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Purgatory: Coronavirus

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  • Most of the plagues, the Black Death, for instance, are spread by fleas which live on rats. There never seem to be too few rats, so there were then plenty of fleas, which seem to prefer a nice juicy human, so the plagues were spread easily. They could quite easily be carried on clothing, and passed to the next human that way.

    Nowadays we don't live in such close relationships with rats, and the fleas they undoubtedly have are not infected with the plague. Though I understand it has been known in some places today, though not sure where. Much more easily treated with antibiotics, too.
  • Wet Kipper wrote: »
    There is a mobile phone game called Plague Inc
    Aren't we all supposed to move to Madagascar, or is that where one is supposed to start? I can never remember...
  • edited February 2020
    On another forum a (US) poster mentioned that, because they've had to take 2 lots of 2 days off because of seasonal flu, if they take another day off from their job at Walmart before June they will automatically be fired. Situations like this raise the possibility that people will be forced out of economic necessity to not report signs of the illness and hence spread it further. I wonder how many people in customer facing or food preparation roles are in this sort of situation. In the UK I can imagine the government passing emergency legislation making such firings illegal to help contain the outbreak. I'm less certain that the state governments in places like Tennessee can be relied on to do the same.

    The firing would be illegal here already. You cannot be fired for a health related condition, particularly when it is temporary. I believe we see fines in the 10K range. A firing within 3 months of an illness is legally risky.

    You can be fired for ill-health here but have some protection if you have a disability.

    Our employment regulations define disability as permanent or temporary. An illness is a temporary disability. "Duty to accommodate" (DTA) is a principle which requires employers to accommodate to disability and restrictions on work for health reasons. DTA Employers are not allowed to know medical diagnoses, only restrictions for work. It works quite well. We see more controls on employee absenteeism when the rules are clear to everyone. (I'm an employer)

    The "right to refuse" dangerous or unsafe work is also enshrined in law here. It can make things difficult if someone sees a danger which someone else does not. Which is also why we are required by law to have OH & S committees within employment settings so that management and workers can discuss risks to safety, It is required to file reports from the committee with the ministry of labour. If the hazard is difficult to deal with, or purported hazard the "prevention" people from Work Safe will come out to help. It is funded via Workers' Compensation which is itself funded by a tax on payroll, typically 0.75 to 3% depending on industry and safe work history.
  • Yes, viruses are annoyingly untreatable by antibiotics, although I was given something for shingles.
  • Thing is (re the game), viruses tend to mutate to less deadly forms if they hang around long enough.* Thus syphilis went from killing people off in a year or two to the lifelong, slow moving form it is today.

    *If they don't hang around long enough, it's likely the reason was it was simply too deadly. And an organism that kills off its host very quickly gets far fewer chances to replicate and spread.
  • Here's great news about how America is dealing with the virus. (f*** me gently with a chainsaw)

    Mike Pence:
    at corona virus press conference, wiped his nose with his hands then proceeded to shake everyone’s hands. This ‘health expert’, who wanted to "pray away" a HIV epidemic, will now oversee the response.

    Who do we love? say it louder.

    https://mobile.twitter.com/Alex_Verbeek/status/1232941679486869506?p=v

  • I am a bit concerned because I tend to get asthma each time I get a cold, and have had pneumonia a number of times. Not overly concerned as I live in a rural community of lower population. My biggest concern is not trusting my #@%$%^^% president to do what needs to be done, as he fired medical personal who were trained to handle this sort of thing two years ago.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    He thinks?

    I maintain an open mind on the question of whether Trump is actually a chatbot in a skinsuit. They've turned out to be just as racist and incoherent pretty often.

    31 of the wildest things Trump said at his coronavirus press conference.
  • Here's great news about how America is dealing with the virus. (f*** me gently with a chainsaw)

    Mike Pence:
    at corona virus press conference, wiped his nose with his hands then proceeded to shake everyone’s hands. This ‘health expert’, who wanted to "pray away" a HIV epidemic, will now oversee the response.

    Hey, if you can't trust a non-doctor who's skeptical that smoking kills to handle a public health crisis, who can you trust?
  • Graven ImageGraven Image Shipmate
    edited February 2020
    "Gramps49 wrote: »
    Now I really am scared.

    Corrected quoting code. BroJames Purgatory Host
  • You. Really. Could. Not. Make. It. Up.
    :scream:
  • It gets worse.

    When the US evacuated Americans from the ship in Japan, they housed them at Travis AFB. The people who were assigned to care for these people were staff members from Homeland Security that had been tasked with dealing with unaccompanied children at the border. They had no training in handling contagious diseases--they were not CDC staff. They were not given adequate protective equipment. At the end of the day, after their shifts, they went to motels off base. Those motels were not informed of who these workers were.


    Story from the Washington Post

  • It wasn't worse to start with?

    From 'Smoking Doesn't Kill' to Conversion Therapy—Mike Pence's Most Controversial Science Remarks.

    I won't ask any more where you find such defective people, and why you elect them. Yes, some of the Pence quotes and stupidity is dated back a ways, which confirms that he has a continuous pattern of being a moron. Continuously. Why am I thinking of Idi Amin these days? And Woody Allen's Bananas?
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    When the US evacuated Americans from the ship in Japan, they housed them at Travis AFB. The people who were assigned to care for these people were staff members from Homeland Security that had been tasked with dealing with unaccompanied children at the border. They had no training in handling contagious diseases--they were not CDC staff. They were not given adequate protective equipment. At the end of the day, after their shifts, they went to motels off base. Those motels were not informed of who these workers were.

    Coincidentally enough, Solano County, California, home of Travis AFB, is the location of the first American case of coronavirus in which the origin of the virus was unknown. What are the odds?

    The county is now in a state of emergency.
    Solano County public health officials declared a local emergency Thursday and activated its Department Operations Center to assist in its efforts in “identifying, screening and following up with individuals potentially exposed to the (novel coronavirus).”

    "Only the best people" used to be a punchline. Not that many people are laughing now.
  • I am in the vulnerable group and so is my wife.We don't go out much so we will have to hope for the best.
  • BoogieBoogie Heaven Host
    edited February 2020
    Gramps49 wrote: »
    It gets worse.

    When the US evacuated Americans from the ship in Japan, they housed them at Travis AFB. The people who were assigned to care for these people were staff members from Homeland Security that had been tasked with dealing with unaccompanied children at the border. They had no training in handling contagious diseases--they were not CDC staff. They were not given adequate protective equipment. At the end of the day, after their shifts, they went to motels off base. Those motels were not informed of who these workers were.


    Story from the Washington Post

    So it will spread.

    But that’s true everywhere, it seems to be a clever virus - plenty of people with no symptoms and plenty with mild symptoms. So spreading is easy, even with the best protective equipment.

    Listening to tRump’s full speech on the matter is hilarious - but nothing new. I think people are getting immune to his outright ignorance. Let’s hope they become immune to this new virus as quickly!

    In the U.K. so far it seems to be a case of ‘keep calm and wash your hands’.

  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    That, and there are already isolation pods set up in the hospitals, a pandemic preparedness plan originally set up in 2011, and a stockpile of anti-viral medication with enough doses of anti-viral medication for half the population (source Newscast).
  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    edited February 2020
    ( I do wonder how a creationist like Mike Pence understands the process of a virus mutating, jumping species and potentially mutating again - evolution in plain sight as it were.)
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    ( I do wonder how a creationist like Mike Pence understands the process of a virus mutating, jumping species and potentially mutating again - evolution in plain sight as it were.)

    I think he is sincere and ignorant, rather than just whistling fundie tunes for advantage. So my guess is that he has no real understanding of the processes.
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    "no real understanding" .... could apply to far too many politicians in positions of power.
  • I'm not sure you need a good understanding to manage the response. You need however to be able to learn quickly and allow yourself to be guided by experts. I prefer Pence the zealot to Trump the deluded.
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    "no real understanding" .... could apply to far too many politicians in positions of power.
    Simon Toad wrote: »
    I'm not sure you need a good understanding to manage the response. You need however to be able to learn quickly and allow yourself to be guided by experts. I prefer Pence the zealot to Trump the deluded.

    Pence can't diverge from the Trump reassurance line, regardless of emerging facts. So even if he does learn quickly, don't expect him to take radical control steps even if the best advice is that doing so is the best thing to do.

  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    ( I do wonder how a creationist like Mike Pence understands the process of a virus mutating, jumping species and potentially mutating again - evolution in plain sight as it were.)

    Evolution doesn't have to come into it at all, ISTM. I grew up fundamentalist, and--if he thinks of the details you mentioned at all--he'd probably of think of them as a result of the Fall, and general evil at work in the world.

    If he were up to the job in other respects, he probably wouldn't need that kind of detail--and if he did, he could just be told that it's a sneaky thing, and adapts and changes.

  • Golden Key wrote: »
    ( I do wonder how a creationist like Mike Pence understands the process of a virus mutating, jumping species and potentially mutating again - evolution in plain sight as it were.)

    Evolution doesn't have to come into it at all, ISTM. I grew up fundamentalist, and--if he thinks of the details you mentioned at all--he'd probably of think of them as a result of the Fall, and general evil at work in the world.

    If he were up to the job in other respects, he probably wouldn't need that kind of detail--and if he did, he could just be told that it's a sneaky thing, and adapts and changes.

    If I have my fundie cant correct he would just say that change within kinds is not evolution, and that for evolution a coronavirus has to change into a bat or it's not evolution.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    It's a long time since I was fundamentalist and maybe ideas have changed. But, then, the "change within kinds is not evolution" wasn't around, at least not in common, everyday teaching. They might have been more likely to say that species don't change. Period.

    I remember something from the Institute for Creation Research about a species of moth in England that was thought to have split into another species, as evidenced by spotted wings. But (per ICR) the spotting turned out to be due to heavy air pollution, and not speciesization.

    Some/many fund/evo folk allow for a longer Creation process, because the Genesis word for "day" can also be interpreted as an undefined "period of time"...which does allow for speciesization over time.
  • I thought that "micro-evolution" was accepted by some creationists, so changes to viruses don't count as full evolution. Weasel words, of course.
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    Golden Key wrote: »
    Some/many fund/evo folk allow for a longer Creation process, because the Genesis word for "day" can also be interpreted as an undefined "period of time"...which does allow for speciesization over time.
    Yeah, those would be the liberals, deceived by Satan into abandoning the clear teaching of Scripture where the KJV says "day" so that must mean 24h (and, who cares what some foreign language like Hebrew may mean by a translation of that word?).
  • LydaLyda Shipmate
    I thought that "micro-evolution" was accepted by some creationists, so changes to viruses don't count as full evolution. Weasel words, of course.

    Yeah, that is the line my high-IQ, but fundie relative takes.
  • I thought that "micro-evolution" was accepted by some creationists, so changes to viruses don't count as full evolution. Weasel words, of course.

    At the risk of being over generous to YECs, that's a little unfair. There's a real difference between microevolution and species changes. Although, of course, with all microbiology the difference between species is not remotely clear cut in the way that it is in animals.

    But I may just be perpetuating a tangent here...

    On the virology side; the most successful viruses are non-lethal. Keeping the host alive to spread the infection is key... think Herpes Simplex which is essentially ubiquitous to all humans.

    Ebola's an interesting counter example. Mortality rates are upto 80% (depending on which outbreak you look at). However, after death, the body sheds huge amounts of virus and thus anyone who has contact with the dead is at huge risk. Thus in the case of Ebola, killing the host is a useful transmission method.

    Polio shows a totally different pattern. Strictly speaking, it's really a gastroenteral virus. It only causes symptoms when it gets into the central nervous system and that's a dead-end for the virus. Something like 97% of polio infections are asymptomatic as the virus passes through (and replicates in) the GI tract without any noticeable effect on the host.

    So yeah, a virus that can both be very mild and fatal is quite a scary prospect. Although it's also routine for disease control experts.

    It reminds of a West Wing quote: "So is it the end of the world or business as usual?"

    Yep, it's both.

    Listen to the experts, take sensible precautions and we can minimize the damage.

    AFZ
  • I thought creationists cited changes within species as micro, not just viruses. But then these can lead to speciation, e.g., the hooded crow, (corvus cornix).
  • /Tangent. But I’ll note that creationists are not a solid lump of clones, and there are many and varied positions among them, including some you might feel more at home with than others. /End tangent
  • It is relevant to the thread, because in the US, there may be Christians who see a new virus, not as a product of evolution, but a punishment from God/Satan. I don't know whether the Trump administration contains any. Well, Trump seemed awfully sanguine about it.
  • Alan Cresswell Alan Cresswell Admin, 8th Day Host
    Yes, there are even some Christians in the US who will claim that Trump was sent by God.

    Though, that might be because God had run out of locusts.
  • It is relevant to the thread, because in the US, there may be Christians who see a new virus, not as a product of evolution, but a punishment from God/Satan. I don't know whether the Trump administration contains any. Well, Trump seemed awfully sanguine about it.

    Dude. In the US, there may be freaking ANYTHING. Alligators in the trees. Truth in the White House.

    ...

    (well, it COULD happen)
  • Yes, there are even some Christians in the US who will claim that Trump was sent by God.

    Though, that might be because God had run out of locusts.

    They're all busy feasting around the Red Sea.
  • Golden Key wrote: »
    ...do we want to know *how* he thinks the number of infected people in the US "will soon be down to 0"?

    ...probably not.
    :(

    He plans to catapult the sick ones South, over The.Wall. If they survive, they'll be Mexican statistics. So simple.
  • Leaving aside the Trump-specific aspects of the problem, the American health care system seems very poorly situated to deal with an epidemic. (Any epidemic, not just a theoretical COVID-19 epidemic.) A system that checks to see if you have a credit card in hand before authorizing emergency surgery doesn't seem nimble enough to deal with a large-scale medical emergency.

    And then there are structural issues that are directly relevant to COVID-19 specifically.
    John Graves
    @johngraves9

    As coronavirus looks increasingly likely to affect the U.S. at some point soon, it’s worth thinking through a few policy issues and how they could affect pandemic surveillance, containment, and treatment efforts.

    The U.S. experience with a pandemic early in the calendar year will be uniquely challenging given that the vast majority of Americans have privately administered plans that (increasingly) rely on deductibles/cost-sharing as a fairly blunt utilization-management tool.

    We can debate whether that’s an effective strategy to combat moral hazard, but it clearly serves as a significant — and uniquely American — obstacle to pandemic containment & treatment.

    26 Feb 2020

    In other words an epidemic in Q1 (when most Americans would have to pay a significant deductible to access expensive, non-standard health care) will be handled by the American health care system (and its end users/patients) very differently, and probably less effectively, than an epidemic in Q4 (when many Americans have already maxxed out or significantly paid into their annual deductibles).
  • BoogieBoogie Heaven Host
    Coronavirus has reached my son’s hospital in Heidelberg.

    (He’s a nurse)

    That‘s worrying. 🤔😷
  • The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod teaches micro-evolution, which I found interesting because after a millennia of micro-evolution don't you-in theory-get a new species?
  • I have been assuming that this virus in a poor area, with not very good medical facilities, could spread like wildfire. However, this could be wrong. But imagine it taking hold in a refugee camp. As to Europe and the US, don't know. Presumably, control wouldn't be as pervasive as in China, but I notice that Japan has closed schools, and I suppose the Olympics will be cancelled, if this continues.

    Wouldn't need to be a poor area. Doesn't matter how good the medical facilities are, if you can't afford to go, and are working during their open hours.
  • Just so, and even in places where emergency health care facilities are free, those facilities may not be able to cope.

    Latest news from the BBC re the virus in the UK:
    https://youtube.com/watch?v=4oaOl9wA5Ws
  • I thought that "micro-evolution" was accepted by some creationists, so changes to viruses don't count as full evolution. Weasel words, of course.

    At the risk of being over generous to YECs, that's a little unfair. There's a real difference between microevolution and species changes. Although, of course, with all microbiology the difference between species is not remotely clear cut in the way that it is in animals.

    It seems to me that macroevolution is just enough repeated microevolutions until the two populations can no longer interbreed.
  • It's interesting to read the list of hospitals that will be doing extra testing:
    Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals, Guy's and St Thomas', Royal Brompton and Harefield, Royal Papworth Hospital, University Hospitals of Leicester, University Hospitals of South Manchester, Nottingham University Hospitals and Sheffield Teaching Hospitals.

    Brighton I can understand as that's been a hotspot, it makes sense to have one of the London trusts involved, and Brompton and Papworth are both major heart-lung centres. Otherwise, they're all in the midlands, or the southern end of the northern regions. I doubt it's based on who has the fanciest lung problem equipment or the best labs, as there are other trusts in other regions we might have expected to see on the list, and I know at least one of those isn't a designated major trauma centre, so it raises the question of 'what do Public Health England know that the rest of us don't?'
  • Pendragon wrote: »
    It's interesting to read the list of hospitals that will be doing extra testing:
    Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals, Guy's and St Thomas', Royal Brompton and Harefield, Royal Papworth Hospital, University Hospitals of Leicester, University Hospitals of South Manchester, Nottingham University Hospitals and Sheffield Teaching Hospitals.

    Brighton I can understand as that's been a hotspot, it makes sense to have one of the London trusts involved, and Brompton and Papworth are both major heart-lung centres. Otherwise, they're all in the midlands, or the southern end of the northern regions. I doubt it's based on who has the fanciest lung problem equipment or the best labs, as there are other trusts in other regions we might have expected to see on the list, and I know at least one of those isn't a designated major trauma centre, so it raises the question of 'what do Public Health England know that the rest of us don't?'

    My guess is that the decision was based in part on this. Those hospitals seem to correlate quite strongly with clusters of population density within the UK. That's important not just because that's where the people are, but since COVID-19 seems to be hella-contagious (sorry for breaking out the technical medical jargon) more densely populated areas are going to be more problematic for reasons of transmission as well.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Boogie🙏

    The worrying thing about coronavirus here is that an outbreak is likely to coincide with the flu season. Hospitals here are already challenged by the usual number of admissions at this time. In addition to that the new building at the local hospital is unlikely to be commissioned before then.
  • HeavenlyannieHeavenlyannie Shipmate
    edited February 2020
    Papworth hospital does heart surgery so will have lots of intensive care facilities, it’s also now based at Addenbrookes Hospital so nearby testing facilities and research laboratories . I noted that it was chosen a few days ago (it’s a short walk from my house) and thought it was ideal.
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod teaches micro-evolution, which I found interesting because after a millennia of micro-evolution don't you-in theory-get a new species?

    AFAIK we have no official stance on such things. We do, however, have any number of people who believe themselves entitled to issue so-called "official" stances, which may contradict each other, let alone Scripture and science.
  • This is worrisome if it's true:
    As the highly infectious coronavirus jumped from China to country after country in January and February, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lost valuable weeks that could have been used to track its possible spread in the United States because it insisted upon devising its own test.

    The federal agency shunned the World Health Organization test guidelines used by other countries and set out to create a more complicated test of its own that could identify a range of similar viruses. But when it was sent to labs across the country in the first week of February, it didn’t work as expected. The CDC test correctly identified COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus. But in all but a handful of state labs, it falsely flagged the presence of the other viruses in harmless samples.

    As a result, until Wednesday the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration only allowed those state labs to use the test — a decision with potentially significant consequences. The lack of a reliable test prevented local officials from taking a crucial first step in coping with a possible outbreak — “surveillance testing” of hundreds of people in possible hotspots. Epidemiologists in other countries have used this sort of testing to track the spread of the disease before large numbers of people turn up at hospitals.

    This story is based on interviews with state and local public health officials and scientists across the country, which, taken together, describe a frustrating, bewildering bureaucratic process that seemed at odds with the urgency of the growing threat. The CDC and Vice President Mike Pence’s office, which is coordinating the government’s response to the virus, did not respond to questions for this story. It’s unclear who in the government originally made the decision to design a more complicated test, or to depart from the WHO guidance.

    “We’re weeks behind because we had this problem,” said Scott Becker, chief executive officer of the Association of Public Health Laboratories, which represents 100 state and local public laboratories. “We’re usually up-front and center and ready.”

    So given what we know about the players involved, is this just a basic fuckup traceable to general Republican contempt for expertise, or did someone with political connections try to leverage a patent for their company out of this mess? Or some combination of the two?
  • I came home from work today because I have a slight cold. Just following the directions of the university. Before I left work, I disinfected everything I came into contact with during the morning. My wife had a mild cold this past week. I think it is my turn this week.

    There are no known coronavirus cases in the immediate area--they do have three patients in quarantine in Spokane at Sacred Heart Hospital 76 miles away. Those patients came from Travis AFB, but SHH is following the strictest procedures.
  • I won't ask any more where you find such defective people, and why you elect them.
    Promises, promises.
    Crœsos wrote: »
    This is worrisome if it's true:
    As the highly infectious coronavirus jumped from China to country after country in January and February, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lost valuable weeks that could have been used to track its possible spread in the United States because it insisted upon devising its own test.

    The federal agency shunned the World Health Organization test guidelines used by other countries and set out to create a more complicated test of its own that could identify a range of similar viruses. But when it was sent to labs across the country in the first week of February, it didn’t work as expected. The CDC test correctly identified COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus. But in all but a handful of state labs, it falsely flagged the presence of the other viruses in harmless samples.

    As a result, until Wednesday the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration only allowed those state labs to use the test — a decision with potentially significant consequences. The lack of a reliable test prevented local officials from taking a crucial first step in coping with a possible outbreak — “surveillance testing” of hundreds of people in possible hotspots. Epidemiologists in other countries have used this sort of testing to track the spread of the disease before large numbers of people turn up at hospitals.

    This story is based on interviews with state and local public health officials and scientists across the country, which, taken together, describe a frustrating, bewildering bureaucratic process that seemed at odds with the urgency of the growing threat. The CDC and Vice President Mike Pence’s office, which is coordinating the government’s response to the virus, did not respond to questions for this story. It’s unclear who in the government originally made the decision to design a more complicated test, or to depart from the WHO guidance.

    “We’re weeks behind because we had this problem,” said Scott Becker, chief executive officer of the Association of Public Health Laboratories, which represents 100 state and local public laboratories. “We’re usually up-front and center and ready.”

    So given what we know about the players involved, is this just a basic fuckup traceable to general Republican contempt for expertise, or did someone with political connections try to leverage a patent for their company out of this mess? Or some combination of the two?
    I think it's worth remembering that it's entirely possible to fuck things up even without Republican foolishness or knavery.
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