit hard by COVID-19. He told reporters his team had found antibodies to the virus in 14% of the 500 people tested. By comparing that number with the recorded deaths in the town, the study suggested the virus kills only 0.37% of the people infected. (The rate for seasonal influenza is about 0.1%.) The teamconcluded in a two-page summary that “15% of the population can no longer be infected with SARS-CoV-2, and the process of reaching herd immunity is already underway.” They recommended that politicians start to lift some of the regions’ restrictions.

Streeck had argued even before the study that the virus is less serious than feared and that the effects of long shutdowns may be just as bad if not worse than the damage the virus could do. However, Christian Drosten, a virologist at Charité University Hospital in Berlin, told reporters later that day that no meaningful conclusions could be drawn from the antibody study based on the limited information Streeck presented. Drosten cited uncertainty about what level of antibodies provides protection and noted that the study sampled entire households. That can lead to overestimating infections, because people living together often infect each otherStreeck and his colleagues claimed the commercial antibody test they used has “more than 99% specificity,” but a Danish group found the test produced three false positives in a sample of 82 controls, for a specificity of only 96%. That means that in the Heinsberg sample of 500, the test could have produced more than a dozen false positives out of roughly 70 the team found.

A California serology study of 3300 people released last week in a preprint also drew strong criticisms. The lead authors of the study, Jay Bhattacharya and Eran Bendavid, who study health policy at Stanford University, worked with colleagues to recruit the residents of Santa Clara county through ads on Facebook. Fifty antibody tests were positive—about 1.5%. But after adjusting the statistics to better reflect the county’s demographics, the researchers concluded that between 2.49% and 4.16% of the county’s residents had likely been infected. That suggests, they say, that the real number of infections was as many as 80,000. That’s more than 50 times as many as viral gene tests had confirmed and implies a low fatality rate—a reason to consider whether strict lockdowns are worthwhile, argue Bendavid and co-author John Ioannidis, who studies public health at Stanford.

On the day the preprint posted, co-author Andrew Bogan—a biotech investor with a biophysics Ph.D.—published an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal asking, “If policy makers were aware from the outset that the Covid-19 death toll would be closer to that of seasonal flu … would they have risked tens of millions of jobs and livelihoods?” The op-ed did not initially disclose his role in the study.

Yet Twitter threads and blog posts outlined a litany of apparent problems with the Santa Clara study. Recruiting through Facebook likely attracted people with COVID-19–like symptoms who wanted to be tested, boosting the apparent positive rate. Because the absolute numbers of positive tests were so small, false positives may have been nearly as common as real infections. The study also had relatively few participants from low-income and minority populations, meaning the statistical adjustments the researchers made could be way off. “I think the authors of the paper owe us all an apology,” wrote Columbia University statistician and political scientist Andrew Gelman in an online commentary. The numbers “were essentially the product of a statistical error.” Bhattacharya says he is preparing an appendix that addresses the criticisms. But, he says, “The argument that the test is not specific enough to detect real positives is deeply flawed.”

Bhattacharya and Bendavid have also collaborated with Neeraj Sood, a health policy expert at the University of Southern California, to do a similar study in Los Angeles county. They used the same antibody test on 846 people selected by a marketing firm to represent the county’s demographics. In a press release issued this week, they estimated that roughly 4% of the county’s adult population has antibodies to the virus—as many as 300,000 people. (Sood told Science that 35 subjects tested positive.)

Another serology study, in the Netherlands, produced a similar figure for antibody prevalence that was revealed in the country’s House of Representatives on 16 April. Hans Zaaijer, a virologist at Sanquin, the Dutch national blood bank, who helped lead the study, says the team used a commercial test, which “consistently shows superior results” in validation studies, but didn’t provide more details. The results made it clear that the country was not yet near the “herd immunity” that some had hoped for. Nevertheless, the government said on 21 April that it would start to lift some restrictions in the coming weeks, opening elementary schools and allowing children’s sports teams to practice.

A small study in the Boston suburb of Chelsea has found the highest prevalence of antibodies so far. Prompted by the striking number of COVID-19 patients from Chelsea colleagues had seen, Massachusetts General Hospital pathologists John Iafrate and Vivek Naranbhai quickly organized a local serology survey. Within 2 days, they collected blood samples from 200 passersby on a street corner. That evening, they processed the samples—and shared the results with a reporter from The Boston Globe. Sixty-three were positive—31.5%. The result carries several large caveats. The team used a test whose maker, BioMedomics, says it has a specificity of only about 90%, though Iafrate says MGH’s own validation tests found a specificity of higher than 99.5%. And pedestrians on a single corner “aren’t a representative sample” of the town, Naranbhai acknowledges.

The pair says a paper describing the team’s results has been submitted to a journal but they shared the data with The Boston Globe first because “we felt there was an urgent infection control issue in Chelsea that warranted getting the information out.” The Boston researchers do not think quarantines should be eased, however. Better containment is urgently needed in Chelsea, they say, to help prevent further spread both within the community and in the larger Boston area.

Even if the antibody surveys show a COVID-19 death rate well below 1%, says Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, control measures will be needed for a long time to avoid overwhelmed hospitals. “The seroprevalence data only confirm the challenge we face. The data [these studies] are generating … is just showing how hard this is.”

Kismet wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 9:56 am

Yale preventive medicine and public health specialist Dr. David Katz on Maher's show last night advocating the "middle ground" between total shutdown and say, the Sweden model with perhaps a bit more in terms or protecting vulnerable populations while allowing herd immunity to take control.

He makes a lot of sense. I'd surely be interested in what some of the science-based folks here think of his suggestions.

sweden has taken a lot of flack. i've been watching them closely.
a few days ago their top guy said their models suggest they may be several weeks from herd immunity, and that what they have so far has slowed the spread. they are doing increased testing and admitting that more (even though it was supposed to be a pillar) to protect seniors needs to be done.

they crossed 100 deaths per day about 18-19 days ago. their daily count varies, but they have about averaged that ever since. haven't spiked any further... yet.
is there a case to be made we are further along than them in that time frame?

here are some of their in-depth numbers:
https://experience.arcgis.com/experienc ... 87457ed9aa
about 250-300 deaths under age 60.
well over half deaths over 80 years old.
if they can do a better job protecting seniors... and immunity is in fact happening and effective (who knows???? not the WHO)....
they may come nowhere near the disastrous predictions made for their model.

not a scientist, but for about a month now this is indicative of a thought process i've been advocating we should be investigating to inform our decisions.
and why i've alluded that we were wholly unprepared and that changing these initial results wouldve been nearly impossible no matter who was in charge.
i'm actually kinda shocked scientists didn't really see a lot of this coming (much, much deeper infection, much higher r0 has to be a part of that).

Cooter wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:39 am

I wonder how often you two or the artist of that picture actually visit a nursing home?

The building I live in used to be 50% senior residents. I became friends with some of the folks all of whom have gone to their eternal reward. Now at the age of 68 I think of them often enough since in a couple of years or so I'll likely be in worse condition than they were.

In the past, society greatly valued its seniors. Today, many of your Republicans gleefully wish them away. Sad but true.

Bandito wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:35 am
Ok stay at home and wait for the government to tell you what to do. The rest of us will move on without you and get on with our lives. D̶e̶m̶o̶c̶r̶a̶t̶s̶ Republicans love what’s happening right now because it increases their tyranny of the population. Which is straight from the playbook. Death rate given recent data is around .01. Time to open things back up. D̶e̶m̶o̶c̶r̶a̶t̶ Republican fascism is a scary thing to behold.

Corrected for you.

Just a gentle reminder that it is your party that is in charge and wrecking the USA.

Trumpism is the problem.

Kismet wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 9:56 am

Yale preventive medicine and public health specialist Dr. David Katz on Maher's show last night advocating the "middle ground" between total shutdown and say, the Sweden model with perhaps a bit more in terms or protecting vulnerable populations while allowing herd immunity to take control.

He makes a lot of sense. I'd surely be interested in what some of the science-based folks here think of his suggestions.

Great interview, thanks for posting. I'll say again, Maher is the best...

Brooklyn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:41 am

Cooter wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:39 am

I wonder how often you two or the artist of that picture actually visit a nursing home?

The building I live in used to be 50% senior residents. I became friends with some of the folks all of whom have gone to their eternal reward. Now at the age of 68 I think of them often enough since in a couple of years or so I'll likely be in worse condition than they were.

In the past, society greatly valued its seniors. Today, many of your Republicans gleefully wish them away. Sad but true.

I doubt whether many Republicans gleefully wish them away. Their are a lot of Democrats who ignore the elderly also. Say for example my sister, who only visited my Mother 3 or 4 times during that 2.6 years my Mother was in the nursing home.
I would be guessing that a lot of the religious-minded republicans care a lot more about the elderly than the typical Democrat.

tech37 wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:54 am

Kismet wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 9:56 am

Yale preventive medicine and public health specialist Dr. David Katz on Maher's show last night advocating the "middle ground" between total shutdown and say, the Sweden model with perhaps a bit more in terms or protecting vulnerable populations while allowing herd immunity to take control.

He makes a lot of sense. I'd surely be interested in what some of the science-based folks here think of his suggestions.

Great interview, thanks for posting. I'll say again, Maher is the best...

Wonderfully thorough interview. Covered what I consider all the bases. Not a science guy, but a numbers guy who keeps a fixed eye on the disease reports both here in the US state by state and globally. Too bad our testing regime is so inadequate as it seems to put the gold standard South Korean model of dealing with this disease out of reach, and leaves us wondering if incorporating aspects of the laissez faire Swedish model should be our next step, a model which we won't know conclusively about for another month or so. In the meantime various states look like they are just now trying out the Swedish thing which again should yield some interesting data, but again not for another six weeks or more. The salient point is whatever we do, the minimum objective is to assure that none of our hospitals get overwhelmed. Meanwhile we need to continue looking into less intrusive ways than a total shut down of social and economic activity to reduce the occurrence of unnecessary deaths from this disease.

calourie wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 12:49 pm

tech37 wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:54 am

Kismet wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 9:56 am

Yale preventive medicine and public health specialist Dr. David Katz on Maher's show last night advocating the "middle ground" between total shutdown and say, the Sweden model with perhaps a bit more in terms or protecting vulnerable populations while allowing herd immunity to take control.

He makes a lot of sense. I'd surely be interested in what some of the science-based folks here think of his suggestions.

Great interview, thanks for posting. I'll say again, Maher is the best...

Wonderfully thorough interview. Covered what I consider all the bases. Not a science guy, but a numbers guy who keeps a fixed eye on the disease reports both here in the US state by state and globally. Too bad our testing regime is so inadequate as it seems to put the gold standard South Korean model of dealing with this disease out of reach, and leaves us wondering if incorporating aspects of the laissez faire Swedish model should be our next step, a model which we won't know conclusively about for another month or so. In the meantime various states look like they are just now trying out the Swedish thing which again should yield some interesting data, but again not for another six weeks or more. The salient point is whatever we do, the minimum objective is to assure that none of our hospitals get overwhelmed. Meanwhile we need to continue looking into less intrusive ways than a total shut down of social and economic activity to reduce the occurrence of unnecessary deaths from this disease.

Yes. A solution to keep hospitals from being overwhelmed is key. We had a two month head start and had to play catch up and this is the price we are paying. Hopefully we will have a therapeutic that will shorten the duration and dampen the severity for most cases. If we get our testing game up, this will be enough to allow things to get to a new normal. The Swedish death rate per MM is high. Let’s see how it comes down and we won’t know if it’s “heard immunity” or something else for some time. I am hoping for a treatment and some mix of mitigation and ring containment when an outbreak is determined. Shutting down was our only choice. The body count doesn’t lie. We were unprepared. Look at Germany and South Korea. Our government was too interested in propping up the market. We are paying for it now. Would have been less of an economic impact had we moved more swiftly. Live and learn. Hopefully.

wgdsr wrote: ↑Sat Apr 25, 2020 11:37 am
i'm actually kinda shocked scientists didn't really see a lot of this coming (much, much deeper infection, much higher r0 has to be a part of that).

They're all afraid of crying wolf, and know that they are giving advice to, scientifically speaking, a poorly educated audience.

Look at how Americans have treated the idea global warming. When scientists unbelievably complicated predictive models aren't flawless and perfect, millions conclude that science doesn't work.....and they stop listening.

Germans have no such cultural roadblock. Japan, too.

It's part of being American. And to be perfectly honest, part of me likes this aspect of American culture.